I just realized I didn’t write about “day 5” of Doggie School. But I can’t remember exactly what we did. Everything blurs.

Because yesterday’s day 6 of Doggie School was mostly a reinforcement of all that we’ve been working on. We continue to work on things like sit, down, place and so on, but with added time, distance, and distraction. Specifically yesterday we added food to the mix. So if I say “sit” but then drop a treat to the ground right in front of Sasha’s face? She’s not allowed to touch the food. Sit means sit and that’s all you do until I tell you otherwise: no moving, no barking, no getting things even within reach of you, nothing… you sit. If I get up and move away, no matter how far away I move, no matter how long I’m gone, you don’t get up… not until I say “free”.

The other thing we specifically worked on was the “recall”. That’s the dog being somewhere away from you and you say “come” or call their name and they are to come directly to you. The amusing part? When an energetic 10 month old 75 lbs. dog comes running at your petite wife? Well… the impact sends your wife airborne. 🙂  Wife wasn’t hurt, but she did get some nice air when Sasha barreled into her. One of those moments you wish the video camera was running.

That marked the end of our private lessons. We have the basics for manners and obedience: sit, down, place, come, , heel, no (corrections, both marking with “no” and a tug on the leash), “good girl” for praise, use of primary reinforcers like food/treats, walking on a loose leash. We have techniques for introducing her to people and people to her. We need to continue to take these further, such as sit with more distance, with more distractions, with more time, with food, etc..  We need to extrapolate behaviors such as when she hears the doorbell she doesn’t go ballistic but instead goes to her place bed (which implies laying down and being quiet, until we free her). So the basics are there, we just need to continue to practice and work on them with her.

I don’t think we’ll do another round of private lessons. I think that was necessary for the situation we were initially in, but now she needs even greater socialization. The neat thing about the private lessons was tho it was one-on-one instruction, Sasha was around a lot of distraction and other dogs because Triple Crown wasn’t devoid of activity while we were there. But I think next up we should take their basic manners and obedience class in the group setup. Yes, this would be a repeat of the curriculum we just learned, but it would be in a different context with more dogs and more people. It would help Sasha continue to generalize the commands, it would help us to reinforce the commands, and hey… I know that getting the same thing a second time can be good because the presentation may be similar but won’t be the same so inevitably you learn something new. Next classes that fit our schedule won’t be until January, so we may have to wait until then.

What can I say about Triple Crown? My experience has generally been good. I can’t imagine they’d be doing such good business if they didn’t do something right. But I also have heard stories and opinions from other people who Triple Crown is bad, but typically that’s been on the kenneling side of the business, not the training side. From reading How Dogs Learn it’s evident there are different approaches to training, and before I can put too much stock in stories and opinions I’d need to delve deeper into seeing where these opinions are founded. Perhaps that person views training differently thus Triple Crown’s methods are “bad” in their opinion. All I know is, I cannot debate the results. The Sasha we have today vs. the Sasha of 6 weeks ago is starkly different, and we’re happy both with the Sasha of today and our ability to handle and work with her. But will I kennel her there? That I can’t yet say, only because I’ve heard enough good and bad that I cannot determine what the Truth of the matter is. But furthermore, I just don’t know how well Sasha would take to being penned up and away from the flock she’s to protect for extended periods of time. Maybe as she’s older and more mellow it might work out better, but for now, just don’t know. So at this point, any sort of kenneling is out of the question no matter who does it.

Doggie grows. She’s just shy of 10 months old, and probably is now weighing 75 lbs. She needs to stop eating acorns (we think that’s what’s giving her the on and off diarrhea… we’re working on keeping her from eating them but she gets sneaky on us). She’s learning the groove of things, she’s becoming better behaved and accepting of the world around her. Like anything worth having, it takes time and work. So far, so good. 🙂