Control Unleashed Reactive To Relaxed

Product Information

The dog that is worried, the different things that worry it become cues to do something else. You've got some operant counter-conditioning going on, where he goes, "A monster! Oh, wait — that monster means I should X, Y and Z." But they're going to feel better about it and they have something to do, which is usually focused on you, so it teaches both at the same time Chapter 1: What Is Puppy Control Unleashed ? Chapter 2: Getting to Know Your Puppy Chapter 3: A Different Way to Think About Focus Melissa Breau: Denise's program. I just think it's super-super-interesting to think about how those two things overlap in really interesting ways. McDevitt begins by looking at whether control unleashed is for you, explaining that the book is aimed at two audiences; students of dog sports or companion dog owners whose dog has difficulty concentrating or working off lead near other dogs in an exciting situation, and instructors looking to get a handle on dealing with disruptive dogs in class. She continues by examining which dogs are appropriate for control unleashed. With these four or five steps of mat work, the goal is the dog is learning not just to go to a mat and lie down and stay on it, but to actually trust in the context of what it means to be on a mat — that nothing's going to bother him and he's safe. They learn that with these steps, which include a lot of desensitization — I have people walk up and away and there's specific steps. Once they have those, then I can use mats as stations and patterns.

Basically, if your dog is nervous, anxious, or having a hard time focusing on your training, this will be a beneficial read for you. It's not going to be the book for every dog-owner. What this book does is set out a formula for how to WORK WITH YOUR DOG to work through all of those fears, anxieties, triggers, etc.

My qualifications & skill set

And there's lots of dogs that you can't be like, "Sit down and do this." FDSA community and so many other trainers are so good about figuring out the right circumstances for a learner, but schools and doctors for human learners are not still. So you have to be so careful. But same with the dogs. If you've got a dog that's anxious or reactive, you don't want to take her to a group class where another dog … it's not manageable. Another dog is going to get loose and run up to her. Or you don't want to take her to a dog show if she's not ready and something's going scare her, because then she's not going to learn well, she's going to think she doesn't like whatever that context is. Melissa Breau: For the game, can you talk a little bit about that? What was going on? How does it work? What exactly was the setup there? Unlike Look at That, LATTE can also be used for socialization, and has been a big hit with shelter dogs learning to interact with volunteers. Whether your learner has a habit of reactive or anxious behaviors and needs to feel safe around "triggers," or is unsure or overexcited about social interactions, or needs support to feel comfortable in novel situations, LATTE can be customized just for them!

Leslie McDevitt: Part of it is the predictability. They know what's going to happen next. That's why it's called a rule structure. It's not rules like, "You must obey this." It's rules like … gravity, like, you can rely on gravity … I hope. So this stuff happens, but once you're within a pattern you can rely on that pattern continuing. McDevitt alleviates the conflict and pressure implicit in this with her “Look at that” game. She rewards the dog for doing what it wanted to do in the first place, e.g., watch the environment, in exchange for attention. In doing so she uses reverse psychology to create a dog that offers the handler the attention they desire and produces a win-win outcome for both. The book is laced with examples of her techniques in practice for both her own dog and others who try her approach. Her approach is so common sense, I often caught myself wondering, “Why didn’t I think of that?” But as Benjamin Franklin said, “Common sense is not that common.” There lays the beauty of Control Unleashed, a book whose simple wisdom I will be striving to employ in my training for quite sometime.” Mary Zoller

Leslie McDevitt: Yes, I definitely do. And that's why I asked Denise to read the manuscript of my last book, and she wrote a blurb for me, and we had lots of talks about the way things go together and stuff like that. Because it's true: If it's the dog's idea and the dog has some control, then yeah, the dog likes it better. Imagine.

Melissa Breau: Right, right. And man, to have been a fly on the wall when you two were on the phone talking about, or in chat talking about, that kind of stuff. That would have been fascinating. Early puppyhood education is arguably the most important part of any dog’s training. For a dog destined for the competition ring, this early learning is all the more critical. I use other stations, too, that dogs might be able to see easier than mats on the floor far away. You could use cones, you could use bowls, you could use platforms. I teach chairs, I teach the dog to go away from me to a chair and get a treat on the chair. Anything that they can see from a distance, because then they know that's where they're going next.Leslie McDevitt: And the laws of learning applied to him too. And yet I go, "What? I should be able to figure it out." He's got some sensory processing challenges, and so you think something's really motivated him for several days in a row and you go, "OK, I can use that." And then all of a sudden he hates that thing because the senses decide to process it differently on a different day. He'll eat this, and then suddenly you put it in his lunch and he spits it out at the lunch table, for example. And you say to the teacher, "I thought he was eating that this week."

Melissa Breau: Right, right. I've got one last question here for you, which is, what's something that you've learned or you've been reminded of recently when it comes to dog training. You can take this anywhere you want to go with it. I just want to hear what you're thinking about these days.Melissa Breau: I do think that that's roughly what was going on. It was a while ago. I have my notes, but yeah, I think it was after you taught us that "One, Two, Three" game that we were working on it. So that would make sense. Paying attention” is its own skill set and teaching it should be separate from teaching your puppy more complex behaviors. Without attention, you won’t get as far as you want with all those other behaviors you’re going to teach because it’s likely they will fall apart in the face of distraction. So it is wise to teach the attention skill set as the “base of operations” for your puppy training. The attention skill set includes: Discrimination skills, self-control skills, and arousal regulation skills. Chapter fives moves on to simultaneously building focus and changing attitudes. McDevitt introduces us to the Look At That! game, explaining how this works, and why she likes it so much. McDevitt also shows us parallel games, which gives the dog a task to focus on while working near other dogs. She explains in detail how to use parallel racing, giving advice on working with motion-triggered dogs and training a reactive dog to watch other dogs in motion.