OB380 Unstick the Stuck Heeling: What's Keeping you from Trialing?

Are you and your dog struggling with heeling? Do you and your dog have nice heeling when you train, but the performance falls apart when you leave the comfort of home? Have you been stuck with the same problem for a while and have no idea how to move forward?

Course Details

Look no further; Nancy can help you find the path to confident heeling with your dog. First, we will examine individual goals for both you and your dog and then evaluate where you are in this process. Your performance goals don't have to look like anyone else's. The emphasis will be on finding the proper communication between you and your dog and developing a plan that builds a confident heeling performance.

This class is not designed to teach your dog how to heel. Likewise, it's not intended to help new dogs learn heeling skills. Instead, it's meant for trainers struggling to make progress with their dog's heeling training. Numerous heeling classes teach heeling from the ground up. But there are no classes for people who get stuck and feel paralyzed in their decision-making. Many teams quit because they get stuck.

Nancy will help you shift your emotional state from anxiety, frustration, shame, or any other problematic feelings in a positive direction. Confidence comes from clarity, a plan, support, and understanding. This class can help both you and your dog make that shift.

If you are considering this class as a Bronze student and are concerned about the value when you are not a Gold student, the systematic approach laid out in this course should help you without Nancy's input. In addition, the course is organized so that whenever an issue comes up during heeling training, you will have a plan to address it.

Nancy has developed flow charts and a framework for you to follow to make heeling enjoyable for both you and your dog.

Here's an example video of a reinforcement procedure to help with forging. How you reinforce your dog for heel position is a critical piece of the puzzle.

Teaching Approach

The initial three weeks of this course are of utmost importance as they lay the foundation for a communication framework, a key element in devising a plan for you and your dog. Subsequently, you will learn to incorporate reinforcement procedures tailored to your dog and evaluate the necessary skills to overcome any obstacles.

Most of the lectures in the class are published during Week 3. Releasing all the lectures at this time can be overwhelming for some students. However, only some of the lectures will apply to you and your dog's stuck issue. There will be different starting points since students each have different issues they want to focus on. Many published lectures won't apply to what you want to work on with your dog. But they will be there if you ever need the resource.

During the last four weeks of this class, you will apply the previously learned skills to a training plan specifically for you and your dog. The training plan will be a step-by-step approach to building the heeling skills to get you and your dog unstuck.

You will receive written feedback and occasionally a voiceover video analysis. Most of the homework will involve evaluating the dog's performance and developing a plan to continue the process based on the previously released lectures.

This class is heavy on information; there is much to read in the first two weeks. However, a lot of background and introductory information sets the dog up for future success during the remainder of the course.

Most heeling issues fall into a few common categories. Therefore, it would best serve the Bronze or Silver students to monitor Gold students similar to your situation during the last few weeks. Content and assignments will be based on the team's progress and goals.

This class will have a Teacher's Assistant (TA) available in the study group forum to help the bronze and silver students!

Podcast

Here's an FDSA podcast where I talk about heeling and a lot about this class:

https://fenzidogsports.libsyn.com/e239-nancy-gagliardi-little-unstick-your-heeling

Syllabus

Week 1

How Do We Get Stuck?
Student Assessment
Common Areas Where Stuck Heeling Occurs
Clean Mechanics
Event Markers
Ready To Work, Beginning of Work, End of Work

Week 2

Training Goals
Eliminate Unwanted Behaviors - Clean Loop Training
Transport Procedures
Reinforcement Procedures
Remote Reinforcement - Initial Steps
Remote Reinforcement - Take it on the road

Week 3

Remote Reinforcement - Move Away From Rewards - Add an Entrance
Building a Heeling Training Framework
Training Framework for Common Areas Where Stuck Heeling Occurs
- Building Duration-Reduce Reinforcement
- Maintain Consistent Heel Position
- Maintain Attention or Focus in Heel Position
- Maintain Performance Everywhere
- Maintain Performance Off Leash
Training Framework for specific heeling skills
- Left pivots/left turns
- Right turns
- About turns
- Halts
- Fast pace
- Slow pace

Week 4

Move Away from Reinforcement – Add Work
Execute the heeling training plan
Evaluate
Develop another plan

Week 5

Continue from Week 4
Heeling Patterns

Week 6

Continue from Week 5
Develop a plan to continue.

Prerequisites & Supplies

Prerequisites:Your dog should have heeling knowledge. This class will not teach heeling from the ground up. The focus of this class is to help students that are struggling with progress in any area of heeling training.OB600 - Healing Your Heeling Handling will help clear up many of the issues related to handling. If you think you might need some help with parts of handling, OB600 will be available for purchase until October 15th. We can work on the handling and the dog training pieces if you have this class in your library. Equipment:Depending on what issues you and your dog are stuck on, there might be a recommended prop to help move your training forward.Ring entrance or gate - you will need a simple ring entrance. Nothing fancy is required! If you don't have something handy, there are many creative ways of doing this. Training Space:You will need enough space to work the heeling concepts that have you and your dog stuck.

OB600 Heeling Handling

This course is designed for experienced handlers as well as new obedience handlers that know nothing about the finer points of handling during heeling in obedience.

See details

OB600 Heeling Handling

This course is designed for experienced handlers as well as new obedience handlers that know nothing about the finer points of handling during heeling in obedience.

See details

Sample Lecture

How Do We Get Stuck?

There are common issues that cause dog trainers to get stuck without progress while training dog sports skills. Social media can create feelings of lack because success is gauged by comparison to littermates or other dogs of a similar age. In addition, the little voice inside of your head can introduce negative self-talk and feelings of inadequacy when you don't know how to proceed.

Other issues can arise when the trainer moves through steps too quickly for that particular dog. That might be because the same procedure worked for a previous dog. Or, else, it could be that you did not recognize the signs that the dog was confused at the time. Or perhaps you don't know how your dog got to this point, but here you are. And that's probably the most common cause of being stuck.

Another frequent way you might have gotten stuck is that your dog started to make mistakes when things were going well previously. Then, you decided to return to how you handled your dog before the errors started to occur. And of course, then your dog was perfect again. That perfect performance or perfect skill is your reinforcement. It's what we all aim for when we train our dogs. We wouldn't continue training if our dogs didn't make progress. But now that your dog's performance is perfect, you don't want to move forward again - the risk is that your dog might start making mistakes again. What a dilemma that becomes!

Another possibility is that you don't feel comfortable trying something different. You are following the guidelines or instructions from the same person or group of people. You sense that your dog needs something else. Dog training can be very creative, and there are times when trying something completely novel and different might work. I had heard of some crazy ideas (they seemed unlikely to help) that trainers thought of and tried when their dog struggled with a skill. And lo and behold, it worked for that dog and handler. Unfortunately, most dog trainers lack the confidence to experiment and change things up. Having the confidence as a trainer to try something unconventional or unusual takes a lot of courage.

And if you feel stuck because you lack confidence with your dog training, you are normal. Confidence comes with a training plan. Confidence comes from little successes that build into significant improvements. The key is to take small steps. Then, with success and support, both you and your dog's confidence will improve.

Do you see your situation in any of these examples? If you feel like it, let's talk about it. If you have other reasons you feel stuck, let's talk about them.

Instructors

Nancy Gagliardi Little

Faculty

Nancy Gagliardi Little (she/her) has been training dogs since the early 1980s, when she put an OTCH on her Novice A dog, a Labrador retriever. Since then she has put many advanced obedience titles on her dogs, including 4 AKC OTCH titles, 6 UD titles, 3 UDX titles, and multiple...

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