Saturday, December 13, 2008

Training the Beast - Click

I decided that, if I'm going to have a teeny tiny dog, she's going to be a well behaved teeny tiny dog. So we are going to obedience training classes for the next 8 weeks. This class uses the 'clicker method'. Basically, when the dog does what you want, you click your clicker and give them a treat. I'm intrigued to watch this play out. I grew up training dogs for obedience and we taught the dog the word, then the action. Here they learn the action and you add the word to it after they get the action down.

I am in a very small class. There are 2 of us plus the instructor. The other dog's name is Sadie and she's a German Shepherd puppy. She's 3 months old and could easily think of Beast as a squeakie toy. Beast is now 5 months old and just barely 2 lbs. Last night was the requisite boring introduction followed by instructions for using the clicker.

When I got home after the class, I showed Kevin what Beast and I had learned. I immediately learned that Ranger does NOT like the clicker. Ranger is already well trained. He's so good that, if he misbehaves and I tell him that he's grounded, he'll go outside by himself and stay until I let him come back in!! Maybe the clicker is an affront to his intelligence.

Beast may have a teeny tiny brain, but it works amazingly well. She's already learned that, when I call her name, she comes running to me and sits right in front of me to await further instructions (ok, to await a treat... the other will come). It's actually pretty cool to watch her come bounding in and sit quietly. Very not little doglike, but pretty impressive.

I was going to try to pull a spiritual analogy out of this, but really, I'm glad God doesn't use the clicker method on us. However, I do want to be better at coming running when He calls me and then sitting quietly at His feet.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Wish I had one of these clickers when my kids were young! Would it have made potty-training easier? LOL!

Nina

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Longview, Texas
In the autumn of my life, I am very content.

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