I wish I would have known about click training nine years ago when I first adopted my dog, Snickers. I went to my vet seeking a training system that was positive and walked away with a squirt bottle full of water instead. I was told to squirt Snickers when she misbehaved and it did work. It worked so well that all I had to say was the word "squirt" and she would squint her little eyes as if being sprayed. But now she hates water!
When I adopted snickers, I performed a series of tests to make sure I was getting the smartest one in the litter. She performed amazingly well and so I fell in love with her and she came home. She learns things very quickly - almost too quickly. Just say it once or twice and she has it down. Because of this, she knows the names of all her stuffed toys (all 10-12 of them) and can tell the difference between her ball (a tennis ball) and her blue ball (which is a racket ball).
So now I want to introduce click training when she is nine years old. Why? Because she jumps up on people when they come in the house and she tries to escape out the front door when ever given the chance. I now live on a main four-lane street and fear she will escape and immediately get hit. Also, I find the interaction with her enjoyable. She loves it when we train and we get to have time together. I always wanted her to be trained from the beginning but I live with a chronic illness so was unable to take her to training classes.
Now, I stand here with a bunch of clickers, some training treats and some fabulous books. I started my first session with excitement and Snickers was eager to learn. We started with the sit. Without a verbal command this was difficult. As I moved the treat above her head, instead of sitting, she just moves backward. Because I wasn't talking, she was getting frustrated - she is a very verbal dog who talks to me with her whines. I know when she is out of water, needs to go out, wants attention or is hungry by the way she whines. Once I add the sit command in, she is doing great. She keeps looking at the clicker waiting to hear it and she is sitting on command. I even have her in a sit for a period of time before clicking. Although she is eager to continue, I end the session.
The next session begins and I start by having her sit again. Today's lesson is to lie down. So after she sits, I get her to lie down. This training session goes great. She is lying down automatically, without having to use a voice command. Yippee!! I am so happy that things are going well.
Day three and all things go amuck! She thinks that the clicker is only to lie down. I am trying not to use voice commands so that the clicker becomes the main enforcer. But now all she does is lie down. So I think to ask her to sit since she learned that in the beginning but all she does is lie down. She has somehow associated the clicker with only lying down! I know that it is something that I did but don't know how I made this association so strong.
Now I am frustrated and she is frustrated because every time I take out the clicker to train she lies down. I am not clicking her for doing this so she gets frustrated. She stands up, walks around and lies back down. She then looks up at me like she is saying "look I did it, I am lying down!!!" but I don't click or treat and she now gets really frustrated so I end the training session.
How do I get beyond the lying down? What did I do wrong to get her to associate the click to only a single behavior?
