BUILDING DRIVE (Part I of 2)
Have you ever said one of the following things about your
dog? "He doesn't have the attention span to learn anything!"
or, "I wish he'd play ball with me, but he isn't interested."
If so, this one's for you.
Regardless of whether your goal is to motivate your dog to
want to learn something new, or to motivate him to play with
you, the key is using the concept of what some trainers call
"pressure and relief." The idea is, any type of
interaction you have with your dog puts some level of pressure
on the dog. You want to relieve the dog from the pressure
BEFORE they were ready to be relieved. This will keep them
coming back for more and greatly increase their interest in
whatever it is you wanted them to do.
We'll take ball as an example. If you can get your dog to
interact with you and ball-tugging on it, tracking it as you
move it near his nose, whatever--keep the interaction going
for 10-20 seconds and then give a release word such as, "all
done" or "okay" and go sit in a chair with
the ball. Do not leave the ball out for the dog to check out
on his own.
If you have a distractible dog, when you release him from
playing he most likely will go sniff around (did I mention
to start this in a very non-distracting environment?) That
is okay; once you've released him, he's free. Wait 30-60 seconds.
Restart the interaction for another 10-20 seconds. Release
for a minute, then do it once more if your dog is perking
up. Each session shouldn't be more than three interactions,
with breaks in between. ****In my next column, we’ll
discuss the outcome!****
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