Well, that whole response I just typed out got all screwed up when I tried to submit it and I don't feel like retyping the entire thing as it was long. GRRRRRR....
well, for those who asked; Sam is almost three years old. He was a rescue so I didn't have the opportunity to train him as a puppy. Uh, we started obedience at Petsmart last January. We completed both of their programs and went on to train with a private obedience club. I've been going there since Sept of last year.
Muckdogs, yeah, I would love to do competition obedience (AKC) somewhere down the road. I'm not into personal protection....that's why I have a gorilla for a husband. I point at the guy who pi$$ed me off...Mr. Boats would go break him in half for me. He could inflict more damage than Sam ever could!:D I realize I'm not going to run next week and enter myself in a competition. It may be another year of two before I feel Sam and I are ready for that step.
PetsMart didn't even give the indication that there is something out there called attention heeling. So, WD, I missed that step in learning the correct way to heel. They were more concerned that the dog got the basics and didn't drag you all over the place. Remember, this is the place that told me that the CGC was a really difficult test and my former trainer only passed one dog in her travels.
I went to the club and all the dogs in my weekly walk-in novice class where focused on their handlers. I thought cool, we're going to be able to do that too. I thought doing the classes here , Sam would pick up on the focusing thing. I didn't know attention heeling existed until almost 2 months into going to the club. My novice trainer just touched on it one night when there were a handful of people in the class. I took some mental noties and figured "okay....that will be something we work on". I still was under the impression that Sam would figure it out since every single dog did it there....."yeah, right"
I looked into an attention heeling walk-in class on another night. But, I got highly frustrated with that class. Most of the dogs in there are utility dogs and I'm the only novice person in there. So, we do intense heeling for an hour and they don't teach you how to do attention heeling. But, at least I did find out Sam can do a five mintue down stay! :) I kind of feel like the parent who's first grader can't spell his name and all the other kids in the class can write complete paragraphs.
So, WD, should I start from scratch and try to re-teach the correct way to heel from the foundation up? I know now, that it's going to take a long time to get where I want to go with the attention thing and it's not going to happen in an afternoon. :)
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Once in class, Ben was paying atttention to me during a heeling exercise, trotting happily at my side...
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That's my goal....that is what I want from Sam when he's heeling.
Thanks so much as always!