Taking Advantage of Teachable Moments and Discoveries with your Service Dog

Teachable moments is a phrase parents often hear meaning that life life presents parents with natural opportunities in which to teach their children valuable life skills and lessons. These are times when children often show their natural interests, strengths, and talents. Once again dogs like children are subject to teachable moments. As a person becomes more intune with their dog, their existing skills and potential for further skill has great potential to increase, that's if you are ready to take adantage of learning opportunities as they present themselves.

Shiloh and I have now been partnered for six months. She has become much more confident in employing the skills she was trained to do before placement with me, as well as gained some new skills such as flushing toilets, ferrying things around the house and wheelchair pulling. The wheelchair pulling and toilet flushing are examples of things I began teaching her when a natural but not life dependent moment to do so presented itself. We happened to be in the bathroom one day and I had time, so I lured her to flush the toilet. It wasn't long before she figured out what I wanted and on the natural marker of the sound of the toilet flushing I threw a mini party. With wheelchair pulling I started by just going for short walks around the block and rewarding her for the slightest pressure against the harness. Again, I did not have anywhere we had to be and we weren't far from home, so I could always call for help. Shiloh is not like a lot of dogs that take any opportunity to go faster. She is quite content to go at my snail pace. Bastien, my first service dog, took to the invitation to go his natural and much faster pace and ran with with it! She is slowly getting the pulling down and as she has more experience with it is enjoying the increase in pace. The other day my roommate and I had some errands to run at the local mall but were in no great rush.I decided that this would be an ideal moment to make some advances in Shiloh's pulling training. Again, I had my roommate so if Shiloh was not interested in working on this it was no big deal. I have trained dogs to pull before and find the low friction, smooth floors of a mall ideal for working on pulling since the chair can coast and the dog is really just maintaining this momentum. My roommate acting as a sort of lure decide to see if she could really get her going by going ahead and calling her. She has since been pulling more steadily.
I also like to take advantage of natural talents and preferences. Shiloh likes to use her feet for things more than her nose. In the case of doors and door buttons her feet often work and work well, but I have been working to show her with the small buttons her nose is more effective and she is now to the point where she is choosing between foot or nose depending on the situation. Shiloh is a very observant girl and it shows.
Bastien is also a dog of many talents. He had a particular talent for learning the names of people, places, and things. I was able to capitalize on this to teach him to find specific people and places while out in public such as my parents, boyfriend, boss, the exits, bathroom and pick up only specific things even if there was a pile of things on the floor.
To take advantage of a teachable moment one needs:
1. Patience
2. Time
3. Rewards on hand
4. To want the dog to succeed but not be in a situation where the dog must do it for safety.
Have any of you had memorable teachable moments with your service dog or been able to identify and turn a natural talent into a trained task?

News: New GPS device Helps Dog Guide Teams Navigate New Places

New Satellite Navigation Device design to work with dog Guide Teams. The GPS device allows the visually impaired user to voice input their destination, then attaches to the harness handle where it vibrates on the left or right for turns. It cost around $1,000. Read the rest of the article.

AKC to allow Mixed Breed dog to Compete

Many service dogs compete in other dog activities such as agility and Rally-O; however, since many service dogs are without papers or crossbreeds they have been unable to compete in AKC sponsored events. Today's news brought the announcement of a new AKC Mixed Breed program that will begin in October of this year.
AKC is a little late to the game, but I am glad to see them realizing that people with mixed breed companions enjoy a variety of dog sports. The American Mixed Breed Obedience Registration began offering formal obedience trials for mixed breed dogs in 1983. The American Association of Pet Dog Trainers and the United States Dog Agility Association, Inc also accept mixed breed and non-papered competitors.
Competing in sports like agility, Rally-O and formal obedience trials can not only enhance the bond between handler and dog, but allow them to learn new behaviors that may benefit their working partnership and fine tune the foundation skills upon which many other behaviors are built. Participating in dog sports also gives handler and dog and additional social outlets. My first service dog, Bastien, and I took a Rally-O class together through a local dog obedience club. We were lucky to find an instructor their who had scene people competing using wheelchairs. She was very enthusiastic in problem solving with us ways to navigate the obstacles. Bastien and I even managed to impress the other competitors with some of our service dog behaviors and skills such as out leash retrievals, and come rounds (a back and turn) that were very helpful in that course. Bastien loved the class and would leave every class completely happy. Rally-O focuses on the partnership as well as the obedience. You can pet your dog, talk to your dog, repeat a cue, but you cannot use harsh correction or physically force your dog to do the behavior in any way. I tell you people (myself included) make absolute fools out of themselves to encourage their dogs and the dogs just love every minute!
I think Rally-O is an excellent idea for new handlers or people looking to have some fun with their service dogs because it meets you where you are at and many of the obstacles transfer to situations service dogs encounter in their working lives. The weave cones, the stay and walk around, the about face turns and many others are all transferable. These moves when practice can lead to the image I treasure of the symmetrical ballet that is a well matched, well established service dog team.

Late Night Emergencies

Warning this post discusses a dog being injured! Please use caution with children and people for whom this topic may be a trigger!






This a post I hoped I would never have to write from personal experience. Two days ago, Einstein, my roommate's service dog slipped out the front door and went exploring. Sadly, this is not one of those incidents we can shrug off. While out he was struck by a car. He is still with us and looks like he will heal. This is every dog owner's worst nightmare. In the hopes that I can make something constructive of the experience, I would like to talk about preparing for emergencies:
1. Know where your nearest all night veterinary hospital is and how to get there.
2. Have someone call the hospital while you are en route and give as many details about the situation as possible.
3. Set aside money in advance for emergency situations. You don't want to have to make your choices based on what you can afford.
4. Take a canine first aid class. Even if you cannot physically perform the first aid, being able to instruct a friend or family member may save your service dog's life.
5. Have a canine first aid kit.