Week One of obedience class was so much fun. Call it fate, but it was only me and another girl in the class, and she has a big old german shepherd. A ten month old female named Nina, I think. She got her a week ago from someone on Craigslist who couldn't be bothered trying to train a gorgeous, fun-loving dog. DIE IN A FIRE, but I digress. Quinn is our trainer, and she asked if (since nobody else showed up) we minded a small class. Neither of us did. I think it would be good for Curly to have lots of stimulation and exposure to other dogs, but considering my ADD, I think it's probably a good thing that it's just the two (well, five) of us. (Six if you count Quinn's dog, who either slept in her bed or stared at Quinn the entire time.)
Quinn started out the class by having us introduce ourselves and talk about issues we want to address in the next eight weeks. I said that I wanted to curb Curly Joe's OMGCHASETHECATS issue, and basically just teach him manners and obedience.
Quinn said that she wasn't here to train our dogs, she was here to train us. Amen to that.
I should mention that, before we left for class, Sis and I had been out in the big yard with the dogs, and Curly Joe pretty much wore himself out tearing around in the leaves. When we got to Petsmart, Curly transformed from Demon to Waif, and when we got into the rink --- what I call the training area because it's basically a teeny tiny ice rink without the ice. Boards. Glass. The works. All that's missing is a zamboni --- and I sat down on a stool, Curly Joe crawled under it and stayed there the entire time. He also slept a lot. SCORE!
His classmate, Nina, kept whining and barking and Quinn would squirt her (or near her) with her water bottle. Curly did some whining himself and was rewarded with some spritzes. He looked at me like, "Holy crap! I can't believe that just happened to me! Did you see that?"
Quinn gave us clickers, but she said we didn't have to use them in class. Thank gad. I hate those things. We did do some exercises with them, and Curly Joe responded well.
Our homework this week is to work on the "watch me" command. Or the beginnings of it, anyway. She wants us to build on having our dogs maintain eye contact with us so that we can get them trained to watch us. Remember how I said Curly Joe won't take food from my hand? Now he will. I did basically the SAME DAMN THING I do at home. Quinn had us take some treats, put one between our first and second fingers. Hold the treat down for the dog to sniff, then bring our fingers up to our face next to our eye. When the dog maintains eye contact for a second or two, we look away, say "Yes!" (or a positive word of our choosing) and give them the treat. Curly gobbled those treats like they were going out of style. We did some clicker exercises, too, but just to see how they did with them. When we got home, I clicked the clicker when it was in my pocket and Curly Joe immediately sat down and started at Sis (who was making her lunch). Whooda thunk the little shit could be trained? I kid because I love.
So Quinn is all about hand signals, which I love. If you're in a crowded or hectic place and you want your dog to listen to you, he's not always going to respond to verbal commands. If he's trained to keep an eye out for hand signals, you can guarantee he'll always be mindful and paying attention to where you are.
I'm looking forward to learning more as the weeks progress. We got our own binders and every week Quinn is going to give us a worksheet and a coupon for treats. After class, I walked Curly around the store, bought some cat litter and used the coupon to buy a bag of treats. I'm going to get a couple of bags of treats to so that Curly doesn't get bored with them. I'm also going to useLuke's his tennis ball as a non-food reward. I'll only take it out when we work at home, that way he knows it's his special reward for doing well.
We got binders and homework, did I mention? Homework this week is to work on the "Watch Me" command and potty training. Curly Joe is house trained (except if I have to leave him home for a few hours; he'll usually pee in the laundry room), so we'll just be working on the "watch me." I figure we'll take the dogs for a long walk and then I'll work with Squirrely afterward. That worked out really well at class this afternoon, because Curly Joe passed out under my chair almost the entire time. Quinn says our training sessions should only be a few minutes long. Maybe a few minutes before we go to work and a few minutes when we get home. Surely I can manage that. I'll be sharing everything I learn with my sister so that she can keep up with the training while I'm at work.
I'm just really excited and glad to finally be doing this. I put it off for far too long.
I had a lot more to say, but I've got to make my lunch and do some stuff before work.
Tune in next week!
Quinn started out the class by having us introduce ourselves and talk about issues we want to address in the next eight weeks. I said that I wanted to curb Curly Joe's OMGCHASETHECATS issue, and basically just teach him manners and obedience.
Quinn said that she wasn't here to train our dogs, she was here to train us. Amen to that.
I should mention that, before we left for class, Sis and I had been out in the big yard with the dogs, and Curly Joe pretty much wore himself out tearing around in the leaves. When we got to Petsmart, Curly transformed from Demon to Waif, and when we got into the rink --- what I call the training area because it's basically a teeny tiny ice rink without the ice. Boards. Glass. The works. All that's missing is a zamboni --- and I sat down on a stool, Curly Joe crawled under it and stayed there the entire time. He also slept a lot. SCORE!
His classmate, Nina, kept whining and barking and Quinn would squirt her (or near her) with her water bottle. Curly did some whining himself and was rewarded with some spritzes. He looked at me like, "Holy crap! I can't believe that just happened to me! Did you see that?"
Quinn gave us clickers, but she said we didn't have to use them in class. Thank gad. I hate those things. We did do some exercises with them, and Curly Joe responded well.
Our homework this week is to work on the "watch me" command. Or the beginnings of it, anyway. She wants us to build on having our dogs maintain eye contact with us so that we can get them trained to watch us. Remember how I said Curly Joe won't take food from my hand? Now he will. I did basically the SAME DAMN THING I do at home. Quinn had us take some treats, put one between our first and second fingers. Hold the treat down for the dog to sniff, then bring our fingers up to our face next to our eye. When the dog maintains eye contact for a second or two, we look away, say "Yes!" (or a positive word of our choosing) and give them the treat. Curly gobbled those treats like they were going out of style. We did some clicker exercises, too, but just to see how they did with them. When we got home, I clicked the clicker when it was in my pocket and Curly Joe immediately sat down and started at Sis (who was making her lunch). Whooda thunk the little shit could be trained? I kid because I love.
So Quinn is all about hand signals, which I love. If you're in a crowded or hectic place and you want your dog to listen to you, he's not always going to respond to verbal commands. If he's trained to keep an eye out for hand signals, you can guarantee he'll always be mindful and paying attention to where you are.
I'm looking forward to learning more as the weeks progress. We got our own binders and every week Quinn is going to give us a worksheet and a coupon for treats. After class, I walked Curly around the store, bought some cat litter and used the coupon to buy a bag of treats. I'm going to get a couple of bags of treats to so that Curly doesn't get bored with them. I'm also going to use
We got binders and homework, did I mention? Homework this week is to work on the "Watch Me" command and potty training. Curly Joe is house trained (except if I have to leave him home for a few hours; he'll usually pee in the laundry room), so we'll just be working on the "watch me." I figure we'll take the dogs for a long walk and then I'll work with Squirrely afterward. That worked out really well at class this afternoon, because Curly Joe passed out under my chair almost the entire time. Quinn says our training sessions should only be a few minutes long. Maybe a few minutes before we go to work and a few minutes when we get home. Surely I can manage that. I'll be sharing everything I learn with my sister so that she can keep up with the training while I'm at work.
I'm just really excited and glad to finally be doing this. I put it off for far too long.
I had a lot more to say, but I've got to make my lunch and do some stuff before work.
Tune in next week!
4 comments:
Yay! I know it's only the first class, but it sounds like CJ's doing really well!
Hmm, maybe I will send Brisket to Pet Smart for his training! I never really thought about doing it that way.
Ed - we'll see how he does this week! I feel really pressured to do a good job, but it's hard finding the time (and brains) for lessons. If I mess this up really bad, at least we get to do the course again for free. But really, I think this will be good for all of us.
Shea - You should! It's a great bonding experience, plus it's good socialization for you and B-Dog. I'm really proud of Curly for behaving so well right off the bat, though (twice) he did try to steal a treat off of my chair. I really want to take him to the dog park, but I was worried he'd be too spastic. He played well with Nina, though, so that's hopeful. Quinn is going to let them have off-leash play this week. She said she'll walk right through them in the middle of it just to break it up for a minute. I guess that evev in play, if dogs get too overstimulated, they might lash out. Smart! She says she might also move some chairs into the middle of the "rink" so that will cause them to stop when they run into them. Man, would I love to train dogs for a living!
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