Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Teaching Barbie to 'wave'

I've decided that I am going to try my hand at making slightly more 'instructive' youtube videos in order for them to be more useful for a wider audience. The problem I guess is that I'm no authority on these things. Barbie is only the third dog I've owned and she's only the second one I've really taught tricks to.

Last night I tried a strategy with shaping 'high five' into a wave. I basically just started asking for a high five, using the high five hand signal, but standing a step away. She did successfully give me a few waves.

This is where Barbie's creativity comes into it though. As I was doing a sit/stay, then the high five (wave), Bender was sitting quite stoically next to Barbie. I asked for a wave from Barbie and got it the first few times, but then she decided that she would try something different. She put her front leg over Bender's shoulders! It was so incredibly cute I laughed and treated her for it. I think we will save that one for later though, I need to get high five and wave solid first.

She also tried pawing Bender in the head a few times because she couldn't reach my hand for the high five. I decided I would stop and give it a go tonight without Bender sitting next to her.

Bender is so beautifully tolerant though, he just sat there and took it when Barbie bashed him in the head with her paw! I guess it is making his sit/stay much more solid!

Comments (13)

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awesome stuff, what a great idea to make instructive videos!
I was going to comment on the 'high five' blog post, but decided not to... anyway, I was going to offer a small bit of advice. With rewarding for a behaviour, you should give the dog the reward/treat/clicker as SOON as the behaviour is correct, ie, high five and a treat immediately. I noticed that with the high five video it wasn't immediate.
Sorry if this comes across as bossy or patronising, it's not supposed to :)
2 replies · active less than 1 minute ago
True, that is the theory. I, like a bunch of other people in the blogosphere have experienced success in using a praise word (good) instead of clicking, so it's not the giving of the treats that is timing dependent, it is the giving of verbal praise.

She also takes me laughing at her as praise, the clown that she is, hence the continuing to bop Bender in the head even though that wasn't what I was asking for!
that makes perfect sense then :)
Hee hee, that could be a new trick! Give Bender a hug or get Bender's attention! I see a video in the works :)

Wyatt
1 reply · active less than 1 minute ago
I like 'hug' maybe that is what I'll call it! thanks Wyatt! ;)
hahaha yeah but I'd have so much video on my hard drive!!!! ;)
i think that other trick is going to have to be called 'hug'... we shall see in a couple of weeks after I get 'wave' working heheh
I'm thinking "climb" and "hit" are sounding like some interesting tricks.
1 reply · active less than 1 minute ago
she tries to climb me already when I get home from work.... I've taught her 'off' but she still has problems keeping her paws off me ;)
I taught Beryl to wave last night and was wishing I'd video'd it as it panned out the same as Barbie and Bender with Beryl putting her leg over Frankie's shoulders quite a few times. As with Bender, Frankie is very tolerant:) Now I just have to work out where to set up the video camera!
1 reply · active 734 weeks ago
I put my cam on the coffee table for most training, seems to be at a good height to capture the action :)

very cute!!
Sounds like a great training session! Wish I could have been there to see it. Poor Bender - he sounds like such a gentleman! :-)

I wouldn't worry too much about the videos - it's just great that you're sharing your experiences! I have only had Honey as my first ever dog and when I made my videos, I got a lot of comments from people saying how much they appreciated the more "instructive" style because a lot of videos just show dogs doing the finished trick. Or - they said - a lot of videos are just teasers from commercial dog trainers trying to attract new clients/business and not really giving much useful info. So they said there isn't actually that much genuinely useful, educational stuff on YouTube - people are either selfishly trying to use to to drum up business or just showing off their dogs' tricks.

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So I'm sure people would love seeing how you taught Barbie things - especially other Greyhound owners! I know it's the princile not the breed that matters but a lot of people still seem to believe that they need to see someone training the same breed of dog as their own for the advice to be valid - and I guess also, they find it more motivating/inspirational. I get a lot of messages from Dane owners saying they were never motivated to train when they watched all the Border Collie videos on YouTube - until they saw mine with Honey and realised that Danes can do it too! I'm sure you'd get the same reaction from Greyhound owners - make Barbie the poster girl for Greyhounds! :-)

Hsin-Yi

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