Category: Performance Events ¤ Author: Helix Fairweather ¤ Title: Stand For Exam ¤ So here is what I have done with Brady (understand that she is conditioned to the as a reinforcement). I broke the behavior down into two pieces - one, is to stand w/o moving your feet and two, stand and stay that way. We practice a lot more of #1 than #2. Brady has been taught to touch my hand when I put it in front of her - this is called targeting. I stand with her in heel position. I place my open palm in front of her nose, she touches it, C/T (click, then treat). This goes on for several times. The next thing I did was to raise the criteria (yes, English majors, I am switching tenses - dont' know why I always start out in present tense, then switch to past, but I do). I placed my hand a bit farther out, she had to stretch her neck to reach it, C/T each time. Now I raised the criteria again, I moved my hand out farther. This process went on until my hand was far enough away that she had to lift butt from ground in order to touch my hand. Yay! C/T and a jackpot! (Jackpots are several treats at once) I repeated with my hand at this distance many more times, ing each time she stood, regardless of what else she did. She soon caught on to the game. (Brady learns clicker training much faster than I do.) One thing that worked for me was to keep the pace moving so that it was a game. The next thing I did was to only click for all 4 feet still for a count of one. After some time at that I raised criteria again, ing for all four feet still to a count of 2, then 3. This did not all take place in one session but in many small sessions over a couple of weeks. At this point Brady can stand on a hand signal (I am teaching Utility as much as possible while teaching Novice). Next I added the word "stand" while presenting the hand signal. I continued to work on just plain stand with no feet moving, mixing up hand signal, verbal and both at random. (Brady now does a beautiful moving stand - hey! she's almost ready for utility. ) Now the next thing facing me was getting her to stay while standing. I use Karen Pryor's (clicker guru who is famous for training dolphins - "you can't punish, jerk, get mad at, or correct an animal who just swims away, so you have to find another way") "keep going" signal. The clicker means the end of the behavior, it is a snapshot of "yes! that is exactly what i want!". For stay you want a signal that means "that is right, keep doing it". I use "g-o-o-d" said in a low tone, very soothing. With Brady I trained the stay using the keep-going signal. I had her stand, this was by now very reliable - I prefer to lead the dog so as to make as few mistakes as possible. So I would not train the stay until the stand is 98% reliable. I gave the command "stay" - which she does not know in this context so I needed to remember she heard me say something but does not know what I mean. Therefore it was up to me to reinforce staying. I did not walk out in front of her but stayed right next to her. I said "g-o-o-d" and treated, repeating this several times. Then C/T to end. I repeated this many, many times, until I was certain she could stay with me at her side. Once again this took many sessions. Next I raised the criteria, I moved a bit away from her, but shortened the time back to barely 2 sec. I increased the time, lots of keep-going signal with treats up to the time I had gained while at her side. Next I moved a bit farther away, putting the time back to 2 sec., then increasing slowly. The whole pattern looks like this: 1. stand reliably on cue (verbal, hand signal, or both) 2. stay for two sec. me next to her 3. gradually increase time up to one minute, me next to her 4. move two steps in front of her, stay for 2 sec. 5. gradually increase time up to one minute. 6. move farther, stay for 2 sec. 7. gradually increase time up to one minute. 8. at a distance of 6 ft., move to one side, stay for 2 sec. 9. gradually increase Brady's ability to stay while I move from side to side out at a distance of 6 ft. 10. gradually increase her ability to stay until I can walk around behind her All during this, I use "g-o-o-d" and a treat as reinforcement for staying. I make sure I say "g-o-o-d" when no feet are moving. If she moves any feet, I ignore it. The idea is to "catch your dog doing it right". Ignore them doing it wrong. I always watch her very closely for body language signs that she is stressed and may break. I dont' want her making mistakes; I want only successes. 11. once I can walk around her, returning to heel position, then I worked on approaching her and examining her myself 12. I would repeat the whole process in a strange place, i.e. a park, training center, friend's house - this will go much much faster Key is to remember every change, be it place, person, distractions means the behavior is new to the dog and must be re-learned (we call it going back to kindergarten) - thankfully it goes much faster on repeat. 13. Only after all that is VERY solid would I add another person. This is the point Brady is at now. Once again, built the other person in gradually. a. first she is just there b. then she is close but just there c. then she puts hand under nose d. then she examines The idea here is to keep everything a success. End when Bryna has done it just right for that session. That's the one she'll remember - latent learning. I practice many more 'stands' than I do 'stand-stays'. Let's face it stand-stays are pretty boring so let's not wear out that Beardie enthusiasm!