clicker training

has anybody tried this kya has been on it for 3 days and already recalls straight away cant believe how fast she picked it up.

How does this work? I have seen it done a few times but only on TV and wasn't really paying attention.

I use clicker training. Gummi is my first puppy that is completely clicker trained and it's SO much easier than with a crossover dog. I taught Bajas and Nimbus the clicker, too, but they were trained more traditionally (with luring, all positive reinforcement and negative punishment) and just didn't have the required creativity anymore. We even go to a clicker training based puppy class so I won't be tempted to use other methods. We're keeping a diary here: https://staffy-bull-terrier.niceboard.com/t7070-gummi-s-puppy-diary if you want to see what we've been doing so far (some of it at least, I don't write everything down).

Maxien78 wrote:How does this work? I have seen it done a few times but only on TV and wasn't really paying attention.

Check out the links here: https://staffy-bull-terrier.niceboard.com/t7305-free-online-clicker-training-class If you take that online class you'll learn a lot about it (and if you try it out your dog will, too).
ETA: but basically it's using a sound effect (the clicker) to show the dog that what it's doing at that precise moment is something you like and will reward. The click is always followed by a reward of some sort (treat, cuddles, tugging, sniffing another dog or whatever your dog is willing to work for). Then you use the clicker to capture behaviors you want from the dog - when the dog sits down you click and it will soon learn to sit for a reward - then you add the cue "sit" and so on. You also shape behaviors, like in my training thread (above) you can find a video where I shaped Gummi to back up and to walk into a tire and sit down. I just started rewarding behaviors he was doing and eventually required him to exaggerate so rather than look at the tire he had to touch it, then step onto it, then walk into it and so on.

Ok thanks

I have grown up with many dogs and have trained a few but times have changed and so have dogs lol. What worked in the past doesn't work anymore or is a little too harsh or too slow (depending onthe dog)

I just want the best for my lil baby and that includes training...although at this rate it might be me who needs to be trained not the pup lol

Maxien78 wrote:Ok thanks

I have grown up with many dogs and have trained a few but times have changed and so have dogs lol. What worked in the past doesn't work anymore or is a little too harsh or too slow (depending onthe dog)

I just want the best for my lil baby and that includes training...although at this rate it might be me who needs to be trained not the pup lol

I don't think dogs have changed so much as we have learned more about behavior and how learning works. Many of the more traditional training methods are very rewarding for the human, which is one of the reasons they can be hard to let go of for many (me included - it's hard sometimes not to revert to things I've done hundreds of times). (These theories are not new, but it's taken a lot to change views on dog training and I think clicker training is still a fairly small field.) As a biologist it's very easy for me to accept the concepts of clicker training since it's actually based on science and I can read the literature and it all makes sense. Plus doing it and seeing it for yourself always helps, of course. But I accepted the principles long before I could actually make them work well since my dogs had been trained for too long with other methods and didn't much appreciate me "going crazy" (making them do the thinking rather than being showed). They did learn stuff, though, with the clicker training I mean! Just not as quickly as Gummi does now. It's a shame I didn't know better when Bajas was a puppy - he'd be a STAR at clicker training. He is such a brilliant problem solver. We still had lots of fun, though. And I taught my pug and my whippet to visually identify the pug/whippet dog book and then touch it with their paw to show what they thought was the best breed of dog. Cute little party trick.

And - I always think it's mostly a matter of training the human more than the pup. They always end up doing what we reward them for, so if we'd just manage to do everything right (yeah, right.. ) things would be so much easier.