Fishing for dog club lesson ideas

Titchy Pony

Titchy Pony

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Hi everyone,
I've recently volunteered as an "assistant trainer" at my Sunday morning dog club (it's an association, not a commercial business). My reasoning being that I would like more experience with a variety of dogs to improve as a trainer and owner for my own (after all, I'm an ok-ish horsewoman because I have ridden dozens if not hundreds of horses in my life and handled even more, whereas with dogs, I only have the one to train!). There will eventually be a course I can go on that will be partly funded by the club, but at the moment, it looks like I'm being thrown in at the deep end!
Sunday, the trainer in charge asked if I wanted to take over the lesson (apparently "euh..." means yes) and I did it but I felt I was very boring and that I didn't really have any ideas. So I've come to the collective mind of HHO for what you would train / like to have learned in this kind of "dog class".
These are all pet dogs/owners, with a large variety of dogs (very speedy parsons terrier to the most phlegmatic Anatolian shepherd I've ever seen) and owners (teenagers to retirees) and abilities / prior training (pair of 2 year old GSDs from the same home that won't split up, 6 months olds over from the puppy class, young very distracted GSD, a friendly wriggly staffie that easily gets bored and so on). You never know who will turn up on a given day, it can be two dogs or ten.
I would like to build up a repertoire of exercise as a "go to" depending on who's there.
Supplementary question: any fun ways to explain how to position yourself to get your dog to walk to heel. Several people stoop over the (large!) dog when its not necessary, forget to release the lead when the dog is not pulling, hold their hand away from the body so dog is bent outwards from their leg. All this despite the trainer (and myself telling them the correct way to do it) so I was wondering if there's a different way of explaining that might "stick" better?
Thanks
 
We scrapped the group classes 'everyone make your dog sit, everyone make your dog lie down' stuff. All dogs and people learn at different rates (especially with the diversity you describe).
We went to one to ones/very small groups five to ten minute sessions several times two days a week as there's no way you can explain everything to every person in the same way, the talented handlers and dogs languished or got bored and the average ones never improved and owners got frustated.
Dogs also need breaks in between learning new things. It's impossible to coach a large group and stop bad habits creeping in unless you have eyes on your backside, IME.

However humans seem to like what they see as their money's worth and cram everything into a class. I don't get it.

Get your head around operant and classical conditioning if you haven't already, it's the best way to explain how dogs learn IME.
Explaining pressure and release on the leash should be easy if you're horsey.
Marker training is also important IME, the dog needs to know that they're right or wrong, if there's a reward coming, if they are released from the behaviour to get the reward.
Sort out which dogs are food and toy motivated. Those who train with food shouldn't feed their dogs the morning of the class. Depending on the dog, the night before 😉
Learn the difference between luring and freeshaping and see which dogs respond to which, best.
Most of these things, I would try to explain to handlers without dogs, maybe you could have some short, fun theory sessions.
As I hate it when you're standing there repeating yourself to the fifth person and the dog is standing there getting cheesed off. Have the big debates before or after the dog is on the field.

You can do the number game, 1 means sit, two means down, 3 means turn around, etc have them walking in a circle, you shout out the numbers and they have to listen to your instructions.

Place command. Everyone brings a frisbee or a carpet tile and teaches their dogs to put their front feet on it. Lifesaver in certain situations.

Everyone stand still in a circle and hold their dogs attention while one dog and handlee weave in and out.

Go around a pole or traffic cone, eventually from a distance.

Recall dog through a tunnel or wall of people (can be done with or without other dogs)

Food refusal.

Article indication.

Working out how to get a toy or food from under an upturned box (bread crate etc)

I teach all positions in a box/oblong, including heel.
I tell people to hold the food lure with the hand out a few inches from the body at hip height, elbow straight (bent elbow means dog will crab) and level with the seam of your jacket. Dog's shoulder at handlers left knee.
You can use coloured tape or post-it notes 🤣

Fun positions like between the legs, heeling on the other side, walking backwards, spinning in either direction.

Your last paragraph, I've had to accept that there are certain people who are uncoachable.
 
Our dog training group does lots of different classes, we did a four week course called “fun and focus” last year which was good.

Some of the exercises to help the dogs included:

1. Placing a treat between your feet and as soon as the dog looks at you, click and turn 180 degrees and place another treat down and repeat.

2. Moving on to throwing the kibble side to side a bit further away and encouraging the dog to make eye contact and also come back to you

3. Teaching touch (we graduated to encouraging them to touch cones and other objects)

4. Walking round a cone (quite random but our dog found this to be great fun! Good starter for lefts and rights in agility too)

We also found “sniff and search” particularly fun with our spaniel who learnt to sniff out rosemary. There were all sorts of dogs in the class including a greyhound.
Our training group also does a class with exercises from the “KC Rally”https://www.thekennelclub.org.uk/events-and-activities/rally/
 
We love the Absolute Dogs Academy (https://absolute-dogs.com/) for endless fun with games-based training that works. It's based on training concepts like engagement (so loose lead walking and recall), or thinking in arousal, etc so if you could put together a mix of games for the areas you'd want to work on in a given session depending on who is present.

With heel, I teach it by feeding the position stationary and put it on a cue before thinking about moving. I guess the first step to that is can the dog follow a treat lure so that I can move the dog around wherever I want it to go. Like @CorvusCorax I also like teaching 'middle' (standing between my legs) as well as the heel position, going backwards in heel as well as forwards, and getting them to move around and between my legs in fig 8s (harder with bigger dogs obviously) so that the dogs are comfortable and used to working in close proximity to me and targeting different positions around my legs. When we start moving, we practice circling together/figure 8 walking patterns to relax the dog into the heel position in a non-distracting environment and then if (when!) they shoot forward when out and about, rather than pull them back to us we go onto a walking pattern that they associate with relaxation, they come back to heel and we carry on.

I did some puppy classes recently where the instructor took the time to teach how to hold the lead and manage your treat hand and then made people practise. I have my own way now, but it reminded me how easy it is to get your knitting in a knot when you don't have a system that you stick to until it is second nature.

Do you have the option of taking the class out and about? Doing the basic things well in a group setting with real world distractions is always a fun challenge. One of our trainers would only teach outside. She used a public green space and set up a series of different activities that we all rotated around. So after the initial explanations we were all doing different things in pairs. Some of the things were e.g. basic nosework, controlled agility, others had to walk on a loose lead around the rest of the group and so on. Or we might do a short group walk, stopping and practising different things along the way based on the natural obstacles we came across (e.g. group sit and stay when crossing the road, climbing and sitting on boulders, down stays in an open space, walking in patterns at different speeds together).
 
CorvusCorax said:
We scrapped the group classes 'everyone make your dog sit, everyone make your dog lie down' stuff. All dogs and people learn at different rates (especially with the diversity you describe).
We went to one to ones/very small groups five to ten minute sessions several times two days a week as there's no way you can explain everything to every person in the same way, the talented handlers and dogs languished or got bored and the average ones never improved and owners got frustated.
Dogs also need breaks in between learning new things. It's impossible to coach a large group and stop bad habits creeping in unless you have eyes on your backside, IME.

However humans seem to like what they see as their money's worth and cram everything into a class. I don't get it.

Get your head around operant and classical conditioning if you haven't already, it's the best way to explain how dogs learn IME.
Explaining pressure and release on the leash should be easy if you're horsey.
Marker training is also important IME, the dog needs to know that they're right or wrong, if there's a reward coming, if they are released from the behaviour to get the reward.
Sort out which dogs are food and toy motivated. Those who train with food shouldn't feed their dogs the morning of the class. Depending on the dog, the night before 😉
Learn the difference between luring and freeshaping and see which dogs respond to which, best.
Most of these things, I would try to explain to handlers without dogs, maybe you could have some short, fun theory sessions.
As I hate it when you're standing there repeating yourself to the fifth person and the dog is standing there getting cheesed off. Have the big debates before or after the dog is on the field.

You can do the number game, 1 means sit, two means down, 3 means turn around, etc have them walking in a circle, you shout out the numbers and they have to listen to your instructions.

Place command. Everyone brings a frisbee or a carpet tile and teaches their dogs to put their front feet on it. Lifesaver in certain situations.

Everyone stand still in a circle and hold their dogs attention while one dog and handlee weave in and out.

Go around a pole or traffic cone, eventually from a distance.

Recall dog through a tunnel or wall of people (can be done with or without other dogs)

Food refusal.

Article indication.

Working out how to get a toy or food from under an upturned box (bread crate etc)

I teach all positions in a box/oblong, including heel.
I tell people to hold the food lure with the hand out a few inches from the body at hip height, elbow straight (bent elbow means dog will crab) and level with the seam of your jacket. Dog's shoulder at handlers left knee.
You can use coloured tape or post-it notes 🤣

Fun positions like between the legs, heeling on the other side, walking backwards, spinning in either direction.

Your last paragraph, I've had to accept that there are certain people who are uncoachable.
Click to expand...
Thank you very much for your detailed answer.
I was thinking on Sunday that this wasn't the ideal situation for many of these dogs to be learning in. I think a lot of the owners also come for the socialisation. I obviously can't come stamping in in my beginner boots and change the whole system they've got going, but maybe when I'm a bit more confident, I can figure out how to break it down so that each dog/handler pair gets 5/10 intensive minutes and then a break as I move on to the next. I might also be able to slip in some bite sized bits of theory in to give the dogs a rest (nobody wants me to go into full lecture mode).
I'm actually academically trained in animal behaviour so have a fairly good knowledge of learning theory, though experience in the practical applications is another story - still working on that. Still, wouldn't hurt to brush up on it a bit.
Some really great exercise suggestions there, thanks. In fact I need to see if I can teach a lot of them to my own dog first (I feel a bit sorry for people who have to rely on me to teach them and their dogs the basics, but I should also improve with time).
It's also come to my mind that if I can pass on a bit of theoretical knowledge, maybe I can start to get some of the owners to think for themselves rather than blindly follow what I or another trainer says. I would hope it would help if they understood the "why" as well as the "how".
 
Splash2310 said:
Our dog training group does lots of different classes, we did a four week course called “fun and focus” last year which was good.

Some of the exercises to help the dogs included:

1. Placing a treat between your feet and as soon as the dog looks at you, click and turn 180 degrees and place another treat down and repeat.

2. Moving on to throwing the kibble side to side a bit further away and encouraging the dog to make eye contact and also come back to you

3. Teaching touch (we graduated to encouraging them to touch cones and other objects)

4. Walking round a cone (quite random but our dog found this to be great fun! Good starter for lefts and rights in agility too)

We also found “sniff and search” particularly fun with our spaniel who learnt to sniff out rosemary. There were all sorts of dogs in the class including a greyhound.
Our training group also does a class with exercises from the “KC Rally”https://www.thekennelclub.org.uk/events-and-activities/rally/
Click to expand...
Another great set of suggestions and a great resource full of ideas. Thank you
 
Chucho said:
We love the Absolute Dogs Academy (https://absolute-dogs.com/) for endless fun with games-based training that works. It's based on training concepts like engagement (so loose lead walking and recall), or thinking in arousal, etc so if you could put together a mix of games for the areas you'd want to work on in a given session depending on who is present.

With heel, I teach it by feeding the position stationary and put it on a cue before thinking about moving. I guess the first step to that is can the dog follow a treat lure so that I can move the dog around wherever I want it to go. Like @CorvusCorax I also like teaching 'middle' (standing between my legs) as well as the heel position, going backwards in heel as well as forwards, and getting them to move around and between my legs in fig 8s (harder with bigger dogs obviously) so that the dogs are comfortable and used to working in close proximity to me and targeting different positions around my legs. When we start moving, we practice circling together/figure 8 walking patterns to relax the dog into the heel position in a non-distracting environment and then if (when!) they shoot forward when out and about, rather than pull them back to us we go onto a walking pattern that they associate with relaxation, they come back to heel and we carry on.

I did some puppy classes recently where the instructor took the time to teach how to hold the lead and manage your treat hand and then made people practise. I have my own way now, but it reminded me how easy it is to get your knitting in a knot when you don't have a system that you stick to until it is second nature.

Do you have the option of taking the class out and about? Doing the basic things well in a group setting with real world distractions is always a fun challenge. One of our trainers would only teach outside. She used a public green space and set up a series of different activities that we all rotated around. So after the initial explanations we were all doing different things in pairs. Some of the things were e.g. basic nosework, controlled agility, others had to walk on a loose lead around the rest of the group and so on. Or we might do a short group walk, stopping and practising different things along the way based on the natural obstacles we came across (e.g. group sit and stay when crossing the road, climbing and sitting on boulders, down stays in an open space, walking in patterns at different speeds together).
Click to expand...
Thank you for the ideas and the resource. I've been meaning to get around to teaching my dog "middle" for a while, so I'll give it a try before trying to teach it in class. I like the moving around the legs idea, but there is no way the anatolian is going between anyone's legs unless they're on stilts!
I think going out and about will be complicated for insurance reasons, though I know they occasionally do it with some of the other trainers. I won't be attempting that for a while yet (if ever). Though I do think it gives a better "real life" experience for pet owners. (one of the trainers brought in a little push scooter for the puppy class to get them used to random moving objects with people on them)
 
Not read all replies.

Teach watch command to start.

You could have half of your class at one side and the other half at the other, facing each other.

To begin do some sit stays, go to the end of the lead and then return to your dog. Then some sit stays, go to the end of the lead and then call fo front.

Perhaps then introduce a heel position.

Once this is practiced, you could get them to walk towards each other, sit their dogs facing each other, walk to the end of the lead behind their dog and then call away.

Can also get them all to sit in a line and one by one walk each dog around all the others. The walker will have to stop their dog getting distracted by all the other dogs. The ones sitting, likewise have to keep working their dogs to stop them being distracted by the walker.

Putting the dog in a down and then walking around the dog is another good one that some dogs will find challenging.
 
Jenko109 said:
Not read all replies.

Teach watch command to start.

You could have half of your class at one side and the other half at the other, facing each other.

To begin do some sit stays, go to the end of the lead and then return to your dog. Then some sit stays, go to the end of the lead and then call fo front.

Perhaps then introduce a heel position.

Once this is practiced, you could get them to walk towards each other, sit their dogs facing each other, walk to the end of the lead behind their dog and then call away.

Can also get them all to sit in a line and one by one walk each dog around all the others. The walker will have to stop their dog getting distracted by all the other dogs. The ones sitting, likewise have to keep working their dogs to stop them being distracted by the walker.

Putting the dog in a down and then walking around the dog is another good one that some dogs will find challenging.
Click to expand...
Thank you for the suggestions.
 
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