fun4fido
I’m Angela the founder of fun4fido. I live down by the coast in East Sussex with a Weimaraner called Harley, and a cat called Gaia.
My goal is to help you build a strong bond with your dog, and to show you how you can enrich your special relationship with effective communication and build trust and respect with kind consistent training methods.
Man and Wolf began their journey of companionship as far back as 100,000 years BC, so you could say that dog is not only man’s best friend, but also his oldest. This is why I believe that dogs offer humans a unique, enduring, and valuable companionship.
My Training Philosophy
Throughout my studies I have kept an open mind, and this has lead me to the theory that not only the wolf but other canids, being so alert, adaptable and opportunistic, pretty much domesticated themselves in order to exploit Mesolithic (c.10,000BC - c.4,500BC) village dumps.
The modern day 21st Century companion dog has perfected this, and we now feed our beloved canine pets from their own dog bowl, in our kitchens. Now that’s what I call smart!
So I hold quite a high opinion of dogs, they are smart, adaptable, opportunistic, observant, sociable, loyal, experimental, curious, sensitive, and communicative. I capitalise on these traits as well as a dogs natural instincts in my training.
My approach is to understand, and interpret canine behaviour, and to share this with you. My style is to gain trust and respect through benevolent leadership, and I can show you how to achieve this too.
My Training Methods
Positive Reinforcement
I use positive reinforcement for puppy socialisation, obedience training, training problems, and behaviour problems. Put simply reinforcement is an event that:
a. occurs during or upon completion of a behaviour, and
b. increases the likelihood of the that behaviour occurring in the future
The principle elements here are two: the two events are linked in real time - the behaviour engenders the reinforcement - and then the behaviour occurs more frequently.
With positive reinforcement the event that occurs is something that your dog likes and will want more of; food, play, attention, petting, etc.
Positive reinforcement embodies the philosophy of causality. Causality denotes a necessary relationship between one event (cause/behaviour) and another event (effect/reinforcement) which is the direct consequence of the first.
Clicker Training
A clicker is a small plastic device containing a metal plate, which when pressed makes a ‘click’ sound. Once the clicker has been paired with a primary reinforcer, for example food, the sound of the clicker is then a secondary reinforcer; it acts as an event marker and signals to your dog that he/she is offering a desired behaviour, and the consequence is that a reward is going to be given.
I use this precise form of communication combined with positive reinforcement. It is an effective, safe, and humane way to teach any animal any behaviour that it is physically and mentally capable of doing.
Operant Conditioning
Clicker training initially starts off as classical conditioning, but quickly becomes operant conditioning as soon as a dog intentionally repeats a behaviour in order to earn a reward. Training through operant conditioning results in purposeful behaviour, while training through classical conditioning results in habitual behaviour.
A dog that behaves with purpose, rather than habit, has become an operant - a dog that actively operates on his/her environment in order to produce a desired effect. Operant conditioning builds confidence, even in a very shy dog, because the dog is aware that it has control over the consequences of its actions.
Desensitisation
Desensitisation is a behaviour modification method I employ when looking to resolve certain dog behaviour problems. Desensitisation involves gradually exposing a dog to stimuli, without provoking the unwanted behaviour.
For example, if a dog becomes fearful, growls and barks at an approaching dog, then the first step would be to find a comfortable distance at which the dog does not growl or show other signs of fear. The stimulus intensity is then increased gradually bringing the dogs closer in proximity without eliciting the fear aggression behaviour. Desensitisation is typically combined with Counter Conditioning for resolving behaviour problems.
Counter Conditioning
Counter conditioning is a method I use to train - condition - a dog to display a behaviour (emotional response), that is counter to (incompatible to), an undesired behaviour in response to a particular stimulus.