[nagdu] What's up with all the scavenging anyhow?

Greg Aikens gpaikens at gmail.com
Thu Jul 2 13:09:34 UTC 2015


I really enjoyed the TSE lectures on clicker training when I went for my most recent guide. I had a foundation in Applied Behavior Analysis beforehand, but I thought Lucas did a great job of breaking it down. TSE really only teaches how to use the clicker for learning routes or finding a new object like a chair and teaching the word chair, or at least that was the way in 2011. I ended up with some extra clicker training because my sweet boy had a terrible fear of the harness sliding over his head that we had to work very hard to overcome. 

I loved that they added clicker training to their program because I felt like they had given me a powerful tool to continue my dog’s training. They did not teach anything advanced like food refusal or performing a new kind of task, but the ability to teach my dog new words quickly was wonderful.

Best,
Greg



> On Jul 2, 2015, at 8:57 AM, Julie J. via nagdu <nagdu at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> Debbie,
> 
> I'm kind of confused by your message.  You said that you wouldn't use clicker training all day every day, but could see it's usefulness for some specific things.  From this statement, I don't think you understand what clicker training is and what it isn't.  Perhaps that's why you are upset by many of the messages about new training methods?
> 
> In a very, very, brief summary...clicker training is just that...training. It isn't meant to be used all day every day.  It is meant as a method to train the dog or person or dolphin to do something specific.  Successive approximations are used to teach this.  So if you wanted to teach a dog to pick up the newspaper, you would click when the dog glances at the paper, when the dog takes a step toward it, when the dog sniffs it, when the dog nudges it with  his nose and continuing on until the dog has caught on the the behavior.  When the dog is going over to the paper each time it is presented, you no longer click for just a glance.  The dog has to do a little more,  each time to get the click and the reward.
> 
> Food is generally used as the reinforcer that follows the click.  Food is used because it is universal and fast.  You can use play or petting, praise or other reinforcers, but they take more time and aren't as valuable to every dog.  For simplicity and speed, food is the preferred reinforcer.  It takes me .5 seconds to get a treat to a dog and .25 for the dog to eat it. I can get in 20 clicks and treats in a minute or two.  If I used petting or play it would take me 10 seconds to deliver something meaningful and still longer for the dog to refocus his attention back on the learning exercise. When I am training something with the clicker, I don't typically talk to the dog.  It's just click and treat, click and treat as quickly as I can in a short amount of time.  The dog is only distracted by my talking and unnecessary body movements because he is intensely focused in on the mental activity of problem solving the situation.
> 
> Dogs who are trained with the clicker know what it is and what it means.  A dog fairly new to the clicker knows that click means treat.  these are the dogs who may be distracted by the treats because that's the exciting part. After a while though, the mental problem solving of the clicker game becomes incredibly rewarding for the dog.  These are the truly savvy clicker dogs. You can teach a clicker savvy dog complex behaviors in minutes instead of days or weeks.  You are actually teaching the dog to proactively think and to solve puzzles.  I suppose it could be considered to be fluent in the language of clicker.
> 
> Here's the thing that I think a lot of people are missing though, once the behavior is learned solidly, you don't continue to use the clicker.  The behavior is already trained, there is no need to continue to train it.  The treats are phased out.  It might be helpful to randomly reinforce a behavior with treats, for a dog who struggles with a particular behavior or something that you are particularly concerned about, but treats are certainly not given willy nilly for the lifetime of the dog.  If a dog won't work unless he is being fed every two feet, this isn't clicker training, it's bribery.
> 
> Monty will be 8 in a couple of months.  I haven't carried treats with me when I am working him for several years.  He still works beautifully. Sometimes in the winter when we all are stir crazy from being in the house, I will get out the clicker and teach him something new.  He still remembers and still knows how to engage in the training.   He does not scavenge or try to take food off the table at a restaurant or any other horrid thing.  There have been many times we have been walking along and my son or husband will tell me, "he just took you around half a sandwich on the sidewalk".   I've had Monty since he was about 10 months old or so.  He used to jump on the counters, pick up everything including dead birds, snakes, grasshoppers and I don't even want to think about what else.    He is an incredibly food motivated dog, which I used to my advantage.
> 
> Clicker training is not synonymous with treat dispensing.  I think this is a large misunderstanding.  clicker training is a specific training method and just like with every other training method, once the dog is trained, you don't continue to badger the dog with training that same behavior.  A properly clicker trained dog should work for the enjoyment of the work or to please his person.  If the dog will only work for the treats, then either the training has gone terribly, terribly wrong or the dog isn't meant for that job.
> 
> Leash correction based training does work.  It works faster up front, while clicker training is slower in the beginning.  However leash correction training has it's limits,  because you are eliminating all the behaviors you don't want and what is left are the behaviors you do want.  Like I said before, dogs get that click means treat right away, that's actually classic conditioning, but the part that they can influence when they earn the click comes a little slower.  Once the dog understands that they are in control of earning rewards the learning speeds up exponentially.  Also because the dog is actively offering new behaviors, many things can be taught with a clicker that cannot be taught with leash correction based training.  Things like yawning, wagging, distance work, off leash behaviors and the like simply cannot be taught with leash corrections.
> 
> I think the guide dog schools teach their students to use leash corrections because it is an easy concept to understand.  Do something bad get a leash correction, that's pretty straightforward.  Someone who has never been around dogs can pick up this concept in seconds.  However clicker training is not like that.  There is a lot more knowledge base needed to understand and employ the training principles.  I have talked to people who have attended the TSE  clicker intro lecture and they don't understand clicker training.  I don't actually know what is in the TSE lecture, but I imagine it is accurate information, but people are not coming away with an accurate understanding at all.   Same thing with GDB.  I have read their clicker lecture materials on the website and it's all good and accurate info.  Then I talk to GDB grads and hear stories from this list and it is very clear to me that folks are not coming away with a good understanding of clicker training principles.
> 
> NLS has a few books on clicker training.  BookShare has quite a few, I'm told.  There is an incredible amount of information on the internet, including the blog that Rox mentioned about guide dog training clicker conference that GDB just did.   I'd encourage people to read a few books to begin to really understand what clicker is and what it isn't before  coming to  inaccurate conclusions.
> 
> Julie
> Courage to Dare: A Blind Woman's Quest to Train her Own Guide Dog is now available! Get the book here:
> http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00QXZSMOC
> -----Original Message----- From: Debby Phillips via nagdu
> Sent: Wednesday, July 01, 2015 11:02 PM
> To: NAGDU Mailing List,the National Association of Guide Dog Users ; nagdu at nfbnet.org
> Cc: Debby Phillips
> Subject: Re: [nagdu] What's up with all the scavenging anyhow?
> 
> I know that Seeing Eye does some clicker training, but students
> are not required to take part in it once they get through
> training.  Everybody goes to the first meeting, I think, and then
> decides for themselves.  It did and does help in targeting
> specific things, like a specific chair in the dining room, a
> particular pole, like a pole for pushing the button at a light,
> or a bus stop pole, or a particular door.  I certainly would have
> no problem using it for very specific things, but never on a
> day-to-day basis.  I can see how tempting it would be to use it
> all the time for everything.  But I think that's a very bad idea
> and I'm glad that Seeing EYE does not do that.    Debby and Nova
> 
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