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Phase 3 Engagement 

Purpose: Now that you have your dog pushing you to get the party started, we can begin incorporating skills into their training outings.

Because the details of clean training loops are so important to me, I start with the essential skills: 

  • Reinforcer cues 
    • Standby 
  • Transports 
  • Stationing 
  • Leash Skills

 

Examples of Training Loops 

1. Build on-leash engagement

Acclimation → Engagement → Reward → LLW → Reward 

Progression: Add stays (wait your turn) before or after LLW. 

2. Build off-leash engagement

 Acclimation → Engagement → Reward → Station → Release from Station → Leash Removal → Reward → Return to Station + Leash on → Reward. 

Progression: Add behaviors after leash removal and before rewards.

Note: Reward means reward event. Remember that party you used to tell your dog that training is awesome. You want to continue applying that strategy since, as your training loops grow, so does the amount of effort your dog puts in, and therefore their payout should stay the same or increase. 

Because our goal is to compete in 20 obstacle courses with no reinforcement on us, we can start building longer and longer chains of duration without reinforcement, using the above frameworks, essential skills, and other foundation behaviors we’ve taught our dogs. 

If the absence of reinforcement means the absence of clean loops, you are either asking for too much in that environment or your skills were not ready to be chained.

Consequences of Disengagement: 

It is not sustainable to let a dog come and go into training whenever they want. We want to communicate that it is their choice to start or stop training, but we will only keep going if they do. 

  • If an unwanted behavior sneaks into my loop, my first response is to return to the step just before things went wrong, or my last reinforcement loop. 
  • If taking a step back does not clean up the loop, I will remove them from the training space for a short break (wait your turn). I will restart the training loop as planned. 
  • If we are still unable to achieve clean loops, I will end the training session.Â