Category: Performance Events ¤
  Author: Shirley Chong ¤
   Title: Eliminating Body Cues ¤

   Carmel Rickard is bending and swaying as gracefully as a ballerina 
while she's trying to do obedience. <G>
   Often the most successful "remedy" for inadvertant body language 
cues is to teach the dog what IS a cue and what isn't one. Show the 
dog enough different varieties of body language that the dog learns 
to GENERALIZE that anything but the one command isn't significant. 
   Carmel, since you are testing in just two weeks, I'd say don't do 
any elaborate fixing. But when you are ready to start fixing, this is 
what I'd do. 
   I'd have her sitting front and I'd sway back and forth in slow 
motion. Click just BEFORE she moves--try to hit that moment of doubt 
when she's asking herself "is that the cue?" Work on it until you can 
sway with a sharp, jerky motion and she just smiles, saying to 
herself "you can't fool ME, Mom!" Then try out nodding your head up 
and down--start with a slow motion nod and click just before she 
moves. Work up until you can do a really fast nod. Then try out a one 
shoulder wiggle (moving one shoulder up and down)--again, start slow 
and work up to a fast jerky motion. 
   Incorporate facial expressions--smiles, frowns, eyebrow wiggles, 
eyes darting back and forth, etc. Incorporate breathing--sudden gasps,
 sudden intakes of breath, taking a deeeeep breath, etc. Keep in mind 
to start slow and small and work up to big, fast, and especially 
jerky.
   The reason to start slow is that if you move unnaturally slowly, 
she is more likely to take her lead from you and she will tend to 
move slowly herself (gives you more chance to click). I learned this 
with the Tiny Tervuren Terror (Chamois)--she's very very fast and I 
had to figure out how to slow her down to the point I could click her.
 I've tried it on other dogs since then and have discovered that most 
dogs will slow down at least a little if the handler is moving 
elaborately slowly.
   I think the above is something that people tend to neglect in 
training for competition. In heeling, for instance, you can polish 
your cues down to practically nothing in practice--down to the point 
where onlookers have no idea what your cues are. Fading the cues is 
seductive--once you start, it's hard to stop. However, it is possible 
to fade a cue to the point where it's below the body language "noise" 
that happens when you're nervous--like in the trial ring!
   And if you forget to couple fading cues with showing the dog all 
the body language that ISN'T a cue, you're in trouble in the ring. If 
a dog is normally a self-confident and outgoing sort, being in the 
ring is not inherently a frightening situation. Even if the dog IS 
the fearful type, being in the ring isn't necessarily frightening--
the Belgian Princess does NOT like to be touched by stranger but she 
thoroughly approves of the concept of being the centre of attention 
and she really shines in a ring situation. Good thing, too, since her 
mother is a nervous wreck in the ring and makes terrible mistakes! 
Yet many (otherwise friendly) dogs seem nervous in the ring and it's 
often thought that the dog is reacting to the handler's nerves--hence,
 the solution is for the handler not to feel nervous. Well, easier 
said than done! In fact, for me, it's easier for me to teach my dogs 
that all of my nervous body language means nothing than it is for me 
to learn to relax in the trial ring. And if the dog understands that 
the body language isn't important... and if the dog understands the 
task... why would the dog act nervous?

M. Shirley Chong
The Well Mannered Dog