Sport/Impulse Control Class

So I'm hoping to pitch the idea for a Sport/Impulse control class at work and I've got ideas but I wanted to throw it out here to get input from you all.

What to keep in mind is that while I would like this class to be a good basis for sport prospect dogs I also really want it to be fun, interesting and accessible to people with over stimulated and over excited dogs that would seriously benifit from some self control work. A lot of our customers are more in the pet side of ownership rather than the heavy duty sport people but a lot like to dabble in sports and really want to do right by their dogs.

I guess I'm saying it needs to not be full of just crate games because that will not be something a lot of.....normal people will enjoy So fun self control games, things to build body awareness and confidence on weird things all would be awesome. Any experiences taking or running classes like this would be great too!!

Have you looked at any of the Recallers games??? They are all about this stuff! I use them in basically all of my training nowadays

I used to assist in a class like this that was catered to teaching a dog off-leash skills. It was a prerequisite for agility but was also catered to people who wanted to be able to let their dogs run in the dog park without totally losing control.

The teacher who taught it designed the class and really, really loved it. Whether the students really absorbed the subject matter was sort of hit-or-miss. The class was her baby and she spent a lot of time going over the theory, working with thresholds and shaping. But to the bulk of the class attendees I think it was too thick with theory and not enough actual progress. It was a fun class when we had students that 'got' it, and tedious when we didn't.

We did LAT, Its Yer Choice with food and toys and in our particularly advanced classes graduated to instructors tossing food at the dogs as they recalled over distractions. We did introduced shaping a la 101 to do with a box. We talked about engagement with the owner vs engagement with the environment, giving attention in order to get it back. We'd arrange classmates and their dogs as distractions for one dog to heel through/around. We hammered home the importance of a release cue, and an implicit stay. We did quite a bit of proofing exercises -- a lot through having half the class working on one thing (like LAT, IYC, stay-until) while the others worked on heeling, recalls, etc.

E: the Recallers games would also be a good source for inspiration for exercises.

Can I come and take your class please?

We played musical chairs in obedience class. Heel your dog around a bunch of chairs in time to music, and when the music stops you sit in a chair. Before you could sit down, you had to put your dog on a sit/stay and if they moved you had to get up and reset them. It got pretty vicious when people would try to distract dogs into moving, so the owner would have to get up and the distract-er could steal their seat :lol-sign: Of course there is one less chair than the number of people, so the loser is out.

I don't remember where the dogs had to sit ... I think there were specific areas laid out maybe 10-20ft from the chairs, and you had to get your dog over to one, leave them in the sit/stay, then run to a chair. It added the challenge that the open spot for your dog might not be near the closest chair.

When I was in Canada to teach a seminar on a similar topic, I covered several things that would fit well in a class setting: 'zen' (similar to It's yer Choice), talked about Premack and had some exercises related to that, two ball/toy work, and Look at That. The attendees really seemed to enjoy it and got a lot out of it in just the 3 days we had.

The raw video footage is online if you're interested. It's $15/day of footage: 8+h, pm me for the address if you would like the link.

I've tried to instill concepts of self-control in my students/dogs, and tbh I've had terrible results in getting them to grok it.

I've done some IYC/zen stuff, and they usually get the exercises but aren't able to translate the concept into living and being with their dog.

One thing that I've found really valuable, but again, can't get them to understand, is a cue for a remote reward. Dead useful in sports, but even moreso in pet dog life because it means they don't have to carry treats all the time to maintain training. I was able to get my students to teach the cue "Get it," but only 1 or 2 out of a couple dozen has been able to put the idea into practice.

It's very YMMV, I think they are good concepts and I know the exercises I use to teach the concept are sound, but I personally have had a very very hard time teaching the concept to owners.

Me, too?

That's all I had to add, other than that I will be Google searching all of these suggestions and hopefully make a bit more progress with Abrams.

Hudson is small, I'm sure he'd fit into a UPS box, I'll ship him to you to use a test/demo dog for your class.

I just wanted to thank everyone for their ideas and suggestions! Any other suggestions more than welcome!

I will ditto the suggestion of Recallers games, there's probably several in there that would be good inspiration.

With Payton one thing we worked on a lot as a puppy was a good release off a tug. Wild, furious tug games and a very strong out/drop command. IYC came into play because I would literally dangle the toy in front of him, put it on his head, et cetera and until I said "okay" he was not allowed to grab the toy again. This is fun for me because he is good at it - but you need to make sure students don't make it too hard/set their dogs up to fail, and either they or you as the instructor needs to be really good at identifying when it's gotten too hard and you need to lower criteria and make it easier so the dog can be successful before you pump up the intensity again.

I also agree about the two ball/two toys game. Very much about "the toy we are playing with is the one in my hand, so forget the other toys on the ground."

If you're looking at body awareness games I think a really good one would be teaching a 2o2o on a wobble disc, or maybe one of those new K9 Fit Bones, and then apply IYC with a toy (or food) here too. Slapping the ground with a toy, dragging the toy in front of them, dropping treats on the floor, and until the release is given the dog has to stay in 2o2o, then a riotous game upon release.

For a sports class I would also consider starting with obstacle discrimination. The Mary Ellen Barry foundations DVD actually talks about this in terms of tricks away from real agility obstacles. For her demonstration she has people shape their dogs to climb into a basket/box, and then go underneath a chair... then the discrimination comes into play when you cue the dog to do, say, the basket, even though the chair is right there. I think this is a really good idea and also like the idea of doing it without equipment. Not impulse control so much as stimulus control though I personally feel the two are related. In a class scenario I think we would start this the very first week to make sure they have time to shape the behaviors as homework, then come back the next week to address problems, third week to start the discrimination part.
I would also elevate this to using some of your body awareness tricks - either get on the wobble board or the balance disc depending on which I have cued. Then probably bring in a tunnel and ask for discrimination with/against the tunnel. At a foundations level I don't think I would even use a jump, but if you have a repeaters class or a second level, at that point I could bring out a jump.

Another idea would be teaching left and right spins and asking for these in succession, switching direction on command. You can also use this for wrapping a jump standard either to one direction or the other.

For me impulse control is an active activity, not a passive one, especially when talking about sports. I don't want my dog to think choosing impulse control is boring, I want them to think impulse control means the game is only going to get better as soon as they get released. OTOH I'm still struggling with a dog who doesn't really want to stop for contacts in agility... so take that for what it's worth.

I would also add that this sort of thing can be stressful for soft dogs. I showed a friend of mine the weave pole proofing I did with Payton (the toys and steak all over the ground) and she said "wow, that would be really stressful for mine, I think he might shut down if I asked him to try that." I told her understood that, and I had my limits on how far I was going to push Payton. I am not, for example, going to ask him to weave while waving steak in his face. That is a lot of pressure for what I personally feel is very little value to our training (I am never ever ever going to be at a show where he will need to weave while somebody throws steak in front of his face.) So just be aware of the dogs in your class and be careful about pushing dogs further than they are comfortable going. Some students may not recognize their dog shutting down and being overly stressed, so you have to be prepared to be an advocate for the dog and issue a break if you see the dog is getting "too much."