Originally posted by David Morris:
You can give treats here and after the release. I have to comment on this part (obviously I don't agree with punishing at this stage...period, but that's a different story). If the goal is to teach the dog to hold a down, then do NOT reward after the release. Reward IN THE DOWN! Rewarding after the release would be fine if the dog spoke English and you could explain to him that the reason you're rewarding him is cuz of the fine down he did IN THE PAST. But since dogs only associate the reward with the behavior at that moment, you're telling him that getting up from the platz is the part you liked the best. Not the signal you want to send. Reward in the down position, release, and walk away and do something else. No reward.

Wow


Walk up and smack him. . .dog training at its very best. :rolleyes: :rolleyes: <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />

Just do it under the chin so the dog isn't afraid of praise. . .just afraid of hands on him.


Don't you dare bribe dem' dawgs for working, make them so afraid of you they HAVE to work. . .or else. That way they will respect you as the alpha.


But throw in the point about praising the dog and showing a lot of LOVE as well. . .


What a bunch of shat. Don't anybody do that!! I am quite sure that is the type of training information that Ed does not want people to take away from his board.

I disagree with you Lee.First of all she says the dog knows how to do a down.If the dog knows how to do a down there is nothing wrong with making it clear to the dog that you want it to stay there by using a correction. I never said "punishment". Am I to believe that to you there is no difference in punishment and a correction? Rewarding a dog after the release surely is not a new concept to you Lee. Maybe to you this doesnt work because you havent made clear to the dog what you want.Im sure you can teach a dog to do a down stay just fine, so can I and I dont have to teach it to understand English.Im glad to disagree with you.

Mr. VanCamp,
Please. You are taking my post and picking it apart to your liking. What I said was that treats are not a requisite to good training, and that you should be firm and loving. My dog does not listen to me because she is afraid of a beating, she listens to me because she loves and respects me. I have never kicked, punched or otherwise abused my dog. The only punishment she has ever gotten is a smack (not even that hard) under the chin with her mouth closed.
GSD's are smart enough, (at least mine) to learn with a little discipline, and a lot of positive rienforcement. There have been a few comparisons between children and dogs. This is plain silly. Do you shove a cookie in your kids mouth every time that he listens to you? No. Do you punish him when he does not? Yes.
To imply that I abuse my dogs, and then try to qualify it with a "but treat them with a lot of love and respect", is insulting. You must be a Democrat.

 Quote:

Originally posted by David Morris:
If the dog knows how to do a down there is nothing wrong with making it clear to the dog that you want it to stay there by using a correction. I never said "punishment". Am I to believe that to you there is no difference in punishment and a correction?

When you change the criteria, you change the exercise. Basic law of learning. By increasing the duration, you change the exercise in the dog's little pea brain. So no, punishment is not warranted since he is learning a new criteria.

Please define "correction" for me. There is punishment and there is negative reinforcement. "correction" is ambiguous. But regardless of your definition, I don't use an aversive in any form at this stage of learning.

When I reread my post, I didn't like the way I wrote that part about not rewarding after releasing. I do reward out of the down, but I do it with a conditioned reinforcer that marks the correct behavior, then throw the ball. That's the beauty of having a CR, either a clicker or verbal one - the dog knows the primary reinforcer that follows is for the behavior he was doing at the moment of the CR (which was the DOWN). What I wanted to have people avoid doing is saying their release word like "ok" and then they pet and praise their dog after he stands up, which the dog interprets as praise for standing up, not for the down which is now history. There's a big difference between a release word like ok that says I'm done and a CR.

So now you dont even agree with what you wrote.What about the speaking English part,is that garbage too? I didnt like the way you wrote it either.Im afraid Im not as impressed with your answers as you are. Actually a release comand can be a marker for correct behavior. A release comand says the excercise is over,the reward is coming, and you behavior is correct right now.The release and reward should not be at the same time, as this teaches the dog to react to body language.I disagree with your whole take on this.

Lee, I'm sure you've spoken of this elsewhere, but I wonder if you could take a moment to expand on the concept of a conditioned reinforcer, perhaps with some examples of using it in an exercise. What you're saying makes a lot of sense, and illustrates some things I've probably been doing wrong with my dog, so I'd like to be sure to get it straight.

Evidently, there's there's more than one way to train a down-stay.

Fleury wrote: "GSD's are smart enough, (at least mine) to learn with a little discipline, and a lot of positive rienforcement."


Exactly, thats what the treat is, positive reinforcement.

Matthew,

Not literally comparing children to dogs........it was an analogy......an example.......

Do you smack your dog evertime he doesn't listen to you?........I think you read into the child analogy far too much.

Bottom line, the dog is started off with rewards of praise and treats for proper behavior, and this is the behavior demonstrated during a formal training session only, so treats are not given every time the dog behaves appropriately as you implied. As the dog begins to understand what is expected, up the ante and begin taking the treats aways so the dog begins to associate the behavior with the command, rather than the treat......eventually the dog will do what is asked because that is what is asked. It is a process........as the treats begin to go away then beign adding the discipline. At that point the dog should know the correct behavior and discipline is more appropriate....but it has to be worked up to......