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I'm Glenn Martin from the Hearing Dog Program in San Francisco and today I'm here with Don
and Donna Forst and we're going to talk to them a little bit about their dog. He is being
trained as a hearing dog and we're also going to show you some hearing dog sequences of
training that should be helpful to you. So, good afternoon and tell us a little bit about
yourself if you would and why we're training your dog. Well, I'm Donna, I'm the Director
of Humane Education for Animal Services Foundation... Speaking of your dog, here he is, Cabo. This
is my dog Cabo and I'm in the program because I have hearing loss and I wanted to get Cabo
to help with my hearing and improving my . Ok, Great. And Don will be your helper today in
one of the things we'll be doing, in what we call the Name Call, where the dog runs
from person to person when their name is called. Alright, thank you, we're gonna go ahead and
get started with our training sequence. Alright, we're going to do the freshman level Doorbell.
Now we have four different levels of sound work. Freshman, sophomore, junior and senior.
A freshman level is where we get the dog excited and he can see the source of the sound and
we call this the target area and I'm going to tease him with this box full of treats.
He's going to run to the sound, so this is freshman. Freshman means it's all setup, it's
easy, it's in sight. That's freshman level. So let's go ahead and get started. Cabo, would
you like this. Oh boy! We've already taught him this is full of treats. We've gotten him
excited over it. So we walk over here and we let him see us set it up with a treat and
I ring the doorbell. Good boy! Good boy, here you go! Ok, thank you Donna.
The whole goal here is to get the dog excited to run to the sound and this target area.
Now this time Donna, we're going to have you stay back a little bit and wait until he eats
the treat. Then say "Good boy!" and follow him up and give the second treat. Ok, so we'll
do it again. Oh boy! Are you ready? Would you like this? So you're going to linger about
here. Ok, so here we go... doorbell Good boy! Good boy! And did you notice the dog
looked back at her when she said "good boy," that's what we're looking for. We want this
dog to start looking back and anticipating that she is going to come up and give him
a treat out of the container. That was very good. This time, we'll do it a third time,
practice, move, but move slowly, you're still moving when he gets to the treat. Keep moving
"Good boy" and then keep moving forward. Instead of stopping, just keep moving. Ok, so let's
go back. Now this is a first step that this dog has done a while ago, so he's used to
this. This is freshman level. Alright. Ready? Pretty soon I'm not going to have to tease
him as much, since he knows the game. Good boy. Good boy. Ok, that was good. The
only little critique that will help you, is a little quicker on the "good boy." It should
come right as he is eating it. Ok, are next step, we're going to keep it all freshman,
in sight, still holding him. We're going to move the target area a little further away,
so he goes a further distance. Cabo, look what I've got. . Good boy. Good
boy. Yes, Yes. Very nice. Very good. Ok, great. So what we're going to do now. Cabo is doing
very well and anticipating that you're on the way to opening the box for the second
treat. He is starting to come back to you even. So now we're going to have you lurk
or stop about half way. You still say "good boy", he'll turn around, but when he does,
I'd like you to signal him to come back to you. Now, we've already taught him to push
and touch, but we're gonna let him come back and alert you. You'll say "good boy" and ask
him "where?" and let him take you back again here. So we'll do that sequence. Ok, come
on back. Here's a treat for you. Alright, Cabo. Good boy. Good boy. Good
boy. That was great. So suddenly now, instead of just a one way response, because you had
him come back, now it's a three way. And that's what the finished sound work response looks
like. They go to the sound and they come back and alert you, then they come back to the
sound. We're actually recreating steps that Cabo has already grown to, that should be
clear. He's already been through these steps, but we're showing what the sequence is. So
you're used to having one or the other of you out of sight for this game. So we'll start
with both of you in sight and fairly close and then we're going to show how the distance
is extended and how one of you starts going around the corner. Ok, now we'll just kind
of smoothly, even though we did it over a period of about a week. So I'll give each
of you three treats and you've played this game before. So again, start close on the
first one and each of you extend the distance and then maybe on the third time he does it,
have one of you out of sight around the corner. Ok, should I get back further. Probably and
I'll let you guys just talk and do what you do naturally. So just play the game. Donna.
Don. Donna. Don. Donna. Good boy. Good. Good boy! That was good, there was lots of enthusiasm
and motivation is the name of the game. That's what we're looking for; and the third run
he disappeared and he said "well he's not right here, he's gotta be around the corner"
This is one way we teach the dog to go back and forth and also to do the out of sight
which is important for freshman sounds. Alright, this is a sophomore doorbell. They've gone
around the corner. I'm going to show the dog the box and he already knows where the target
area is. So we're introducing the idea of coming to some sound he hears that's out of
sight. That's actually a good thing, it's very motivating for the dog to come around
the corner when running to a sound. Cabo... look what I got. Ok.. Good boy.
Good boy. That was good. Now again, what we can do this next time is don't be in such
a hurry to get here. Maybe as you had just barely come around the corner, have him come
back towards you. Remember, if you give him a "good boy" he's going to be heading back
for you anyway. Ok, so let's try it out. Alright buddy, I don't know how many of these treats
you want, but we got more. I'm waiting a little bit to build the anticipation up. Doorbell. Good boy. Very nice. Excellent.
Alright, now there is one other step, which is Junior. And we haven't really talked about
junior. Junior would be if we just walk away with the dog casually and then the sound happens
without me teasing him with the box. No setup. So I think we're ready for you to try it out.
Why don't you go ahead and take your treat, I'll take my mine to put on there and then
just casually walk away with it. Now let's see if he comes when the bell happens when he doesn't
totally expect it. Ok. Doorbell. Good boy. Good boy. Very good. Did he turn right around
when he heard it. It certainly seemed that way. He came so quickly. Now, we can delay
the time a little bit now on a junior. We can have him go back and be with you now for
maybe 30 seconds, before it happens. So it's really kind of out of his mind. In fact, he
went back already, he heard me. So why don't you go with him. Ok. So just go back and hang
out for a little bit. We're doing our countdown to 30 seconds. We're just gonna wait, he's
not really totally prepared, but he comes from out of sight, so we're extending the
time a little bit. Let's see if he responds now, just to the sound. doorbell. Good boy.
Very nice. Excellent. Ok, let's not really treat him this time, just give him a tiny
bit, we're gonna fill him up and he's gonna be overloaded with treats. Ok, so that was
really good and you can see how you can gradually increase the time on it, but it's becoming
more a junior sound, you know it's going to happen, he doesn't. As we increase the
time a little bit, now it's getting closer to the real world. Where sounds happen when
you least expect them. Right now he expects it a little bit, but it's not uppermost in
his mind. So that's why he's responding so well. When we introduce a new sound, like
the timer, we have to realize that this is a totally different cue to him. And he doesn't
necessarily know he's supposed to do the same thing with this as the doorbell. So we make
it easy for him and we do that by going back to the very beginning, going back to a short,
close freshman timer. So, it's very close and inside even though he is capable of running
back and forth, he's got to learn to do it for this new cue. So we treat it as if it's
a whole different thing. We don't have to stay very long at the beginning steps, but
we do start there. Ok, so we'll move our target area.
Now moving the target area is a good
thing, because now he knows this is something a little different. Ok, so let's hold him. Alright, I'm now
setting the time for 3 seconds. That means, oops, that's the wrong one. So I set it for
3 seconds, I press start, It'll go off 3 seconds after I set it now.
~Alarm beeping~
Very good. So right now, no problem, that's because he has all the cues he needs. He knows this
is the same game, only it's a different sound. Same game, different sound. Really when we
teach a hearing dog, here's another way to look at it, we're teaching hearing dog ten
different commands that all mean sit. So we're teaching him sit in 10 different
languages, but they all mean to do the same thing say so this is a different cue but do
the same thing. Ok, ok. Right we'll do it again. We're going to place the treat there,
set it for three seconds.
~Alarm beeping~
Good boy. Good boy. Yea, that worked. Don't
forget to give him another one out of the box. Ok, give him another one. Ok, alright,
good so will let this run for a little bit and stop it, so he's having no problem with
us because the setup he knows this is the same game. Very predictable to him and remember
dogs do things based on their expectations, so he expects the same game. The next step
then after we practice this would be to have you go around the corner, but it's important
that I come and tease him to come back here. So, you had a little problem with this before,
when you got out of sight. Where did you have problems, this way or this way? This way.
Let's go this way okay. So I'm going to let him see me set this. I'm gonna go around the
corner and let's see what he does. Okay that's probably close enough okay so here I am, Cabo.
I'm setting this timer for one, two, three seconds. Ready? I've got a treat here, I've
got a treat for you. Good boy. okay. Okay
~Alarm beeping~ he slipped away too soon but
that's actually a good sign. It shows he's motivated and enthused to play the game. So,
this time we won't let him get away and this time we'll see if he actually comes around
the corner. Okay so let's go back ok perhaps okay. But you may not have done this this
sophomore step up doing this setup. The odds of him coming are about ninety percent
right now. Because I'm making it really easy for him. Okay, so we set it down and we turn
it on. Great perfect. Very nice. Just a tiny bit, we're filling him up
so much with treats here. So no problem on this stage right. We're doing a sophomore
timer, I'm setting him up and getting him revved up ready to go. He's flying in here
like nobody's business. I think what happened is, you probably jumped ahead to junior too
quick. I was farther down the hall back there. Further, plus it may have been yeah not the
immediacy of me seeing him go around the corner got to start close and then you extend distance
and then you go to junior. Okay yeah that's the secret you follow. At the the risk of
totally filling him up with treats, I guess we can try one more here. Okay. Yeah he's
doing well. Where do you want to do that one. Let's to keep the same location. We don't
want to mess with what's working here. Great. Alrighty, look what I got. One, two, three.
Here we go. Look what I got. Good boy. I'm letting the timer continue to
go off so there's that strong association there between sound and treat. Okay you notice
when it started going off he keeps looking at you like "got anymore treats coming?" Okay,
so this is very good, especially since he's had a little problem with being out of sight
on the timer. Now we know you were a little too far away, we need to be closer, we need
a little more going around the corner. So it's a shorter set up and he's having absolutely
no problem. So again you're gonna go back through the same sequence you went through
with the doorbell only don't do it too quickly. Okay, you know this is one of those things
that we did wrong, with the box, we weren't shaking the box. Yes, tempt him and this is
one of the cues that I "Okay I hear that box, I'm ready to run. I gotta get ready to go,
I'm just waiting for that sound." Yeah the boxes suddenly kinda disappeared and the box
is an essential part of this this this box is a target, it's a target he
can smell, a target he can see, a target he can hear; that's the best kind of target.
You know, all three, so that's a powerful thing there to get him to run to the sound
and eventually with people who have these boxes, I've gone to their homes and I've noticed
they're empty and I said "do you keep treats in there?" and they said you know I did the
beginning but they don't need the treats every time now. They just love doing the sound work
so that's interesting as powerful as this is, it starts them off well and by the
time you're done you know they just love the activity.Yeah, but you can still keep treats
and give them to him now and then. But be sure today we will have a box that's outta
sight so there's always the chance to reward. Always the chance, we just give it less often
but always the verbal praise, treats a little less often. Okay, alright, very good, you
did a good job Cabo. Ok, well thank you, we had a good practice session today. Cabo as
usual is the superstar, he did very well and we went back through some steps that he'd
already done as you know going from the freshman doorbell to the sophomore to the junior we
showed him doing junior sounds where there's no setup and we then went to the timer which
is what we had done in the last lesson and he was having a little trouble with the timer
when you're practicing he wasn't sure about going and my feeling was it may be the progression
have been a little too quick with a brand new sound. What did you see different today
from what was happening before? You made it so easy for him to keep his motivation up
when he was in sight of the target area and my mistake was I took him too far way. I expected
him to hear the sound. Right. Also, we didn't continue to keep the box in place, by shaking
the box. Yea, that box is an important part. So, yes we did make it easy, we went back
a step, we started here with the with the freshmen sound he did so well we thought you
know let's go ahead with an easy set up close by shaking the box. He did equally as well
about that's where the credit so tempting when you could see how well he's doing running
long distances and out of sight doing all that to say that he should do that with the
timer, not yet but it won't take long you know the sequence that will happen is much
quicker and once he gets the idea that there's two sounds that play the game with them below
third to fourth and pretty soon what he'll do it still say gee all the sounds to respond
to the same way and but again you're right the motivation, making it easy keeping his
motivation up, that's the key. If I were a dog I'd like running back and forth for treats
too. Right now it's all about the treats, you know it's all about the treats, but that's
what gives value to the sounds and eventually the treats become less frequent, but they
love the activity, so he's doing very well, you're doing well and I thank you for our
lesson.