Category: Advanced Stuff, Performance Events ¤ Author: Torbjörn Bückström ¤ Title: External Reward (Treat Behind Dog) ¤ On Sun, 12 Oct 1997, Maria Groot wrote: > please let us know more on this method, and how you combine it with > clicker training? Ooops! I'm still new to clicker training and this "external reward" method is something I was taught and have used while training with positive motivation methods only. It fits nicely into the Positive Motivation Training Toolkit though, so I'm gonna keep it . I've introduced the clicker to my dog using external rewards in the signal exercise, and it works fine. Here's a short description of the steps. Since I train to compete (and having fun along the way) there are lots of details that might seem unnecessary, but to me they make sense. Since body language can be a very strong cue to the dog, one can take advantage of that. First the dog has to know "sit", "down" and perhaps "stand", if that is included in the exercise. Start with the dog in a sitting position by your left side. Hold lightly in the collar the first times, and hold it with your left hand. Toss a treat over the dogs head, behind her, with your right hand. Click and release. The dog should get the game quite fast - sit, tossing of treat, remain sitting... go get sweet... I use the word "release" here and not "treat" since the treat is not by me, but behind the dog. Also, my crossover dog sometimes need extra body cue to get this. Now introduce the "down". In Sweden we lay the dog down before leaving it, I don't know how it's done elsewhere. So first you "sit" the dog, toss sweet, cue "down", . In the beginning you mix these steps, sometimes only sit, sometimes with the down. Next you continue to step away from the dog once it is in the down position. Just a step, turn and face the dog. Use the same position and stance as you would in competition. Either cue "sit" - C/release or just C/release. Confident in this part you can move on to ask for a new down after the first sit etc, always mixing the amount of work demanded before you C/release. You can also begin to increase the distance to the dog, one foot at a time. At some distances it seems to be very hard for the dog to understand what you want. Also, if you introduce "stand", seldom mix all positions but train them in pairs, like "sit"-"stand"-"sit" etc or "stand-down-stand" etc. Now it's time to start varying things. Slowly fade the amount of movement you do when tossing the sweet, but keep the "signal" there. Begin to toss the sweet with you right hand on your right side without your dog noticing. Then pretend to do it over the dogs head as usual. In this way the dog soon learns that whenever you "do that thing" there's a sweet behind the back. Mix this with not throwing any treat at all, but still giving a "hand signal" as usual. In this case, when you you immediately toss the treat to behind the dog (I know, it cannot be done when you're 45 ft away . I use a ball in that case.). Last stage in this is to perform the whole exercise and not click till you are back with the dog, and reward with yourself playing and having fun with the dog. Mix this with the other variants, but don't do it to often. Finally, when you're at competition, the dog (hopefully) knows whats up. When you get ready for the exercise and ask the dog to sit, you also give it the hand signal. You can then tell the judge you're ready. I hope this makes sense. There is much more to it but this is the general idea. Also, I just discovered it's hard to put it all in writing, all the variations etc. This is not using the clicker to shape a behaviour either, but for me it works fine. The other exercises - long down and drop/stop on recall - I train without clicker at the moment, "external reward" and verbal/body cue only. have fun, Torbjorn B (Sweden)