|
 Performance Arts for canines ranges from teaching your Goldens
the simple trick of giving their paw to that of directing a sequence of scripted movements
for a photo shoot, television commercial, or movie. Most performing dogs start out by
learning individual tricks. Then, these tricks are sequenced together into routines.
This guy here is Parker,
one of the dudes to play in the Air Bud movie series. Don't you just love those
sneakers?As a school psychologist, we utilized behavior
therapy and its principles all the time, on kids, that is! But, they're the same for our
canine friends. Two things are really important, though, to be successful. The first
“have to” is consistency. That is, whatever you are doing, it has to be
presented the same way, over and over again, until it sticks. And, the second has to do
with timing. That is, your good buddy has to know exactly what he or she has done to get
the reward. And, what's the reward? A food treat paired with your really happy and bouncy
praise for a job well done).  Want to see our Alfie and Darcy performing
some tricks? Click here to see Alfie's adorable standup beg and Darcy's ability to do
complex mathematics & simple dance kicks. A very important part to any trick or
behavior taught is to respect your buddy's need to really get it. It's gotta
stick, and it will stick forever, if you do it enough times. There are no dumb
dogs out there, just humans that are poor teachers.
When kids or canines learn a new behavior, it must first be reinforced every
time it occurs. But, if we don't gradually change that, then they won't do the
behavior unless that present is waiting. While we still do use food reinforcers,
we do not reward every time and we now require more than one behavior to be
treated. An intermittent schedule of reinforcement is the best at increasing the chances of our doing
certain behaviors. That's why slot machines are so popular. We all know that it's rare
that the bells start ringing and money starts pouring out of the machine. But, we sure do
stick around a long time putting in our money waiting for the big prize!
Get Started with your Dog's Training
Be sure to
meet all our Canine Stars and check out all the training
information, print materials, and web resources below.
TaleTell: Your own Stories of Performance Goldens
Meet some wonderful, hard-working performance stars.
And, if you have a Talented Golden tale to share, just send
it along with photos to:
back
|
|
