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Location: Cornwall
Joined: Jun 2005
Posts: 2,786
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Had a great training class last night!
As alot of you will know I have been having problems with a recent change of instructor at our training class.
Last night we left to get there early so Loki could have a big of a play and meet the other dogs as they came in.
The change this week was amazing we had hardly any barking which I could stop fairly quick when he did bark, he did become unsettled when someone came in late with a different dog so rather than letting him get more and more wound up I just went over to the owner of the new dog and said can he just say hello or he wont settle which most people were fine about. At the end two people for the next class came in with their dogs and when I asked them they said both said no their dog didnt like other dogs (surely a dogs class with a room full of other dogs isnt the best place for them then?!) and Loki was back to only half concentrating on me so obviously makes a big difference!
The difference in how the instructor talked to me was even more amazing then the change in Loki, he used us for demonstrations and where before he was clearly getting annoyed with Loki's barking last night he said its just because hes so clever and keen to work! (thats what I said to him last week!) He didnt talk down to me at all and because of that I found him alot easier to talk to. I think before he just thought I hadnt bothered to put the work in with Loki and was just saying he knew it but he actually didnt, but last night he realised Loki can do everything he was teaching in the lesson pretty much already, and kept saying you dont need to do it this way as he knows it, when demonstrating the steps to do something, which was my main problem before I was trying to explain to him when he was trying to get me to teach Loki to sit etc that he already knew it he just wasnt concentrating and changing to doing his method for that instead of the one he knows will just confuse him but because Loki was too hyper to do as I asked I guess it just looked like he didnt know how to, but if he'd have listened to me about what Loki knew and spoken to the other instructor about what he could actually do he would have known I was telling the truth and he could do it.
I was so proud of Loki when we left and glad that I had struggled to get there even though my car is broken so Loki didnt miss a week, I just think its a shame that my dog has to be behaving for me to be spoken to not down to! We're not perfect we need to do alot of work on his doing things without a treat as hes not very good at this yet, and obviously work on him keeping his attention on me even when there are distractions, I dont mind being told where Im going wrong and I know the instructor knows more about dog training then me or I wouldnt be there I just wanted to be spoken too properly not made to feel like I was wasting his time and obviously didnt do any work with my dog! Now we are developing a better working relationship I think I can/will learn alot form him and am looking forward to the next session again not dreading it, because even if Loki was to play up again at least he knows now what he can do and that I do/have spent time training him!
Sorry for long post think I got abit carried away!