Why Plan Training Sessions

I'll be the first to admit that I don't always create a written plan for everything I train, but I do think it's important to have a plan. 

• Plans can be as simple as you want or as complex as you need to meet your goals.
• Plans might cover a specific behavior that you want to work on for this training session or may cover a 3 month or longer plan for something you will be developing over time.
• Plans may be in your head, on a simple note card, in a notebook or journal, or in a digital format.

The best thing about plans is that they should help you to meet your training goals by tracking the skill level you are currently at, documenting the progress you are making, and outlines any mistakes so you can figure out how to make it better next time.

Setting Goals

I think it's important to set some short term goals and long term goals for training. This helps you to keep your focus on what you are training today or this week and how it's going to build up to the advanced behavior you want your dog to do.

Check out this blog on SMART Goals to learn how to set goals that will help you!

Training Levels

Most behaviors have to start small and build up! For example if we are teaching a dog to stay on a station, bed, or mat we need to start small asking them to stay for just 1-3 seconds as we back up a half step in an environment with no distractions. These are all small measurable steps to track duration, distance, and distractions. Then when we build up, we focus on only changing one of the criteria (measurable steps) increasing the time, distance or distractions slowly. While I may build all 3 criteria in one training session, I'm only going to focus on one at a time. 

When I teach stay on station I'll start by standing right next to the station and feeding them multiple times for being calm on the station. At first I'm feeding every second or two, but then I'm slowly adding time between delivering the treat building up to about 20 seconds without the dog trying to get off the station. When I hit the desired time, I may rock back or take a half a step backwards and return quickly to reinforce again slowly moving back a bit more after 3-4 rewards at one distance. I'll do this until I make it 2-3 steps back. Then I might start working on distractions by starting really small with turning a radio or tv on for sound distractions or I may drop something small and non-dog related such as a piece of paper or note card. (I'm not going to drop an item if my dog is trained to pick up dropped items as a Service Dog task!) My goal with distractions is to build up to something that my dog really loves such as having a friend working on the other side of the room. 

Check out this video for teaching stay in puppy class.

Progress Levels

When we track our progress, we know if we are hitting our goals as our puppy grows up or our adult dog learns a new behavior. While all dogs, being individual, will hit goals at there own pace most trainers have some general guidelines or expectations of what they want their clients to accompish. If we look at the stay behavior, general rule of thumb is puppies under 6 months should be able to stay as the owner backs up about 5 steps, adolescents should be able to stay as the owner backs up 20 steps, and adults should be able to stay with distractions present. Of course all of this is dependent on continued training through levels set up by the person who is training or the trainer assisting them. You can't expect an adult dog without any training of the stay behavior to suddenly be able to stay with the owner at 20+ feet away in a distracting environment without building up to that behavior. It's important to keep realistic expectations when setting your training levels. You may have 5 levels that you hope to accomplish or 30 levels just depending on how detailed your plans are and how many baby steps you want to outline in your plan. For a simple plan, I might outline in puppy stage, adolescent stage, and adult. For more advanced plan I might outline it as 5 steps, 5 seconds, no distractions and build up the steps first going step by step further away, then building the time adding seconds to becoming a minute, then slowing building up distractions. Writing out the baby steps can help you see that your training is working or help you see when your training is not working. If you seem to stall, get frustrated or are not making the progress you want, it's time to re-evaluate your plan and possibly get help from a trainer.

 Training Mistakes

We all know mistakes will happen because we are all human. No matter how much we try our communication, our mechanics, our reinforcement, or some other part of training will be done incorrectly. This is why it's important to work with a trainer who can help you through those mistakes teaching you how to adjust and make training easier for you and your dog.  This can be done in person or via video review. As a trainer, I have tons of videos on my YouTube channel and every single one of them could very possibly have a mistake or something unexpected that happens, changing the training session. That's why I work with other trainers around the U.S. so that we can help each other through struggles and frustration. 

In the example of the stay behavior and I can often see something the small that the owner doesn't even realize they were doing that can make a huge difference. Recently a client was saying her dog's name when the dog was about to leave the station, meaning the name to be a correction or reminder to stay. However the dog heard the name and thought the owner was recalling them so the dog would race to the owner. When I pointed it out, the owner stopped saying the dog's name and started using a hand signal to remind the dog to stay on the station. The clear communication made all the difference for the dog who was then able to hold the stay position much easier.

Pointing out mistakes can often be taken as finding fault. As a trainer I work to help my clients realize that my goal is to help, not judge. My goal is to do all training with compassion, awareness, knowledge, empathy, & support. But remember, even I make mistakes sometimes. 

If you're interested in more planning help, check out my last blog on the January Planning Special. If you have doubts that I can help you, send me an email at yooperpaws@gmail.com and let me help you with a simple plan to get you started.