ClickerExpo Portland | Conference Program

Questioning Common Training Ideas and Practices☆ - Chirag Patel

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Science

As a consultant, Ken is called upon frequently to resolve training challenges. These challenges have ranged from problematic zoo animals to difficult working dogs to more common pet challenges. In every case, he utilizes structured problem-solving processes and tools that guide him and his clients to an effective solution. Ken will share that process with participants and use several case studies to demonstrate how to problem-solve effectively. Become a better, more confident problem-solver with Ken!

Questioning Common Training Ideas and Practices☆

Precise Heeling Deconstructed☆ - Hannah Branigan

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Science

Related Learning Lab:

Questioning Common Training Ideas and Practices – In Action!

Join Chirag Patel for a new look at common ideas and practices in behavior and training. There are many things that we do because they are popular or sound like common sense, but what does the “science sense” say about them? Topics discussed in this Session will include teaching quiet, impulse control, frustration-tolerance exercises, classical conditioning, and puppy-play biting.

Precise Heeling Deconstructed☆

A Moment of Science: Clicker Training 101 - Kathy Sdao

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Competition, Skill

Related Learning Lab:

Precise Heeling Deconstructed – In Action!

Can we reverse-engineer beautiful heeling? When you see a team moving together in sync, heeling looks almost like a dance. Flashy, top-scoring heeling requires fluent understanding of the position combined with complex movement skills that allow the dog to adjust his body seamlessly to stay in position as the handler moves. Are dogs born with the floaty, animated gait that makes their heeling so flashy, or can it be trained? (Spoiler: We can train it!)

In this Session, we will deconstruct the complex behavior of precise heeling and analyze the differences between an adequate performance and a breathtaking one. Then we will isolate the component behaviors that are needed and develop a plan to teach them to optimize any dog’s movement and skills and to bring a team closer to the magical ideal.

A Moment of Science: Clicker Training 101

Failing the Marshmallow Test: A Thoughtful Approach to the Teaching of Impulse Control☆ - Sarah Owings

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Science, Skill

You might be new to clicker training. Or maybe you’ve been using it but are confused by the terminology or uncertain why we do things the way we do. Here’s an introductory course on learning theory and the key scientific principles that govern clicker training. The information you’ll learn here will inform the many choices you make as a trainer and will improve your application of clicker training techniques.

Kathy Sdao, applied animal behaviorist, former marine-mammal trainer, and dog professional, is a gifted teacher who enjoys sparking her students’ interest in the science of animal training. Start your ClickerExpo experience on Friday with this Session and you will have the foundation and vocabulary to help you understand, enjoy and benefit from the rest of the program.

Failing the Marshmallow Test: A Thoughtful Approach to the Teaching of Impulse Control☆

Puppy Start Right One to One: Private Lessons☆ - Debbie Martin

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Science, Skill

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 8 dog/handler teams. Teams should have some basic clicker training experience using both verbal markers and clickers. Dogs should be able to work calmly in close quarters with other dogs around food and toys. If any dog is deemed too stressed or disruptive, that team will be directed to move to a back corner of the room or asked to leave. You may participate with your dog, or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

The Marshmallow Test was a test devised by the psychologist Walter Mischel in the 1960s as a way to study delayed gratification in young children. Although the results have not held up under scrutiny, the conclusion drawn by researchers that a person’s ability to resist a food temptation at a young age ultimately means more successful outcomes in life, remains a much-discussed idea in popular culture today. “Impulse control” is a hotly debated concept in the world of positive reinforcement training, too. Often, the way we train for it resembles a kind of marshmallow test for our animals.

The Lab discussion will dig into questions such as: What do we really mean when we talk about impulse control? Can trainers control impulses? Are animals and, in particular, dogs capable of the executive functioning required to understand delayed gratification the way humans can? When an animal succeeds in resisting a temptation, what is really going on behaviorally? What learning principles underly the training protocols that are often used to get impulse control? Are there better ways to achieve the important goal of a safe and calm animal around potentially exciting stimuli like food, squirrels, toys, and more?

In the active/exercise portion of the Lab, we will focus on practical teaching strategies that avoid some of the frustration and emotional conflict that can come along with learning via negative punishment and extinction. Depending on what each dog and handler team inspires in the moment, exercises may include:

Release cues
Back-chained Zen Bowl
Leave it without the “Leave it”
Temptations as cues
Distractions as non-relevant stimuli
Stimulus control (waiting for cues, listening for cues) without extinction

Puppy Start Right One-to-One: Private Lessons☆

Lunch & Roundtable Discussions

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Business, Teaching Others, Veterinary

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 10 dog/handler teams. Participating dogs need not be puppies! Older dogs need these lessons, too. However, this Lab is intended to demonstrate preventive measures; it is not for the treatment of existing issues. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

Interested in teaching Puppy Start Right Preschool classes but have a business model based on private training? Have a client that can’t make it to your group puppy classes, or a puppy that has a medical condition? No worries, the Puppy Start Right curriculum can be modified easily for private lessons.

In this Learning Lab, Debbie Martin will share options for customizing the Puppy Start Right Preschool program (or any group puppy-socialization class) into one-to-one sessions, including how to approach the lack of puppy play time. This Lab will also delve into implementation of proper socialization and exposure.

In addition to practicing positive exposure to novel items, prevention exercises, such as teaching a puppy to enjoy having people around his food bowl and having his collar reached for and touched, will also be demonstrated and practiced.

12:30pm - 2:00pm • Friday, January 25

Don’t miss out on the networking roundtable lunch, where you will have the opportunity to dive into more detail on topics of mutual interest with faculty members and fellow attendees. View our planned table topics here.

Lunch is $28 per person and on Friday includes:

Romaine Salad with Herb Crusted Croutons, Shaved Parmesan, and Cucumber Remoulade
Grilled Artichoke Pasta Salad
Vegetable Soup (GF)
Chicken Chile Verde: Tomatillo, Cilantro (GF)
Rice (GF)
Dessert
Coffee, Tea

Lunches are prepared by the hotel and available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to purchase or change meals is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

2:00pm - 3:30pm • Friday, January 25

Reactive to Relaxed: What's Next in Control Unleashed☆ - Leslie McDevitt

Reactive to Relaxed: What’s Next in Control Unleashed☆

Leslie McDevitt

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Skill

Join the author of Control Unleashed™ (CU), Leslie McDevitt, for the latest evolutions in the popular book and counter-conditioning program that has helped working, performance, and pet dogs feel comfortable and safe in any challenging environment.

Leslie will provide revisions to, and new perspectives on, the original program, including the “Look at That” game and its evolution over the years. She will introduce new protocols and games such as Voluntary Sharing for Resource Guarders and Requested Approach Training—for dogs worried about meeting new people and other dogs. New CU protocols even give dogs a “start button” to control their own counter-conditioning and allow for a clear feedback loop between dog and human.

Join Leslie for her debut at ClickerExpo!

Animals in Control: “Start-Button” Case Studies☆ - Eva Bertilsson & Emelie Johnson Vegh

Animals in Control: “Start-Button” Case Studies☆

Eva Bertilsson & Emelie Johnson Vegh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Competition, Skill

“Start-button” behaviors are behaviors that are taught to an animal partner to direct the pace and progress of another behavior or procedure. For example, a dog that learns to nod “yes” to indicate he’s ready to start the teeter movement, a horse indicating that the ferrier may pick up his foot, a cat ready to start a pairing procedure of vacuum cleaner = goodies, and a giraffe indicating that he is ready for tactile work are all start-button behaviors.

Start buttons are an integral piece within the training philosophy, highlighted in the last few years at ClickerExpo conferences. They provide greater control to the animals themselves over aspects of the training process, elevate the level of dialog between the animals and the trainer, enhance the level of trust, and improve results. Emelie and Eva help you learn the details of start buttons, case by case.

In this Session, Emelie and Eva will conduct an in-depth exploration of start buttons, through case studies that stretch over 20 years and showcase the variety and depth of uses of start-button training in different venues and species. In the cases studies, you’ll learn how trainers work with concepts such as goal-setting, and to choose if and how to implement a start-button behavior. Selecting specific teaching strategies and session structures, designing desensitization protocols, choosing reinforcers, selecting the placement of rewards, implementing “stop-button” behaviors, and more are all presented and discussed.

Join Emelie and Eva and become inspired to continue the journey of enhancing learner control—no matter the venue, no matter the species!

This Session will include case studies, video examples, story-telling, and opportunity for questions.

My Question Is... Getting Started with Horses☆ - Alexandra Kurland

My Question Is… Getting Started with Horses☆

Alexandra Kurland

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Equine

How do you introduce clicker training to your horse, and how do you use it to solve the training puzzles you are dealing with? In this Session, you will find the answers to your questions.

Most attendees come to ClickerExpo with specific questions. Trainers have hit a stumbling block that they are just not sure how to solve, or they can’t quite visualize the next step in the training. Perhaps you’re new to horses and want to know how to get started. Or, you have a horse that gets nervous out on trails. What do you do? How do you connect the dots between all the wonderful presentations you’re going to attend during ClickerExpo and the puzzles you’re trying to solve at home?

After a short introduction, Alexandra will open the presentation to your questions to be certain that your questions get answered. When questions drive the teaching process, more engaged learning occurs. You get to present the problem and Alexandra will demonstrate a process for creating an organized path to a solution.

At the end of the Session, attendees will look back and have not just the answer to their specific questions, but generalizable knowledge they can turn to for training guidance. Knowledge will include an understanding of goal setting within the clicker training framework, skills that provide the foundation for all training, how to define “problems” in a way that leads to solutions, and how to keep moving forward toward your goals.

Come ready to engage! Whether you are solving a training problem or building toward a performance goal, you’ll be learning how to identity and train the components that lead to success.

Train that Chain: Behavior Chains - Laura VanArendonk Baugh

Train that Chain: Behavior Chains

Questioning Common Training Ideas and Practices - In Action!☆ - Chirag Patel

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Skill

Related Learning Lab:

Train That Chain: Behavior Chains – In Action!

At some point, we realize that one click and one treat per behavior will be cumbersome to keep up forever; it’s simply impossible for certain important behaviors or tasks. At that point, we must develop and maintain chains of behaviors.

Behavior chains can be smooth and efficient packages of pristine behavior if handled well, or they can be frustrating and time-consuming if handled poorly. They can also be our worst behavioral nightmares, reinforcing bad behaviors, if they are not planned carefully!

This Session will focus on:

Defining a behavior chain
Cues as reinforcers
Types of chains
Poisoned cues and their impact on chains
A closer look at back-chaining
Maintaining a chain
Finishing a chain
Varied uses of chains
Duration behaviors as chains
Breaking a chain

Questioning Common Training Ideas and Practices – In Action!☆

Precise Heeling Deconstructed - In Action!☆ - Hannah Branigan

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Science

Prerequisite Session:

Questioning Common Training Ideas and Practices

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 6 dog/handler teams. Teams should bring with them: (1) a water bowl that is familiar (one that the dog drinks from daily at home); (2) water that the dog is familiar with; (3) a blanket, mat, towel, or bed that is familiar to the dog; (4) a selection (3-6) items /toys for the dog; and (5) a selection of treats that will function as reinforcers for the dog’s behavior. Dogs must be experienced working successfully in a busy group setting and in close quarters with other working dogs, even when excited. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

In this Learning Lab, Chirag Patel will demonstrate practical examples of using a science-sense approach to teaching what some would label impulse control and frustration-tolerance exercises. Lab participants will then work hands-on and practice these exercises while receiving coaching and feedback from Chirag.

Precise Heeling Deconstructed – In Action!☆

TeamTaught: The Elusive Skill of Shaping☆ - Hannah Branigan, Alexandra Kurland, Theresa McKeon, Ken Ramirez, and Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Competition, Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Precise Heeling Deconstructed

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 10 dog/handler teams. Teams should be clicker-savvy and have experience with both front-foot and full-body platforms. Dogs should have fluent chin and nose target behaviors with at least 3 seconds of duration, and experience with rear-paw targeting. Dogs must be experienced working successfully in a busy group setting and in close quarters with other working dogs, even when excited. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

In this Learning Lab, you will use targeting and shaping to build and refine your dog’s movement skills and component behaviors that contribute to precise and flashy heeling.

3:30pm - 4:00pm • Friday, January 25

Afternoon Break

4:00pm - 5:45pm • Friday, January 25

TeamTaught: The Elusive Skill of Shaping☆

Hannah Branigan, Alexandra Kurland, Theresa McKeon, and Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Moderated by: Ken Ramirez

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Science, Skill

The new 2019 TeamTaught format brings together a small team of ClickerExpo faculty members to present distinct perspectives on a single theme. In this Session of TeamTaught, we will discuss the art and science of shaping—and why both excellence in practice and agreement in principle often seem elusive.

For example, there is confusion about the definition of shaping. How is shaping different from capturing, free-shaping, and scanning? Can prompting be considered part of a shaping plan? How does environmental management fit into good shaping? There is even confusion about how to begin the shaping process, particularly for novice trainers. Join Hannah, Alex, Jesús, and Theresa to discuss these and other questions that make shaping both alluring and elusive.

Making New Mistakes☆ - Michele Pouliot

Making New Mistakes☆

Aging Dogs: Functioning for Life☆ - Lori Stevens

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Competition, Skill

Errorless learning refers to training techniques that are designed intentionally so that the learner does not make mistakes while learning new behavior. Errorless learning is often contrasted with trial-and-error learning, in which efforts may be correct or incorrect and with the intention of mistakes also assisting in the learning process.

Are errors beneficial to learning? Does “error-free” learning create superior behavior? How do mistakes help or hinder the learner? Do errors develop resilience? Is it even possible to ensure that learning is errorless? If errors do have the capacity to support learning, how do trainers avoid negative outcomes (for example, decline in confidence, increased mistakes)? This Session on errorless learning versus learning with mistakes will lead you to ponder your own training program.

In this Session, Michele will explore how these kinds of questions have impacted her 45 years of training horses, guide dogs for the blind, and dogs for competition sports. In Michele’s first 25 years of experience, she trained through traditional methods that relied on using errors to train dependable behavior. Her last 20 years of training have been filled with discovery through practicing positive reinforcement methods. Through these extremely contrasted experiences, Michele will delve into the hot topic of errorless learning versus learning with mistakes.

Aging Dogs: Functioning for Life☆

4:00pm - 4:45pm Free Cookies? Non-Contingent Reinforcement for Frustration - Sarah Owings

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Health & Wellness, Skill

In this Session, Lori will provide information helpful to everyone living or working with older dogs. As dogs age, they slow down just as we do. Typically, dogs lose hind-end strength and proprioception. Mental and sensory functioning often decline as well. As the aging process continues, many dogs lose the ability to function in life’s daily activities, for example, going up and down stairs. This loss is partially due to muscle weakness, which can often be strengthened so dogs can regain function again. This Session will introduce bodywork, fitness exercises, useful equipment, and tips for everyday life with older dogs.

You will learn how to keep aging dogs active and how to keep them functioning. You’ll also learn what you can do to support aging dogs and help them regain confidence. This information is empowering in an area where we often feel helpless.

Applying these techniques will make life easier for your aging dog. It will also make caring for aging dogs easier, more joyful, and enriching for you.

Free Cookies? Non-Contingent Reinforcement for Frustration

5:00pm - 5:45pm Psychopharmacology and the Trainer☆- Debbie Martin

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Shelter & Rescue, Skill

Demand and frustration-related behaviors are often hard to live with, and can damage the human-animal bond. Barking, pawing, jumping up, vocalizing, destructiveness—even aggression—are loud expressions of need, that when ignored, often just get louder. Common fixes such as “ignore what you don’t like / reinforce what you do,” frequently backfire, resulting in even more resilient versions of the problem behaviors than you started with.

When applied systematically, non-contingent reinforcement provides a simple, yet powerful starting point for addressing many of these types of issues. By meeting the underlying needs of a learner up front in such a way that “attention-seeking” or demand behaviors become unnecessary, new, healthier communication patterns have a chance to emerge. For trainers looking beyond NILIF, status reduction, and “Learn to Earn” type protocols, non-contingent reinforcement invites us to explore new possibilities of increased understanding and co-operation with the animals we share our lives with.

Psychopharmacology and the Trainer☆

Muzzle Tov!☆ - Kathy Sdao

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Science, Veterinary

If you are a trainer working with a pet that is taking behavioral medication, it is important to know potential side effects. This Session will discuss some of the common classes of behavior medication and how these medications may affect the pet and your training plan. This Session will not discuss dosages or medication choices for behavioral conditions.

Muzzle Tov!☆

Train that Chain - In Action! - Laura VanArendonk Baugh

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Veterinary, Shelter & Rescue

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 4 dog/handler teams. Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship, be comfortable with normal handling, and be able to work in close quarters with other dogs. Handlers should have some experience with shaping. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

We invest time and care ensuring that each of our dogs is comfortable wearing a well-fitted harness (or collar), because this gear is considered essential for attaching leashes, carrying ID tags, and more. Yet we tend to skip ensuring that our dogs are comfortable wearing a well-fitted muzzle because this gear is optional, right? Or only for bad dogs? And ugly and stigmatizing? Well, no… Come learn why muzzle training is a gift we can give every dog.

At some point in their lives, many dogs will be in a situation where fear, pain, or uncertainty makes them more likely to bite (for example, at the emergency vet clinic or in a novel social situation). Having an easy way to place a barrier between the dog’s teeth and any human or animal nearby increases safety, opens up behavior-modification options, and helps everyone relax. We’ll discuss specific training applications where muzzles are an asset, tips to overcome client aversion, and potential problems to avoid.

We’ll also practice muzzle-acclimation techniques.

Train that Chain: Behavior Chains – In Action!

Spot-Remover: Clean Up “Not Quite Right” Behavior - Hannah Branigan

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Train that Chain: Behavior Chains

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 12 dog/handler teams. Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship and should have at least five fluent and reliable behaviors. Dogs should be able to work in close quarters with other dogs. Handlers should have some experience with shaping. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

At some point, you realize that one click and one treat per behavior will be cumbersome to keep up forever; it’s simply impossible for certain important behaviors or tasks. Chaining together behaviors is essential to efficient and useful training, and it’s not nearly as hard as some fear!

This Lab will walk dog/handler teams through forward chaining and back-chaining, the importance of testing cues for use in chains, and how to recover from mistakes and fix broken chains.

Observers may be asked to assist working teams with data collection or other aids.

7:00pm - 9:00pm • Friday, January 25

Social Event - SOLD OUT

SOLD OUT!

Come, kick back, and relax with a networking game, music, socializing, food, a cash bar, plus the chance to win prizes. Join us for this fun night to start the weekend off right!

The Friday night social event is $40 per person and includes:

Roasted garlic roma tomatoes, pesto crostini, fresh mozzarella, basil
Antipasto Skewers: Marinated Mozzarella, Tomatoes, Artichokes
Tandoori Chicken Meatballs
B.B.Q. Pork Sliders with Shredded Pork, Pineapple Slaw, Brioche Bun
Teriyaki Chicken Wings (GF)
Vegetable Spring Roll with Sweet Chili Sauce

The social event is available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to change meals and events is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

SUNDAY

DAY 2 - Saturday, January 26, 2019

7:00am - 9:00am • Saturday, January 26

Breakfast

Jump-start your day by joining us for breakfast! Breakfast is $20 per person and on Saturday includes:

Chorizo Scramble: Eggs with Potatoes, Onions, and Green Chili Peppers
Veggie Scramble: Asparagus, Spinach, Peppers, and Fontina
Oatmeal with Raisins, Dried Cranberries, Brown Sugar, and Milk (GF)
Sliced Fruit
Juice, Tea, Coffee

Breakfasts are prepared by the hotel and available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to purchase or change meals is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

8:00am - 8:45am • Saturday, January 26

Spot-Remover: Clean Up “Not Quite Right” Behavior

Teaching and Training at the Next Level: Karen Pryor Academy - Lindsay Wood Brown

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Competition, Skill

Have you ever trained something into a behavior accidentally, and then wished you could go back in time and undo it? Me, too. But we can’t go back.

Whether it’s a squeak as the dog moves into heel position, a foot shuffle on a stand stay—or maybe you’ve trained your dog to nose-then-paw on a paw target? Sometimes “junk” behaviors get reinforced accidentally as part of a goal behavior; often, this is not realized until after the fact. Are those little quirks permanent? What can you do to get rid of them? In this Session, we’ll talk about how those unwanted behaviors creep into training sessions and we will discuss strategies and tips to remove them without losing that enthusiasm valued so highly in clicker-crazy dogs.

Teaching and Training at the Next Level: Karen Pryor Academy

KONG Solutions - KONG Company

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Business, Science, Skill, Teaching Others

Are you an experienced trainer hoping to develop your expertise in behavioral fluency, stimulus control, and the use of cues as reinforcers? Perhaps you’re new to the field, ready to start your own business and strengthen your teaching and training skill-set alongside a supportive, global community of certified trainers? Or, perhaps you’re looking for education courses you can take online to further your skills, knowledge, and relationship with your dog.

Join KPA faculty member and board-certified Applied Animal Behaviorist Lindsay Wood Brown to learn about the highlights of Karen Pryor Academy’s full range of courses. Lindsay will discuss the Dog Trainer Professional program and your potential to surge forward in your career—no matter where you are now or how long you’ve been a trainer! This Session will demonstrate how Karen Pryor Academy can help you achieve your training education goals and career aspirations. Lindsay will offer a taste of the content from all of KPA’s courses and discuss the benefits of a KPA education. There will be plenty of time for you to ask questions as well!

Success as a Service Dog Trainer - Atlas Assistance Dogs

Success as a Service Dog Trainer

Atlas Assistance Dogs

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Sponsor

Service dogs seem to be everywhere we turn these days, and we are continually discovering novel and amazing ways dogs can help people that we never imagined or understood before. But even with an increase in the number of service dogs, there are many people who might truly benefit from a service dog but have not been able to get the kind of training and support they need and do not know where to turn to for help.

Atlas Assistance Dogs® is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to help eliminate obstacles people face in obtaining a properly trained service dog. We respect that disabilities are a part of someone – not something to fight or hide from, but something to claim and thrive with. We work with people with disabilities to help them find the independence and quality of life possible with a well-trained service dog at their side.

Most trainers at Clicker Expo understand how to read and adjust to a dog’s stress signs and how to use compassionate training methods to successfully shape dogs’ behavior. However, there is a whole other art and science to understanding how to work with people with disabilities – be it physical, psychological, or a combination of both – in safe, respectful, and effective ways. Atlas is dedicated to preparing trainers to be successful working with people with disabilities and their dogs.

Come learn about the vast array of people, dogs, and service specialty skills it takes to be a part of this incredibly rewarding and needed field. Expand your understanding of what service dogs can do and who can train them. Discover important aspects about what you should have in your training program or facilities to meet internationally recognized requirements and to protect yourself, your clients and their dogs.

Atlas has developed a comprehensive training program for professional trainers wishing to be service dog trainers as well as for our volunteer team facilitators who work hands on with our clients. Learn how Atlas’ team facilitator and trainer programs can help you acquire the skills and knowledge necessary to be successful as a service dog trainer. Hear from some of our clients, facilitators, and trainers about the impact this work has had on them and find out how to get involved.

9:00am - 10:30am • Saturday, January 26

Location, Location, Location: Refining Behavior with Reward Location☆ - Michele Pouliot

Location, Location, Location: Refining Behavior with Reward Location☆

Fit for Life: Building a Strong Foundation☆ - Lori Stevens

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Competition, Skill

Real estate agents know the power of “location.” Clicker trainers should understand and take advantage of the power of “location” as well.

Many positive reinforcement trainers use a variety of methods for reward delivery, depending on the goals for the behavior being trained. Styles of delivery can affect the learner in different ways (for example, raise energy, promote stillness, reset for the next repetition, support a specific position). Can the use of reward strategies be taken even further?

In this Session, Michele shares her ongoing experiences with applying reward strategies. Over the past eight years, Michele has continued to discover the power in using specific reward locations and deliveries for training and maintaining a variety of behaviors. Thoughtful strategies can result in rapid learning of even complex behaviors.

Michele will demonstrate training a variety of behaviors using specific reward strategies for each goal behavior. The results show how amazingly powerful a well-applied strategy is, supporting very fast learning. Behavior examples will include distance responses, challenging body poses, and a variety of trick behaviors.

Join Michele as she shares enlightening moments of discovery in the available power in the application of reward-location strategies.

Fit for Life: Building a Strong Foundation☆

What a Cue Can Do: Developing Cueing Skills - Kathy Sdao

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Health & Wellness, Skill

Related Learning Lab:

Fit for Life: Building a Strong Foundation – In Action

Fitness is important for your dog’s health, and doing fitness exercises with your dog is fun and enriching for both of you! In this Session, Lori will introduce foundation exercises for including canine fitness in your dog’s life. These exercises increase muscle strength and improve performance, confidence, flexibility, focus, body awareness, and balance.

This Session will focus on getting foundation behaviors for fitness and learning how to observe posture and encourage proper alignment. You will also learn how to introduce canine fitness equipment and how to progress through the exercises safely. Dogs exude joy when canine fitness is taught in an empowering, enriching, safe, and reinforcing environment.

In this Session and its associated Learning Lab, you will learn how to help your dog find that joy and acquire the skills needed to reap the benefits of canine fitness.

What a Cue Can Do: Developing Cueing Skills

How to Win Friends & Influence Puppies: Effective Socialization - Laura VanArendonk Baugh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Skill

Related Learning Lab:

What a Cue Can Do – In Action! – Sarah Owings

Effective cueing is essential for achieving reliable responses. The process of adding cues in clicker training is different than in other training methods. Getting behaviors on cue is often the most difficult concept for new clicker trainers to understand because the process is somewhat counterintuitive.

This Session is about choosing and maintaining effective cues for operant behaviors as well as understanding how cues are integral to more advanced training applications. Kathy will show you how to use cues to gain control of operant behaviors. You’ll learn what a cue is—and isn’t—and how cues differ from commands. We’ll discuss how to choose cues to maximize clarity and how cues function in behavior chains.

How to Win Friends & Influence Puppies: Effective Socialization

Human Behavior: Now that I Know—What Do I Do?☆ - Theresa McKeon

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Science, Shelter & Rescue

Proper socialization is essential for a healthy, happy family dog, yet socialization is one of the most misunderstood and under-utilized concepts among American pet owners. Instead of solving problems, we could be preventing them. This Session will cover the science of socialization and the recommended techniques to use in puppy-socialization programs or with your own dog.

Human Behavior: Now that I Know—What Do I Do?☆

Theresa McKeon

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Teaching Others

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 25 spots for participants. You may participate or you may attend as an observer. This Lab is for people; no need to bring your dogs—let them rest! The focus will be on trainer skills.

You know the saying, “Training the dog is the easy part. It’s the human that’s the challenge.” But behavior can be identified and reinforced—no matter the species. In this Lab we’ll discuss how to observe and acknowledge human behavior, and then practice using that information to build a supportive learning environment for the student and the teacher.

Identify human behaviors that can influence learning.
Identify human body language and what the learner is trying to “tell” you.
Practice breaking down the constructs: clumsy, scared, overwhelmed, excited, or unwilling.
Explore: “Now that I know, what do I do?”
Learn to use TAGteach tools WOOF and the Focus Funnel to respond to your learner with just the right amount of instruction, information, and reinforcement.

These tools are not just for those who teach people to train their animals. TAGteach tools are now being used in the medical field, corporate training, classrooms, on the sports field, and in the home to help those who teach, identify learner behavior, and fine-tune their response.

Streetwise: Polite Greetings on the Street - Emma Parsons

Streetwise: Polite Greetings on the Street

Conservation & The Creative Trainer - Ken Ramirez

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Skill

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 8 dog/handler teams. It is recommended that teams have a working knowledge of the click to calm methodology. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

Do you have a dog that simply cannot control himself or herself meeting a stranger on the street? Does the dog start propelling his/herself in the air, and start barking if he or she can’t meet the person fast enough? Do all of your attempts to try to make the dog sit (the most popular solution) end in despair? If so, come to this Learning Lab!

We will use the Click to Calm method to explore ways in which a dog is first shaped to see the person and settle, and then shaped to meet the person courteously, keeping all four paws on the ground. This behavior is put on the verbal cue “Go Say Hi.” After the dog greets the person gently, he bounces back to his handler to receive the next cue: remain with his handler or spend more time with the visitor. This process creates a much more versatile learning environment for all involved.

10:30am - 11:00am • Saturday, January 26

Morning Break

11:00am - 12:30pm • Saturday, January 26

Conservation & The Creative Trainer

The Power of the Pattern: Counter-Conditioning Games with an Operant Twist☆ - Leslie McDevitt

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill

Creative trainers are always finding new ways to apply their skills and knowledge. In the last several decades, trainers have used advanced training skills to give back to nature and contribute to a wide range of conservation initiatives.

Conservation training is an exciting and expanding area where experienced trainers can put their skills to use. Key applications include the expanded use of husbandry behaviors for conservation research, remote training projects, introduction of species to the wild, and other uses of behavior knowledge that aid in managing and studying animals in order to contribute to conservation. These applications have been used to assist with conservation efforts with condors, wolves, sea otters, dolphins, sea lions, polar bears, sea turtles, chimpanzees, elephants, and many others. The use of remote training in these projects has great possibilities for application in the pet-training world.

Ken will share his training experiences with several of his unique conservation projects as well as projects initiated by other skilled trainers. See if this work appeals to you! You may find ideas and inspiration for your creative training at home.

The Power of the Pattern: Counter-Conditioning Games with an Operant Twist☆

Leslie McDevitt

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Competition, Science, Skill, Teaching Others, Shelter & Rescue

Related Learning Lab:

The Power of the Pattern: Counter-Conditioning with an Operant Twist – In Action!

Come learn the power of Pattern Games, a set of exercises designed specifically to empower dogs to initiate their own counter-conditioning procedure. Pattern Games combine the power of operant conditioning with counter-conditioning.

Why patterns? Dogs learn best within a clear and comfortable rule structure that involves a flow of feedback between learner and trainer. Patterns offer dogs this structure, or system of rules, they can operate while feeling safe. From the safety of patterns, dogs learn to function well and feel relaxed around things they worry about. Patterns are also easy for both dogs and trainers to learn, and allow for creativity, as any short, repetitive behavior chain can be transformed into a new pattern game. Your dog can make up his own!

Join Leslie for her ClickerExpo debut and Pattern Games!

Progress Guaranteed: Never Get Stuck in Your Training Again - Eva Bertilsson & Emelie Johnson Vegh

Progress Guaranteed: Never Get Stuck in Your Training Again

Eva Bertilsson & Emelie Johnson Vegh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Skill, Competition

We have all experienced situations where our dogs stop making training progress. They do the wrong behavior, they freeze, or they just look at us, disinterested. Eva and Emelie call this, ”getting stuck.” Getting stuck can take many forms, and it isn’t fun or helpful for you or your dog. Can we do anything about it? Absolutely!

Eva and Emelie have created an innovative twist in the training process that can un-stick your dog. When incorporated from the start, this technique will prevent the dog from getting stuck altogether. What’s the secret? Train so that behaviors can be both spontaneous and on cue. At first this may seem paradoxical (spontaneous AND on cue?), but it is not. This idea is the core of training in Scandinavia, where training spontaneously offered behavior is part and parcel of a standard training plan.

This Session will cover:

How understanding spontaneous behaviors, prompts and cues helps you unstick your dog
How to use stimulus control, contextual cues, and repetition savviness to your advantage
Acknowledging cues and prompts as potent reinforcers
Going cueless— how you can work with spontaneous behaviors for foundation training, refinement, and problem-solving (“the Scandinavian way”)
Training-session structures for spontaneous behaviors vs. cued or prompted behaviors
Transitioning a behavior from being prompted to being offered spontaneously, without the dog being left in limbo and waiting for help
Dealing with mistakes within the realm of spontaneous offered behavior
Teaching and retraining cues

This Session will include video, demos, and, hopefully, a lively discussion! Don’t get stuck in that same old place. Join Eva and Emelie.

Striking it Rich! Gold Nuggets from Popular Horse Training Paradigms☆- Peggy Hogan

Striking it Rich! Gold Nuggets from Popular Horse Training Paradigms☆

Peggy Hogan

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Equine, Skill

Looking back through the techniques and concepts of other horse training philosophies has the potential to be helpful and bring insights for horse trainers transitioning to clicker training. Join Peggy as she mines for usable gold—insights about horses and behavior—buried in other training approaches, insights that are both consistent with and helpful to learning and adopting positive reinforcement-based techniques.

The horse community in general is a relative newcomer to the world of clicker training. By connecting dots between past and future practices, Peggy makes it easier to adopt, adapt, and use clicker training principles with horses. For example, Peggy will look at other horse training processes and protocols, ranging from Dressage to Natural Horsemanship. She will show how to adopt popular techniques like training at liberty, developing a soft feel, and creating tactile cues, all with positive reinforcement.

This 90-minute Session will include video examples and some light audience participation.

Fit for Life: Building a Strong Foundation - In Action!☆ - Lori Stevens

Fit for Life: Building a Strong Foundation – In Action!☆

What a Cue Can Do - In Action! - Sarah Owings

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Health & Wellness, Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Fit for Life: Building a Strong Foundation

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 5 dog/handler teams, and Lori will coach one team at a time. As the teams develop foundation behaviors, participants and observers will work on sharpening their own observation skills.

Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship, be comfortable with normal handling, and be able to work in close quarters with other dogs. Dogs should be fluent in nose-to-hand targeting: moving from A to B to target your hand. It will also be useful if dogs can target with two front paws, for example, step up to a platform. Handlers should know how to shape and prompt behaviors. Be prepared to reinforce your dog often. Please also ensure that your veterinarian has cleared your dog to do fitness exercises.

You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

In this Learning Lab the primary goal is to help you and your dog find joy while doing canine fitness exercises properly! You will see how to set up the environment for fitness exercises as well as learn about safety and effectiveness. Topics and activities will include reinforcement strategy, position resets, getting proper alignment, and how to empower your dog during fitness training. You will also learn how your body position influences your dog’s movement and alignment. This is an introductory Lab; no prior canine fitness experience is needed.

What about equipment? You’ll learn what equipment to start with and how to progress the exercises so that your dog stays safe and in proper alignment, while getting the benefits of the next level of difficulty.

What a Cue Can Do – In Action!

Lunch & Roundtable Discussions - SOLD OUT

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Skill

Prerequisite Session:

What a Cue Can Do: Developing Cueing Skills – Kathy Sdao

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 8 dog/handler teams. Dogs need to have at least 2-3 behaviors on cue, be comfortable with normal handling, and be comfortable working in close quarters with other dogs and people. Any dogs that seem overly stressed or disruptive will be asked to move to a far corner of the room or asked to leave. Handlers need a minimum of foundation-level clicker training experience. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

Understanding and working with cues effectively is a key component of becoming a skilled clicker trainer. This Lab will explore what cues are and how they set the stage for behavior, by asking the age-old question: “Does your cue really mean what your dog thinks it means?”

Working in small discussion groups along with observers, participants will be guided to tease out the most salient aspects of their cues by testing the parameters of those cues one by one. If dogs are making mistakes, we will then use what we learn from the “saliency tests” to clear up any cuing confusions or communication glitches.

Depending on time and skill-level of participants, we may also go through the process of shaping a simple behavior, putting it on cue, and then teaching the dogs how to wait and listen for that cue. Reviewing best practices and shaping basics in this way is important, because behaviors taught cleanly right from the start, with cues added at the correct time, rarely need any cleaning up later.

12:30pm - 2:00pm • Saturday, January 26

SOLD OUT!

At the networking roundtable lunch you will have the opportunity to dive into more detail on topics of mutual interest with faculty members and fellow attendees. View our planned table topics here.

Lunch is $28 per person and on Saturday includes:

Pulled Pork Sliders
Traditional Slaw
Roasted Veggies
Vegan Chicken patties
Home Fried Potatoes
Dessert
Tea, Coffee

Lunches are prepared by the hotel and available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to change meals is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

2:00pm - 3:30pm • Saturday, January 26

Goldiamond in the Rough: History and Insights from Skinner to Goldiamond☆ - Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Goldiamond in the Rough: History and Insights from Skinner to Goldiamond☆

Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Science

The history of operant conditioning is fascinating—full of people, their personalities, and their insights. With a little look at “hidden” or lesser known history, we can see both the direct line of connection between the giant mind of B.F. Skinner to current practices, as well as the links and breakthroughs of great behavior scientists, like Israel Goldiamond, that also directly influence (or should) practices today.

For example, the idea that behavior could be built bit by bit was a central tenant of B.F. Skinner’s operant conditioning. Skinner showed that by arranging a suitable environment and then carefully selecting certain responses, completely new behaviors could be taught. Unlike the trial-and-error learning of other theorists, Skinner didn’t think that errors were necessary for learning. Skinner first began with the concept of response differentiation. Over time, he developed this into the concept of shaping! He then further refined it into the concept of errorless learning. Together, these concepts formed the basis for programmed instruction and the foundation for Israel Goldiamond’s highly influential constructional approach which solves problems by building behavioral repertoires (instead of by eliminating problem behavior). While shaping is deeply embedded in training circles, gems like the constructional approach are less explicitly influential. Yet they could (and do) form the basis of modern training protocols for problem-solving. In this presentation, Jesús will tell the story of how these ideas evolved and discuss implications for the future of animal training.

Right On Source: Clicker Training and the Nosework Team - Sarah Owings

Right On Source: Clicker Training and the Nosework Team

Building Behavior: Shape the Future - Laura VanArendonk Baugh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Competition

Related Learning Lab:

Right On Source: Clicker Training and the Nose Work Team – In Action!

Nosework is one of the fastest growing dog-related sports in the U.S. This exciting, wonderfully inclusive pastime provides dogs of all shapes and sizes, ages, and breeds, the opportunity to shine at what they do best. Teamwork, suspense, total engagement in a task—if you are someone who enjoys puzzles, treasure hunts, and hours of minute examination of dog behavior, this is definitely the sport for you!

Clicker trainers entering the world of Nosework are sometimes told that operant learning principles don’t apply, and can even be harmful to a dog’s natural desire to hunt. In this Session we will look at these ideas objectively, with the goal of building bridges between the different schools of thought. The reality is that in order to succeed in the upper levels of K-9 Nosework, or any other scent-detection venue, competitors will benefit from all points of view. Regardless of your chosen training methodology, it is extremely helpful to, at least, be able to recognize when the laws of learning are working for you or against you. False-alerts, frustration, and slow progression through the levels are often signs that communication between dog and handler is unclear or the dog’s motivation is too low.

Clicker training brings great tools to the Nosework team, such as: clear criteria-setting, the power of high rates of reinforcement, the ability to apply back-chaining effectively, and knowledge of how to build specific skills in a targeted way. Above all, clicker training’s strong focus on clean mechanical skills allows handlers to clarify what exactly is being reinforced, making it that much easier in the long run for trainers to be able to trust their dogs, and for their dogs to be able to trust their humans.

Building Behavior: Shape the Future

Riding with Clicker Training - Alexandra Kurland

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Skill

Related Learning Lab:

Building Behavior: Shape the Future – In Action!

Some of the most common questions about clicker training relate to obtaining a new, desirable behavior to mark and reinforce. Luring, modeling, capturing, and prompting can take us only so far, and shaping seems like such a complex challenge. Let’s talk about splitting a behavior into many tiny steps and progressing smoothly through a training plan to a goal behavior. In this way, animals discover their own creativity, power, and desire to work with a trainer. Shaping is fun for both trainer and learner. It builds a great relationship, but requires awareness and comprehension of the game by the animal, and both conceptual and mechanical fluency in the trainer. We will work on concepts in the Session first, and then on mechanical and technical skills in the Learning Lab.

Riding with Clicker Training

Alexandra Kurland

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Equine

For many riding with the clicker seems mysterious. How do you deliver treats? What do you click? Doesn’t your horse have to stop to get his treat? How is that going to work? You click when he’s cantering, and suddenly he’s slamming on the brakes. How can that be right?

Clicker training is all about breaking our lessons down into small steps. Every time you click the clicker you are creating a step in the training. On the ground those steps are often easy to understand. You want to teach your foot-mover of a horse to stand still next to a mounting block. You can see all the preliminary lessons you need to teach him before you ever take him near a mounting block. It’s easy to click and hand him a treat. But now you’ve taught that lesson well, and you’re ready to put your foot in the stirrup and climb aboard. You want to take clicker training along for the ride. How do you do that?

This program will look at the universals of riding and how to teach them using the clicker. This crosses all riding disciplines. It doesn’t matter if you ride english or western; if your dream is to ride in a dressage arena or on back country trails, there are basics we need ALL of our horses to understand. Remember the very first lessons a beginning rider is taught? This is how you ask your horse to go. This is how you stop him, and this is how you turn.

Stopping, starting, turning, moving in balance: those are the universals. What separates a novice horse from an advanced performer is how well he responds to those basic requests. So in this program we’re going to tease apart the universals of riding. We’ll see how to introduce them to a horse and how to develop them into performance excellence. Again, this is independent of riding discipline. We’ll be looking at the overall structure of using clicker training to build performance under saddle.

(Does this mean this program is only for riders? Not at all. If you are interested in how to break a complex behavior into its component parts, and then how to teach those parts separately so you can recombine them to create performance excellence, this program is for you even if you never intend to put your foot in a stirrup.)

The Power of the Pattern: Counter-Conditioning with an Operant Twist – In Action!☆ - Leslie McDevitt

The Power of the Pattern: Counter-Conditioning with an Operant Twist – In Action!☆

Leslie McDevitt

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Competition, Science, Skill, Teaching Others, Shelter & Rescue

Prerequisite Session:

The Power of the Pattern: Counter-Conditioning Games with an Operant Twist

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 10 dog/handler teams. Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship, be comfortable with normal handling, and be able to work in close quarters with other dogs. Handlers should have some experience with shaping. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

Come watch the Power of the Pattern in action as Leslie demonstrates how to create patterned rule structures that empower a dog to make choices and direct his own counter-conditioning procedure. The Pattern Games are easy and fun for both learners and trainers. Patterns are a powerful tool that you, or your students, can start using immediately to help dogs feel better and navigate stressful environments, such as dog shows, the neighborhood, the vet’s office, the training club, stores, and other public situations for working and service dogs, and more.

Love it! Effective Non-Food Reinforcement - Ken Ramirez

Love it! Effective Non-Food Reinforcement

Ramirez and Pouliot: Off the Cuff☆ - Michele Pouliot & Ken Ramirez

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Skill, Shelter & Rescue

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 8 dog/handler teams. Dogs should be clicker-savvy, have a robust behavioral repertoire, and regularly and effectively use toys or play as a reinforcer already. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

The effective use of non-food reinforcers is a critical skill that all trainers will likely use or need at some point in their training career. Being able to use non-food reinforcers is extremely useful, but requires an understanding of their role in training and a well-thought-out training approach. This stand-alone Lab focuses on two main practical aspects of using non-food reinforcers: how novel stimuli, like clapping and verbal praise, become reinforcers; and how to maximize the use of play and toys.

Dog/handler teams will have the opportunity to start training novel stimuli as reinforcers and gain valuable insight from Ken about how to maintain the strength of these unique reinforcers. In the latter half of the Lab, the focus will be on using play and toys as reinforcers—demonstrating their use with participating dogs, as well as maintaining and evaluating their effectiveness.

Observers and dog/handler teams will all get valuable tips and strategies for making non-food reinforcers more effective. The Lab will include some brief video examples and a step-by-step demonstration of how to teach new reinforcers to an animal.

Join Ken for this important Lab. You’ll “Love It!”

3:30pm - 4:00pm • Saturday, January 26

Afternoon Break

4:00pm - 5:30pm • Saturday, January 26

Ramirez and Pouliot: Off the Cuff☆

Michele Pouliot & Ken Ramirez

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Science, Skill, Teaching Others

“Off the Cuff” has become a ClickerExpo favorite since it began three years ago. The talk offers a unique opportunity to sit back and relax while two faculty members have an impromptu and candid conversation, off the cuff. This year Michele Pouliot will join Ken Ramirez in Portland to talk about everything and anything that comes to mind in an unscripted, spontaneous and insightful conversation.

Reactive Dog Class Update☆ - Emma Parsons

Reactive Dog Class Update☆

But My Dog Is Not Food-Motivated - Kathy Sdao

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Teaching Others, Shelter & Rescue

This presentation will be an update of the Reactive Dog Class, taught with the new Click to Calm methodology in place. Utilizing the new design, students are reaching their goals much faster than ever before. For example, in the original set-up of the class, in Week Six, handler/dog teams were still at the point of exposing their dogs to other dogs (neutral) from the vicinity of their barriers. Now, after making a change to the ratio of reinforcement (acknowledgment versus disengagement) as well as adding movement, in Week Six handler/dogs teams are now “bouncing off” of each other sooner—as well as starting to parallel walk and demonstrate other cooperative activities.

Students will walk away with a comprehensive plan of what behaviors to present from week-to-week in a reactive dog class in order to ensure success for all handler/dog teams.

But My Dog Is Not Food-Motivated

Arousal: Science, Not Sex - Lindsay Wood Brown

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Veterinary, Health & Wellness

When clients say “But my dog isn’t food-motivated,” my response is “not yet.” Eating is an operant behavior. Therefore, we can often increase its probability and intensity and lower its latency through structured training procedures. While this might seem laughable if you have a ravenous Rottweiler or always-hungry hound, situations that require skilled intervention abound: a senior dog whose appetite is fading; a wary dog who has learned to distrust treats; a little dog fussy about meals; or a dog whose health is threatened by conditioned anorexia. While various medical conditions (requiring veterinary expertise) may create finicky eaters, so can unwise behavioral practices. We’ll review several common mistakes and provide alternatives.

Arousal: Science, Not Sex

Right On Source – In Action! - Sarah Owings

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Science, Aggression & Behavior Management

High arousal. Over arousal. Low arousal. Arousal as a behavior description is ever-present in our conversations about animals within shelter, performance, and working environments. Across training settings, we’ve attached the label readily without an agreed-upon definition of its meaning. What does arousal mean? What is the relationship between arousal and emotion? How does arousal relate to other descriptors we use (often interchangeably) like drive, frustration, aggression? Is there a functional component to arousal? Is use of the label beneficial for training conversation or does it muddy the waters? Let’s unravel the science of arousal and consider the applications within training practices and behavior-change plans. It’s not sex, but for behavior nerds it’s still sexy!

Right On Source: Clicker Training and the Nose Work Team – In Action!

Building Behavior: Shape the Future - In Action! - Laura VanArendonk Baugh

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Competition, Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Right On Source: Clicker Training and the Nose Work Team

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 8 dog/handler teams. Skills taught in this lab are appropriate for Nose Work dogs ORT-NW3. Teams at all levels of competition will benefit from the exercises, ORT-Elite. Dog/handler teams will get the most out of this Lab if they come with some basic clicker training experience, if they are currently on at least one odor, and if the dog can offer a simple nose target to an object a few feet away from the handler. Dogs should be able to work and relax in close quarters with other dogs nearby. Any dogs that appear overly stressed or disruptive may be asked to work outside the room. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

This Learning Lab will explore the many ways clicker training, and operant learning principles, can bring a new level of clarity, enthusiasm, and precision to teaching of scent-detection.

Depending on what each dog team teaches us in the moment, we will focus initially on building strong commitment to odor using a special classical conditioning “device.” Other exercises may include rapid-fire sourcing games, motivation-building games involving a much higher rate of reinforcement than many Nose Work dogs are used to, and exercises designed to help handlers become more aware of how body language can influence a dog’s behavior while searching, potentially proofing against handler-induced false-alerts.

If time and space allow, we will end either with individual problem-solving and/or a mini search where each team gets to put newly honed skills to work.

Building Behavior: Shape the Future – In Action!

Conference Dinner & Panel Discussion - Room with a View: A Training Conversation

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Foundation
Topic: Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Building Behavior: Shape the Future

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 12 dog/handler teams. Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship, be comfortable with normal handling, and be able to work in close quarters with other dogs. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

5:45pm - 6:15pm • Saturday, January 26

Book and Media Signing

7:15pm - 9:30pm • Saturday, January 26

Join us for an evening of inspiration and lively conversation on Saturday Night of ClickerExpo. This seated dinner will feature a facilitated panel discussion between members of the ClickerExpo Faculty and provide attendees the opportunity to ask question of the Faculty and network with each other.

The Saturday night dinner is $59 per person and includes:

Mixed Green Salad
Choice of:
- Herb Roasted Chicken with Roasted Veggies and Garlic Mashed Potatoes (GF)
- Seared Trout with Green Curry, Rice, Baby Carrots, Grilled Broccolini, and Scallion vinaigrette (GF)
- Quinoa Purse: Quinoa, Lentils, Rice, and Roasted Veggies in Puff Pastry
Dessert
2 Bottles of House Wine Per Table (One Red/ One White)
Cash bar

Available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to purchase or change meals and events is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

SUNDAY

DAY 3 - Sunday, January 27, 2019

7:00am - 9:00am • Sunday, January 27

Breakfast

Jump-start your day by joining us for breakfast! Breakfast is $20 per person and on Sunday includes:

Veggie Quiche with Asparagus, Spinach, Peppers, Onions, and Cheddar
Bacon Mushroom Quiche with Cured Bacon, Mushrooms, Leeks, and Cheddar
Yogurt with Granola and Seasonal Berries (GF)
Juice, Tea, Coffee

Breakfasts are prepared by the hotel and available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to purchase or change meals is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

8:00am - 8:45am • Sunday, January 27

Out in Front: Preventive Behavior Services Trainers Can Offer Veterinary Hospitals - Debbie Martin

Out in Front: Preventive Behavior Services Trainers Can Offer Veterinary Hospitals

Training Light: How Training Science Can Help You Eat Smart, Lose Weight, Feel Great - Aaron Clayton

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Business, Aggression & Behavior Management

The adage is “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” This certainly is true with canine and feline behavioral concerns. With behavior issues being the number-one reason pets are relinquished, it is imperative that veterinary hospitals provide preventive behavioral services for their clients/patients. In this Session, an overview of several preventive behavior services that can and should be offered in veterinary hospitals will be discussed.

Training Light: How Training Science Can Help You Eat Smart, Lose Weight, Feel Great

Aaron Clayton

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Health & Wellness, Science

This Session focuses on the application of behavior-change science and clicker training principles to health and wellness.

The development of healthy habits is a struggle for many people, particularly around eating mindfully and maintaining a healthy weight. For example, losing as few as ten pounds and keeping it off is a goal shared by many people—but few succeed. In aggregate, published statistics about successful sustainable weight loss deliver a consistent if depressing message. Somewhere between 70% and 95% of people who try to lose weight and maintain the loss are not successful.

The leader of this Session was one of those statistics. For over a decade, he tried and failed to lose the 55 pounds he had gained since college. But, in 2015, he set out to lose 15% of his body weight and used a new approach. Less than 12 months later, he had hit his goal—losing more than 30 pounds, which he has kept off and is confident that he will in the future.

What changed? Much of the food and weight loss industry wants people to believe that a lack of “will power’’ is the reason for failure. But that characterization is both inaccurate and counterproductive. Blaming will power is not a science-based approach to the problem. It ignores the evidence that the only reliable method of changing habits is one that builds in the science of behavior change, and it blames the “learner” for failure.

Aaron approached his goal like a clicker trainer. He developed a program of behavior change that was customized for his situation and based on universal principles that work. Essentially, Aaron applied the very same behavior-change and training principles used to create a fluent new behavior to the goal of healthy eating and weight loss.

In this Session, Aaron shares this integrated perspective. He explains how trainers and teachers who already understand and use training principles can use them to tackle the really big problems that trip up most efforts to develop healthy eating habits, lose and keep off weight, and feel the benefits of better health. Interested attendees will be invited to join Aaron at lunch the day of this Session to make the discussion even more practical!

Join Aaron at 8:00 am. We think you’ll be hungry to get started, and then hungry for more. And that’s okay!

Note: This Session is not recommended for people whose weight gain was sudden or potentially triggered by trauma, or for people with eating disorders.

Training and Behavior Modification in the Age of Smart Technology - Pet Tutor

9:00am - 10:30am • Sunday, January 27

Emotions: Inside Out☆ - Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D.

Emotions: Inside Out☆

Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D.

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Science

What does joy feel like to you? Is it the same for the person sitting next to you? Is it the same for your dog? Are emotions pre-wired in the brain or are they learned? These are just a few of the interesting and important questions that surround the topic of emotions. In this Session, we will focus on contemporary approaches to understanding emotions, which have upturned the commonly held classical account. The benefit of understanding more about human emotions is clear, but what does it mean in terms of the animals we care for?

Training Backwards: Building Reliable Behavior Sequences with Back-Chaining☆ - Michele Pouliot

Training Backwards: Building Reliable Behavior Sequences with Back-Chaining☆

From Clues to Cues: How Cues Evolve Out of the Shaping Process☆ - Alexandra Kurland

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Competition, Skill

Training individual behaviors effectively via clicker training can be challenging. Connecting several behaviors into a behavior sequence that will be reliable in performance, without rewards, is a next-level challenge. Every trainer wants behavior chains that result in enthusiastic and reliable responses from their partners.

Joining three to five behaviors into a dependable performance chain is a common goal for many trainers. Imagine creating a behavior chain of 30 to 70 behaviors! The sport of Canine Musical Freestyle requires developing routines (performance chains) comprised of many behaviors. The more advanced a Freestyle team becomes, the longer the performance chain.

In 2007, Michele first learned about applying back-chaining for putting sequences together, but she did not use it extensively. However, over the past 10 years, Michele has experienced impressive results from the back-chaining tool, expanding her use and confidence in its application. In addition to improved reliability with back-chained behavior sequences, she has also experienced its effect on improving performance duration without primary reinforcers.

In this Session, Michele will share her step-by-step process of building very long behavior sequences (60+ behaviors) via back-chaining. The presentation will use video examples of chains being built as well as the outcomes of those chains in actual performance. You do not need to take part in canine freestyle to appreciate the task of building performance chains of more than 50 behavior cues in succession.

Come and learn about “training backwards!”

From Clues to Cues: How Cues Evolve Out of the Shaping Process☆

Alexandra Kurland

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Equine, Science, Skill

Cues evolve out of the shaping process, or rather, the most meaningful and useful cues that you choose should evolve out of the process of shaping behavior. This core insight helps Alexandra Kurland be very thoughtful about her selection of cues. To understand why, remember that the conventional wisdom and practice are that a behavior is “put on cue” after your learner can perform it reliably, accurately, and so on. While that convention is highly useful, it hides a powerful reality. Cues—information that helps an animal learn what earns reinforcement—are often being communicated to your learner unintentionally in the process of shaping behavior.

Here’s a simple example: When Alexandra clicks and reinforces her horse for putting his ears forward, where is she looking? Inevitably, at his ears. In contrast, when Alexandra wants her horse to back up, where is she looking? Inevitably, at his chest.

The horse will pick up on these differences naturally and try to use them as clues in the puzzle of working out what will earn reinforcement. Alexandra can use this knowledge to intentionally amplify the informational value of the clue. In fact, if she chooses eye direction to cue the behavior (rather than, say, a hand cue), she simplifies and amplifies the learning. On the other hand, if Alexandra is unaware of where her gaze falls, her horse must spend time and energy to sort out the information conflict. It’s as if Alexandra had to learn that you greeting her with a big, broad smile at ClickerExpo does not mean that you are happy to see her. She could eventually learn that, but it wouldn’t be easy.

In this presentation, we’ll look in detail at how it works—cues evolving out of the shaping process—and how the method will help you improve your training efficiency and the quality of your learner’s training.

How do you spot the clues that your learner is using so that you can turn them into deliberate cues? How do you use the learner’s keen observation skills to your advantage to help you:

develop good stimulus control over individual behaviors?
transfer your cues to performance cues?
become subtler and light in your cues?
build complex sequences of behavior?

Join Alexandra for this breakthrough Session to turn your clues into cues and help your animal learn.

Keep Calm and Click On: Improvement in the Click to Calm Method - Emma Parsons

Keep Calm and Click On: Improvement in the Click to Calm Method

Fit for Sports: Exercises for Canine Sports and Competition☆ - Lori Stevens

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Competition, Shelter & Rescue

Related Learning Lab:

Keep Calm and Click On: Improvement in the Click to Calm Method – In Action

The Click to Calm methodology was first published in 2005. Its main goal has always been to teach reactive and aggressive dogs how to calm themselves in situations that were formerly challenging and, sometimes, dangerous. This method works well for fearful dogs, and with exuberant, enthusiastic dogs! It is also successful with dogs that are involved in a dog sport where the handler needs extreme focus despite the heavy distractions in the environment.

Through years of working with clients like these, Emma has made several changes to the Click to Calm methodology. For example, she has found that moving with these dogs, instead of remaining stationary, works much better while she is exposing the dogs to the questionable stimuli. The ratio of reinforcement has also changed: looking at the stimulus versus looking at the handler. Emma has added more default behaviors that directly prepare the handler in case the dog explodes in a given situation.

Join Emma for a brief review of her successful Click to Clam methodology, a look at the many improvements made over the years, and a discussion of a few case studies.

Fit for Sports: Exercises for Canine Sports and Competition☆

Real Skills, Fake Dogs☆- Theresa McKeon

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Competition, Health & Wellness

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 4 dog/hander teams. Teams should know how to shape and prompt behaviors. Dogs should be fluent in a nose-to-hand target when moving from A to B to target your hand. Another fluency that would be useful is targeting with the paws, for example, paw-to-hand and paw(s)-to-equipment. If your dog can already perform some foundation fitness behaviors, for example, tuck-sit, sphinx-down, side-stepping, backing up, and hind-leg targeting, that would also be useful. This prior training will let Lori observe your dog’s current capabilities and take them to the next safe level of fitness. It will be helpful if you know which muscle groups you want to strengthen in your dog before you participate in this Lab. Be prepared to reinforce your dog often. Please be sure that your veterinarian has cleared your dog for fitness exercises. Dogs must be experienced working successfully in a busy group setting and in close quarters with other working dogs, even when excited. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

Fitness is essential for dogs that perform in sports and competition. In this Learning Lab, Lori will focus specifically on strengthening muscle groups needed for healthy, long-term sports engagement. Exercise and training, done right, are essential in canine sports and/or competition to avoid injury, sustain participation, and keep up the fun! If you and your dog are spending a lot of time training and competing in your sport, the exercises presented in this course can not only prevent sports injuries to your dog, but may improve your dog’s performance.

In this Lab, participants and observers will learn how to build strength appropriately, which muscle groups to target, and training exercises that strengthen your dog’s core, for a variety of specific sports—including agility, obedience, freestyle, conformation, IPO, lure coursing, flyball, hiking, and more. Attendees will also learn how to squeeze fitness training into a sports schedule and what to do when a dog is reluctant to engage in specific exercises.

Lori will coach four working teams through several hands-on exercises, coaching that will include assessing and improving the dogs’ alignment, practice exercises, and advice for how and when to progress the exercises. In between the work and demonstrations with the teams, Lori will be presenting the core concepts of exercise training on screen with videos and PowerPoint presentations. Join Lori as she teaches you how to get your dog fit for sports. Note: The focus in this Lab is on fitness exercises only, not on any other aspect of training competition behaviors. For example, the focus will not be on how to get a precision sit, down, or heel behavior while doing individual competition sports.

Real Skills, Fake Dogs☆

Theresa McKeon

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Teaching Others

Participant Notes:

In this Lab, stand-in animals, mirrors, video, and helpful humans will be the substitutes for live animals while you build your skill set and confidence. Practice to your heart’s content knowing that your partner will never get full, tired, confused, or stressed out.

The Lab will have stations for stress-free practice of clicker mechanics and basic training skills such as cueing, clicker timing, and treat delivery.
Advanced trainers can use the variety of stuffed, blow-up, rolling, puppet, and video animals to develop, practice, or polish techniques before you take on the real thing.

If you’ve ever said, “I understand the theory – I just need a chance to practice the practical,” then this is the Lab for you!

10:30am - 11:00am • Sunday, January 27

Morning Break

11:00am - 12:30pm • Sunday, January 27

Duration without Frustration☆- Hannah Branigan

Duration without Frustration☆

Fifty Shades Deeper: The Sequel to Arousal☆ - Lindsay Wood Brown

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Competition, Skill

Related Learning Lab:

Duration without Frustration – In Action!

Is shaping for duration as simple as just waiting to reinforce longer behaviors? I don’t know about you, but that has not been my experience!

Well beyond a boring sit-stay, there are many situations where we want to train our dogs to perform a particular behavior for an extended amount of time, but this process often leads to frustration on both the part of the learner and the trainer. This Session will explore the different forms that duration can take in our training depending on the behavior in question and examine why it is sometimes so darn hard to train.

We will look at how the entire behavior cycle influences the behavior being trained, and why we are best served by setting our criteria so that we are always training “clean” units of behavior. We will look at examples and techniques that allow us to set up our training sessions to minimize frustration (in both trainer and learner!) while increasing duration of the behavior.

Fifty Shades Deeper: The Sequel to Arousal☆

On Your Mark, Get Set, Start Button☆ - Peggy Hogan

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Competition, Science, Shelter & Rescue, Skill

MORE arousal! Or, maybe, less arousal? What does it mean and, more importantly, what does it even look like? This talk builds on the concepts from Arousal: Science, Not Sex and dives deeper into how we can apply our understanding of arousal to meet our training goals. Do we have an arousal problem—or a training problem with behavior we’ve labeled “stressed” or “aroused?” How do conditions and consequences increase or reduce aroused behavior? What’s the role of antecedent arrangement in training for more or less arousal? Can we be strategic about our use of conditions to facilitate the level of arousal we want in behavior? How do the reinforcers we apply impact aroused behavior? Let’s unpack some ABCs and training strategies to find effective and efficient ways to achieve the desired behaviors. Whether we want low arousal or high arousal, it’s all sexy, all day long.

On Your Mark, Get Set, Start Button☆

Peggy Hogan

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Equine, Skill

As positive reinforcement trainers we search continually for ways to create partnerships with our horses. However, there can be a huge difference between simply gaining an animal’s cooperation and giving the animal true choice! “Start Button” behaviors are behaviors that are taught to an animal partner to direct the pace and progress of another behavior or procedure. Start buttons are an integral piece within the training philosophy, highlighted in the last few years through Animals In Control and other Sessions at recent ClickerExpo conferences. They provide greater control to the animals themselves over aspects of the training process.

In this Session, which combines lecture, personal examples, and videos, Peggy will introduce ways of teaching horses to “give you permission” to proceed or to indicate that they are “ready” to participate in an activity or procedure. She will also move to the next step, actually teaching the animal to signal or “invite” you to continue.

Encouraging horses to enter into this type of dialogue lets you be more aware of and responsive to a horse’s body language. Start buttons can be taught and used in a wide variety of applications. You will see illustrations that range from husbandry to riding behaviors.

This lecture will benefit anyone who wants to learn techniques to reach the place where you and your animals are harmonious participants in a teaching and learning process.

Join Peggy and saddle up for the journey!

The Learning Planet - Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D.

The Learning Planet

Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D.

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Science, Skill, Teaching Others

Earth is often called the blue planet because of its impressive oceans. However, at least as impressive, but less well considered, is the extent to which Earth’s inhabitants—mammals, insects, and even plants—change their behaviors based on experience, specifically consequences. Consequences also change brain function and gene expression—the “whole shebang.” In this Session, different aspects of the learning planet will be discussed, guided by Susan Schneider’s book The Science of Consequences, and several other seminal works. Key points will be illustrated with video examples.

To Lure and Not To Lure: Effective Use and Omission of Lures in Training - Michele Pouliot

To Lure and Not To Lure: Effective Use and Omission of Lures in Training

Game On! Train or Be Trained - Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Competition, Skill, Teaching Others

Participant Notes:

We will have 4 dog/handler teams. Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship, be comfortable with and able to work in close quarters with other dogs (no reactive dogs please). Handlers should have experience with shaping via marker training. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

This is a Combination Learning Lab and Session, mixing lecture with hands-on training for 4 working participants with their dogs. The Session will include PowerPoint presentation, video demos, and hands-on training exercises with working teams.

The use of lures to prompt behavior in clicker training has been a controversial topic for several years. Many clicker trainers claim that lures are problematic in advancing behavior, as the lure becomes a required cue for response, and/or that the Lure prevents dogs from thinking about what behavior they are doing actively. Other clicker trainers claim that lures allow them to prompt the behavior they desire quickly, making the training process much faster.

In this Lab, Michele will strive to validate the conclusion that both opinions are very much correct. The Lab will focus on how to use lures effectively as training tools while preventing a reliance on them and not distracting the learner from awareness of the behavior in process.

The 4 handler/dog teams will train new behaviors. The first training sessions will use thoughtfully planned and applied lures to initiate desired behavior. Within 2 training sessions, these lures will be omitted thoughtfully and replaced with desired behavior cues to further progress those behaviors.

Game On! Train or Be Trained

Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Teaching Others

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 60 spots for participants. This Lab is for people; no need to bring your dogs—let them rest! The focus will be on trainer skills.

Great clicker training relies on effective communication between teacher and learner. A well-timed click, effective delivery of reinforcement, and a well-thought-out plan go a long way to make the experience a joyful one for both human and animal. Although we all know this, nothing compares to actually experiencing it.

In this Lab, you will be introduced to PORTL (the Portable Operant Teaching and Research Lab) and introduced to how it can be used to gain insight into the training process. PORTL is a game played with a collection of small objects and a clicker. The teacher communicates with the learner entirely through reinforcement. No instructions, prompts, or models are used during the game to direct the learner. PORTL can be used to improve mechanical skills, model training concepts and behavioral principles, and gain insight in developing and modifying a shaping plan.

This Lab will introduce you to PORTL and the basics of how to set up and play PORTL.

We will practice the fundamentals of PORTL mechanics and play one exercise where you will get to be the teacher or the learner. After the exercise, we will discuss what you experienced while playing the game, including your emotions as the learner or teacher. Through these activities, you will experience how PORTL can be an effective teaching tool for helping people understand clicker training and improve their shaping skills.

12:30pm - 2:00pm • Sunday, January 27

Lunch & Roundtable Discussions

Lunch is $28 per person and on Sunday includes:

Mixed Greens
Seasoned Chicken Fajitas, Sautéed with Onions and Peppers, and Served with Corn (GF)
Flour and Corn Tortillas, Sour Cream, and Guacamole, Salsa
Cheese Enchiladas
Spanish Rice & Refried Beans (GF)
Dessert
Coffee, Tea

Lunches are prepared by the hotel and available for advance purchase only (no on-site purchases will be available). The last day to purchase or change meals is Thursday, January 3, 2019.

2:00pm - 3:30pm • Sunday, January 27

Mark My Words☆ - Kathy Sdao

Mark My Words☆

Give Training Back to the Animals☆ - Chirag Patel

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Skill, Teaching Others

Does our core ethic “positive reinforcement works and coercion is dangerous” include our verbal behavior, the ways in which language both spoken and written is used? Are we as force-free with our clients and colleagues as we are with the animals in our care? Can the unconditional positive regard we have for every furry and feathered animal we meet extend to every man and woman we speak with? Even on Facebook and Twitter? Even when you think that person is ignorant, cruel, or just plain wrong? And, do the answers to these questions have any bearing on the high rate of burn-out in our profession?

Our work of training and behavior consulting often takes place in emotionally charged situations. The stakes can be high and our clients can be upset, argumentative, and unpleasant. These same characteristics sometimes describe our colleagues and our competitors. Yet when speaking with challenging people, we can apply our core skills of careful observation, controlled emotionality, gradual shaping, and timely reinforcement of alternate behaviors.

In this Session, we’ll examine specific formats for compassionate communications. And should you choose to extend “do no harm” to include your verbal behavior, we will discuss key practical changes to support your commitment.

Give Training Back to the Animals☆

You Talkin’ To Me? The ABC of Communication☆ - Eva Bertilsson & Emelie Johnson Vegh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Skill

Related Learning Lab:

Give Training Back to the Animals – In Action!

In this Session, Chirag will focus on training from the perspective of the animal and on looking at the larger context of animal welfare and humane care. The Session will look at what a trainer should consider before picking up the clicker, including understanding the animal’s natural behavior, safety, and long-term needs. Chirag will discuss the importance of teaching animals to cooperate in their own health care (husbandry behaviors) and how to make that easier for both trainer and animal.

The Session will explore the benefits of and methods needed to empower a learner. Chirag will demonstrate how he teaches the learner to engage in a signal that cues the trainer that the animal is ready for the training conversation ahead, as well as when the learner needs a break. These strategies help increase positive welfare, reduce aggressive behavior, and create learners that are motivated and actively part of the conversation.

You Talkin’ To Me? The ABC of Communication☆

Eva Bertilsson & Emelie Johnson Vegh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Advanced
Topic: Science, Skill

As everyone sharing life with a non-human individual has experienced, animal companions learn to direct their communication efforts toward us readily. A simple bark, an extended tug, or a jump in the lap—it’s all communication. Behavior is communication, even if we don’t always recognize it or really understand what is being communicated. Behavior is a foreign language, open to interpretation and with the potential for a range of accuracy well beyond the vagaries of Google translate!

ABC stands for antecedent-behavior-consequence. This acronym is the basic unit for understanding the behavior of individuals—how animals use their behavior to impact their world and how their behavior, in turn, is shaped by these interactions. In this Session, Eva and Emelie will explore how the ABC lens can help trainers tie together behavior with language and communication more powerfully, and how trainers can use training skills to enhance interspecies communication. This Session will:

view animal-human communication through the ABC lens,
use functional analysis as a tool for understanding what an animal is saying,
examine teaching “request behaviors” (mands) to decrease problem behavior and increase quality of life,
…and more!

Join Eva and Emelie for a cutting-edge Session, exploring animal-human communication through an ABC viewpoint.

Please Sir: May I Have Some Have Some Food, Water... and Control? From Surviving to Thriving - Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D.

Please Sir: May I Have Some Have Some Food, Water… and Control? From Surviving to Thriving

Susan G. Friedman, Ph.D.

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Science, Aggression & Behavior Management

Ask a 3-year-old child what her eyes, ears, and legs are for and you will usually get fast, accurate, gleeful answers. But, when asked what behavior is for, even experienced animal trainers and consultants will pause. Simply put, behavior is an evolved tool to control outcomes. Controlling outcomes is what makes behavior effective. In this presentation, the benefits of providing control to the learners in our care will be discussed.

Keep Calm and Click On - In Action!☆ - Emma Parsons

Keep Calm and Click On: Improvement in the Click to Calm Method – In Action!☆

Duration without Frustration - In Action!☆ - Hannah Branigan

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Shelter & Rescue

Prerequisite Session:

Keep Calm and Click On: Improvement in the Click to Calm Method

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 8 dog/handler teams. Dogs must be experienced working successfully in a busy group setting and in close quarters with other working dogs, even when excited. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

This Learning Lab will allow participants to practice the Click to Calm method as practiced today. We will start with a multi-functional default behavior and then move on to the training equation itself. Increasing the rate of reinforcement, while keeping the dog and handler moving during exposures, can hasten the process of turning the reactive dog into a thinking dog.

Duration without Frustration – In Action!☆

All Ears: Protocol for Dogs with Sound Sensitivity☆ - Debbie Martin

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Competition, Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Duration without Frustration

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 10 dog/handler teams. Teams should be clicker-savvy and have experience with shaping and offering behavior without luring or prompting. Dogs should have fluent sit, down, and stand; an offered moving behavior like back up, spin, or wrap a cone; and a fluent nose target behavior. Dogs must be experienced working successfully in a busy group setting and in close quarters with other working dogs, even when excited. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

In this Learning Lab, you will practice extending the duration of behaviors using a systematic approach that accounts for the entire behavior cycle. We will apply the techniques discussed in the prerequisite Session to stationary, moving, and target behaviors.

3:45pm - 4:45pm • Sunday, January 27

All Ears: Protocol for Dogs with Sound Sensitivity☆

Spreading the Word: Publishing & Blogging☆ - Laura VanArendonk Baugh

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: Intermediate
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Skill, Veterinary

It is estimated that a third of dogs have noise aversions! If you saw 12 dogs last week, 4 of them are likely to develop noise sensitivities in their life time. Not only can a fear of sounds be physiologically and emotionally damaging for dogs, it can also strain the human-animal relationship.

This Session will provide strategies for how to approach and prevent sound sensitivities, including teaching desired coping skills.

Spreading the Word: Publishing & Blogging☆

Effective Affection: How to Get it Right - Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Business

As the adage goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. However, as clicker trainers we know that if you set up a lovely field full of sunshine, green grass, and a sparkling, bubbling stream, your horse will likely drink a lot more!

Presenting fun, exciting, and clear information on clicker training and related welfare and behavior topics can be one of the best ways to spread the word about these beneficial practices. Allowing interested learners to absorb information privately and at their own pace rather than reacting defensively to challenges yields greater success. Finally, sharing and collaborating with other trainers helps everyone. In this information age, we can share information more easily than ever.

Come learn about the best ways to share your training experience and enthusiasm, what you should share and why, how to handle conflict or criticism, and how to get started. By helping ourselves, we help others and the community too!

Effective Affection: How to Get it Right

Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Shelter & Rescue

Pet owners often reinforce unwanted and annoying behaviors inadvertently (such as petting a dog when he jumps up) by giving attention and affection for these behaviors. When trainers are shaping new behaviors, they often default to food as a reward, and find it difficult to use petting, scratching, or other forms of affection effectively in order to reinforce behavior. Yet, if the problem behavior is maintained by affection, using affection is often the fastest and most effective way to solve the problem. The pieces that are often missing in this kind of problem-solving are teaching the animal how to receive affection and teaching the human how to use affection correctly to shape behavior.

In this Session, Jesús will describe in detail a powerful procedure that can be used to teach animals how to request and receive affection. Then we will discuss how to use affection to shape new behavior effectively, with plenty of video examples from a variety of different species.

Choice, Control & Empowerment for Shelter Animals - Lindsay Wood Brown

Choice, Control & Empowerment for Shelter Animals

Give Training Back to the Animals - In Action!☆ - Chirag Patel

Course Type: Session
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Science, Shelter & Rescue, Aggression & Behavior Management

Empowering animals by providing opportunities for choices within their daily lives is a popular topic and an important welfare strategy in zoos, aquaria, and, more recently, professional dog-training settings. But in animal shelters, a focus on choice and environmental control is only gaining momentum slowly. Yet, it is in this environment that behavioral-welfare strategies are most essential; shelter animals lose control over their environment and experience significant reduction in choice from the moment they enter the shelter until the time they leave. Empowerment strategies can and should be in practice throughout an animal’s length of stay. However, it simply isn’t enough to say that we provide the opportunities; we need to also acknowledge and respond when an animal makes a choice.

Let’s explore how we can support behavioral welfare from shelter admission to exit through the provision of daily choices and attention to responses. How can we give some control back to the animals in our care? How can we do so in a manner that is both practical to the setting and beneficial for the individual?

Give Training Back to the Animals – In Action!☆

Moving Away from Eye Contact☆ - Emma Parsons

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Skill

Prerequisite Session:

Give Training Back to the Animals

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 3 dog/handler teams. Teams should bring with them: (1) a water bowl that is familiar (one that the dog drinks from daily at home); (2) water that the dog is familiar with; (3) a blanket, mat, towel, or bed that is familiar to the dog; (4) a selection (3-6) items/toys for the dog; and (5) a selection of treats that will function as reinforcers for the dog’s behavior. Dogs must be experienced working successfully in a busy group setting and in close quarters with other working dogs, even when excited. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab. To participate in this Lab, you are expected to attend the prerequisite Session.

In this Learning Lab, Chirag Patel will demonstrate practical exercises related to empowering learners and to building trust, confidence, and strong relationships.

Lab participants will work hands-on and practice these exercises while receiving coaching and feedback from Chirag.

The Lab exercises covered depend on the individual dogs and caregivers attending but may include: teaching yes/no and start/stop signals to the dogs, playing The Bucket Game, and working dogs in protected contact systems and muzzle behaviors.

Moving Away from Eye Contact☆

Closing Session: Hidden Treasures 2019 ☆ - Ken Ramirez

Course Type: Learning Lab
Skill Level: All Levels
Topic: Aggression & Behavior Management, Shelter & Rescue

Participant Notes:

We will have approximately 10 dog/handler teams. Dogs should already understand the click/treat relationship, be able to work in close quarters with other dogs, and have some simple behaviors already built, such as sit, down, and settle. You may participate with your dog or you may attend as an observer. Observers should not bring their dogs to the Lab.

Once a behavior has become reliable, it is imperative that those same behaviors are practiced without the presence of eye contact. If you stare at your dogs every time you cue a behavior, then that eye contact can become part of the cue itself. No eye contact. No behavior!

Handlers of reactive dogs need their behavior to be as reliable as possible. They need to have the ability to turn away from their dogs and partake in another activity, like talking to someone else or signing a document. These dogs cannot “make a break for it” when their handler’s backs are turned, as that could be dangerous!

In this fun and challenging Lab, we will work on asking our dogs for behaviors that we think are reliable and testing to see whether eye contact is actually part of the behavioral context.

4:45pm - 5:15pm • Sunday, January 27

Afternoon Break

5:15pm - 5:45pm • Sunday, January 27

Closing Session: Hidden Treasures 2019☆