Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Training Plan- Results!

I've spent just over a week working on the training plan I created. Here are the results:

Exercise: Get-ins
Criteria: Sit straight when in heel position
Data: During the first trial, she succeeded 40% of the time. On the final trial, she succeeded 80% of the time.
Notes: Interestingly, this was the only set of data the reflected steady upward growth. All of the other exercises went up and down day to day.

Exercise: Attention heeling
Criteria: Maintain eye contact with the first step of heeling
Data: The data here was all over the place, starting at 90%, dropping to 50% and then returning to 90%.
Notes: I am unsure what her true ability is here as I just don't have that much data. Part of it was complicated by the fact that I was working on two elements of heeling- separately, but still, I think this made things a bit messier. Sometimes she got clicked for the eye contact, and sometimes she didn't. I think this could be made much clearer if I just worked on one aspect. And, I believe Laura said that in the comments, as well. Laura is massively talented; I should have listened.

Exercise: Fronts
Criteria: Sit straight and roughly centered (between my feet)
Data: She started at 60% and ended at 50%. In the middle, however, she tested at 60% or 70%.
Notes: This is the only set of data that I do not feel is an accurate representation of her abilities. During training, I would guess she is at closer to 90%. I'm not sure why the test was so poor today.

Exercise: Duration heeling
Criteria: 300 peck heeling, more or less
Data: The first day we did approximately 50 feet without a treat while maintaining attention. Today, we did approximately 120 feet without a treat while maintaining attention, and I think she could have gone further.
Notes: I am unhappy with how this was tested. Since I didn't want to set her up for failure, I didn't push her until she quit, so I never got the full sense of her abilities. Also, I didn't get fun percentages. I like percentages.

I really enjoyed doing this. I like charts and checklists and such, so I often write training goals, but this is the first time that I've written out exactly what my criteria is as well as tracked the results. I definitely want to do this again!

4 comments:

Laura and The Corgi, Toller, & Duck said...

I'm glad things went well! There's so many ups and downs in training and days where the dog seems to forget even the most basic things. I'm highly impressed with your record keeping though! And thanks for the compliment but trust me I've made and still make plenty of mistakes! We all learn as we go.

Crystal (Thompson) Barrera said...

Isn't that the truth! It's amazing how "on" Maisy can be some days, and others, it's like I've never done anything with her.

Dawn said...

I wish I were as dedicated as you are, I am really impressed. Can't wait to see you both this weekend.

Crystal (Thompson) Barrera said...

Oh, Dawn, I've actually been pretty lazy this last week. I skipped a class last week and only trained every other day! Oh well- she probably needs the break as much as I do!