2010-01-04

New Trick, "Knock"

I've begun teaching the cue "knock" to both dogs. "Knock" will mean to hit something with your paw and make it fall over. I shaped it with both dogs tonight with a noodle box. At first Buzz was SURE it was meant to be picked up and he was SO cute trying to figure out how to pick it up. Pawing was WAY more fun though! He really got into it!

Tonight I ended when I got consistent hard, direct, paws on the object and it fell over.

Tomorrow I may start adding in the cue, or I might add distance. I haven't decided yet.

Also still figuring out a cue for Buzz. A real knocking motion is his "guess which hand" game cue combined with a "back up" cue. Thinking about a knock with right hand into the left palm. I have to see how well I can execute that cue though.

I'll try to get it on video soon. The batteries for our p&s (the camera I use for video) have decided they don't want to hold a charge, so it might be a webcam video!

2 comments:

Laura and The Corgi, Toller, & Duck said...

yay, I love teaching tricks! really cute name for it too! I'm not adding in any hand signal yet for my paw touch as I'm STILL working on getting 100% verbal discrimination on paw vs nose!

Megan said...

Buzz is deaf, so I need a signal for him.

He had a really hard time learning a foot target, despite loving to use his feet. I pretty much gave up and just use a nose target with him. I was surprised that he got this as quickly as he did. Maybe I should revisit a foot target when we get this solid.

Bailey has a pretty good understanding of "stomp" vs "target" but it is NOT on stimulus control. She really likes to offer "stomp" (foot target) and is good at keeping it still, now to just build up duration!

In this sequence though, my next step is finding more objects for them to knock over. Books sound like dangerous fun. I briefly thought about a cat... but naw! Buckets?