What words and signals does your dog know?
Going to exclude formal commands here because I try very hard to generalise those commands and present it in different settings/ways and it would take me a really long time to recall everything.
Day to day random babbling
Go away - Rarely used. When i'm eating or cooking and I want him to go away from me.
You ready? - Get hyped cause something fun is about to happen.
Room - After walk post feet cleaning, go to my room.
Dude - I'm getting annoyed, stop messing around for the time being.
Night - Come here and let me brush your teeth
Thats all I can think of atm. Really interesting. I realised through this exercise that I don't talk to him that much out of training.
Homework videos and reflection:
Stationary heel position. Still slightly awkward, haven't gotten my full range of motion in my shoulder back so it still hurts a tiny bit. Other than that all pretty happy with it!
Didn't get to do the in position rewarding because it started raining. Not very happy with my treat throwing, will have to practice more. Usually I use a remote reward and tell him to go get it instead of throwing it but I think throwing rewards is a useful thing to add in my toolbox.
Used a little opposition reflex to try and get him to close the gap even more. Sound wasn't recorded for some weird reason.
Really enjoying this course so far! It's not something we would normally do on our own but the break from my usual shenanigans has really been refreshing for both of us. Nice to go back and revisit some things and better our mechanics. Only two chapters in and I've already found something to add to my toolbox(throwing reward).
I know it will be a long list, but I find a lot of value in writing out all of your formal cues, too. For example, it somehow took me months to realize that I have both a "touch" and "tuck" cue, which is just awful...
Also, it makes you feel good to see how much your dog knows. 😁
I'm so glad that I could introduce the treat tosses to you! I use it all the time. There are so many useful things about treat tosses as a reinforcement procedure.
You can make a show out of really showing him where you're throwing it - letting him track the motion of your hand as you toss the treat. (Let me know if that doesn't make sense.) I feel like labs in particular tend to quickly default to hunting with their nose, but somehow in doing so also miss that the treat is very much in plain sight.
You'll both get better with practice!
This all looks great! The front game is really cute with him; I love the little pushes.