REWARD MARKER VS "good dog".......

Who? I have a masters agility dog. I've taken seminars with people who have been to the worlds.

I don't know anyone in agility who clicks and doesn't pay out. If we want more we may pay out and simply NOT click. I don't always use a clicker, but I always in training have something to reward with.

well, now that that's done with... I think it's time to take the Keeda monster out for a little evening stroll!

Hi Kayla

To be honest, I have never been a huge fan of clicker training for movie dogs, and not because it does not work. It actually works very good, but here is the problem. We want animals looking natural on the set. You have all seen how a clicker gets the animal into you and the training session which is great. Many times it really motivates the animal too. Unfortunately, on the set we want the animal to be mellow, and the last thing we want is the animal all excited and looking at the trainer.

That really is the main reason, and I personally like the bridge "GOOD". It takes the dog's attention off my hands and keeps him focused on me. If you go to my site, under the RETRIEVE in the ONLINE DOG TRAINING AREA, I have 27 one minute clips on teaching a retrieve using "out" as a bridge. But you can definitely use a clicker in place of that. I think I actually vary a lot of the reinforcements in those clips too. So you can see what I am talking about.

Can I chime in from a non trainer perspective?

I am not an expert on really all that knowledgeable on clicker training, I always understood it as the click signified that a correct behavior was performed and a reward (treat) was to follow. I probably did not explain that too well but hopefully you know what I mean?

So I am confused when Joel talks about "clicker training" but there is no reward? Doesn't that take away half of the science of the approach and make it a different form of training altogether?

Hi MafiaPrincess

On my show GOOD DOG U, Karen Moureaux of Contact Point was a guest several times. Apparently she is pretty respected in the Agility Circle. What I am referring to was simply watching her. That is the way I saw her train the dogs, as well as many of her students too. I am sorry if that is something that you do not do, but understand that i just have to write based on what I see.

If Clicker Training is defined as always giving a reward, then that is not what I do.

You may not be an expert on the matter but you just nailed it in your last sentence bunny.

Joel- Interesting point you make about the on set mellowness I guess it depends as to what your doing,I dont see why calmness couldnt be clicked, I know I do it all of the time with Duke- especially when we are working around things that used to trigger his reactivity.

Either way you are confusing me in one post you say you do not like clicker training because it is so flawed, and now you say clicker training works great- soo which is it?

Which ever gets him a following and causes him to say he's famous the optimum number of times per post.

What if you really liked your job? And instead of getting a paycheck on Friday, you get a slightly bigger paycheck on Monday?

That's not what clicker training is defined as.

Clicker training is using a click to MARK a behavior, say, if you were free shaping a roll over, every time the dog moves incrementally to his side, instead of in a sphinx position, you click AND REWARD. Sometimes, if the dog gets confused, you drop criteria until the dog is back to where he was. Eventually (I actually did this in one night with my dog Ozzy) you have a dog that fully understands the concept of roll over.

THEN and ONLY THEN do you add a cue. And you cue the dog every time right before he rolls over. And you reward after every roll over. THEN you start adding variable reinforcements. Sometimes you don't reward after he rolls over. Say, maybe you want him to roll over twice. You hold out on the treat and the click at the end of the behavior until he is doing exactly what you want, when you want, on cue, for no treat, 75 percent of the time.

Then, I consider the behavior trained, but not distraction proofed.

And that's another topic.

Now, I may be wrong, and I may not have explained myself very well, but that's what I do.

If I was told Id be given my paycheck and I always got it after being told and then one day was told but not given it but then later told and given it as a human I could proabably ask alot of questions- So what happened why did you lie about my paycheck? Unfortunantly animals CAN'T and when we rely on a conditioned reinforcer to communicate with our animals, then it makes more sense to hold up our end of the bargin and not dilute our communication source that is purposely paired closely with a reward to do just that.

but that's different, isn't it? paychecks are not set up on a variable schedule (or at least mine aren't). you know how when we talk about extinguishing behaviors for which dogs have been rewarded and we use the comparison of kicking the coke machine? that's what i think of. i put my money in, i want my soda out. compared to a slot machine where you put your money in and you may get nothing but you may get a huge jackpot. clickers are not slot machines. my paycheck is not a slot machine. it comes when it's scheduled to come because that was the pre-arranged agreement. if the pre-arranged agreement were of a variable pay schedule, it'd be different.

You just answered it.. What I do is not clicker training

EXCACTLY- Clickers are a classically conditioned training tool which become a CONSTANT predictor of good things to come. Variable reinforcement is hugely useful in training but it is not the same thing as the closely paired relationship of clicker and reward.

then why on earth are you posting in a thread named clicker training 101 and correcting people on what they are doing??

I think we've all verified that by now Joel- and that's fine, but I will re interate if what you do is not clicker training please refrain from coming onto clicker training posts ( like mine) and correcting people about how to clicker train, noone is demanding you use it as a method and noone is rejecting the way you train BUT we would like if you did not pretend to be an expert on a training style you DON'T even use yourself.

Regards
Kayla

I am going to give you something else to have fun with. I would say probably 90% of the time I do not use any form of a bridge?

Okay? Since you dont use clicker training this makes sense, bridge is just a fancy word for what the clicker does- marking the time from when the animal hears the click and recieves reinforcement.

Unless we have different definitions of a bridge? It's not like you cant train a dog without reward markers or bridges, these things are aimed at excellerating the learning process but they are not mutually exclusive to learning.

So since we are having fun with this I have a suggestion:

Feel free to open your own thread as to how you train, its clear you are just bursting to tell us, as far as im concerned this thread is going off course and what Doc initially created as an interesting discussion has been just that and more. So if you have nothing more to say about reward markers, please feel free to create a new thread.

I know your new to this forum so simply go to the training section, click new thread and type away.

Kayla

I am not at all..

Sorry I am misunderstanding your post.

Not at all what? Not new? Um if you have only been on this forum for what a day or so now, then yeah you are new here.

I have been here for about two months now and I still consider myself "new".