Today Jackie started Foundations for Agility 2 class, with much success. We continued working on contacts; for now it is best to use a nose target at the end of the contact for every time we play. This is to be sure the contact behavior is 100 percent solid so when we progress to the actual dog walk on an agility course she has already perfected the behavior and has a very high chance of success from the outset. It also helps to avoid injury by teaching her to keep her balance front and forward while moving across the dog walk or A frame.
For only the second time in her life, Jackie saw an agility tunnel today, and aced taking the cue, running through, and coming out all while staying connected to me. Because she is a superb dog to be sure, but also because our coach has taken the time to show us the building blocks necessary to achieve error-free success for each novel behavior. I am really beginning to understand why foundation games are so important; as with dressage, the sexy stuff comes easy when you have solid basics. And for dog agility, solid basics means a confident dog that stays engaged with the handler and has a very high rate of success and thus reinforcement, and masters each small step before moving on to the next behavior.
Our homework this week is to focus on reinforcing contact behavior using the plank and the nose target. We can begin to work on adding a little distance, as Jackie understands the two-on-two-off behavior I can begin to send her ahead to the plank and reinforce her for "Feet!" as well as have her sit-stay and then I go out in front of the plank and release her "Break! Go walk! Feet!" and reinforce her for the two-on-two-off behavior. I'm loving Jackie's new plank from Cato Outdoors products:
Jackie has only seen a tunnel one time in her life before today:
- All-important foundation games are giving us momentum
- Homework includes continuing to reinforce two-on-two-off "Feet!" contact behavior, and adding distance in front of and behind the handler
- Thanks to a solid foundation from a fantastic coach, Jackie is nailing more advanced novel obstacles like tunnel with a very high rate of success
