# Therapy dog basics?



## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

For various reasons, I'm interested in possibly getting involved with therapy dog work with one or both of the family dogs. I'll state right at the start that I am aware that they may not ultimately be suitable, but I feel they are social enough and generally calm enough to be worth seeing what happens as they progress through training.

Which leads me to my question. 

The general impression I have is that the best thing to do is start with an eye towards the CGC test for general obedience and behavior, and then from there move on to therapy-specific issues like familiarity with wheelchairs/medical equipment.

Is that correct? I don't want to be teaching them something which has to be untaught later on.

(I may also want to do some work with one of them for mobility stuff, like bracing, just for my own benefit, but I'm thinking that can also come after the basic obedience/behavior work.) (I have arthritis in my lower back, so I can see how being able to brace on a dog could be handy, although I wouldn't intend for him to ever be a proper service dog in terms of going everywhere with me. It's more it'd be handy if he could help if he was there.)


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

Yup, that is right. The TDI (Therapy Dogs International) test is the CGC test PLUS the dog being comfy around medical equipment - wheelchairs, oxygen etc and a command "say hello" where the dog is accessible for petting. It can be simply sit on cue or to stand on a chair.

There are a couple things to think about besides this. You are probably going to lose some things you've trained. Some focus will go out the window, because you're training the dog to be attentive to others. My stunt dog started running off the stage to greet the audience. :banghead:

How will your dog respond to people who pet roughly, have irregular speach or behavior patterns? _How will your dog respond if it associates the hospital/nursing home with getting *ice cream*?_ My dog gets very stressed in a nursing home, but works well in the hospital pediatric ward. Listen to your dog.

If your dog is well-behaved, most nursing homes will allow you to walk the halls with your dog to see if your dog is comfortable with it. Assess your dog, note areas of needed training (maybe a stronger "Leave it!" command?). Do your training, get the CGC and TDI and then get out there.


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Anne Vaini said:


> Yup, that is right. The TDI (Therapy Dogs International) test is the CGC test PLUS the dog being comfy around medical equipment - wheelchairs, oxygen etc and a command "say hello" where the dog is accessible for petting. It can be simply sit on cue or to stand on a chair.
> 
> There are a couple things to think about besides this. You are probably going to lose some things you've trained. Some focus will go out the window, because you're training the dog to be attentive to others. My stunt dog started running off the stage to greet the audience. :banghead:
> 
> ...


Are there any particular tips or techniques for teaching friendly dogs to be more patient about greeting? Our newer dog is VERY friendly but as he's at the larger end (70 lb, so not huge, but big enough to knock someone over) I've been working to try to get him to stand and wait for permission before saying 'hello', so that he's not so intimidating-seeming. That seems to be working out pretty well so far- it has the added benefit of giving him a moment to get over the 'omg new person!' high so that his approach is more controlled. (I should add he doesn't do the leap-up-greet thing or go rushing to bowl people over, so he's not THAT bad as it is- he just can be a little too boisterous and pushy for kids/less steady people.)

That's actually my biggest concern with regard to the CGC requirements- rating how social they are without discouraging them entirely.

I'm less worried about the medical equipment/noises issues because both dogs seem to be pretty relaxed- they're understandably curious about things (the electric wheelchair we ran into on a walk got a sniff) but not a lot seems to be worrisome or startling. That general attitude, plus being pretty social, is what makes me think it's worth having a try with them.


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## Maren Bell Jones (Jun 7, 2006)

My certified therapy dog is kind of the opposite of Anne's. We're cleared to go visit in the Children's Hospital, but she gets somewhat stressed by kids much younger than 5 or so. She prefers kids about 8 and older, especially teenagers. We're going to start looking into doing the nursing homes, even though the hours are not as convenient as she does very well with older folks. 

One thing to get them accustomed to is slick floors. A lot of dogs, even relatively stable dogs, don't like the slick linoleum floors in nursing homes or hospitals. In the case of the Children's Hospital, we also have to go up 7 floors in an elevator to get there, so elevators are another thing to get used to in some cases. One of the members of our therapy dog club at the vet school has to have her Newfoundland take the stairs because he hates the elevator (and he's had double knee surgery!). Another is having someone pet them with a lot of wires and tubes out of theirs arms, like if they have an IV in or something similar, as that weirds out a lot of dogs. Teaching them a few crowd pleasing tricks, like high five or sit pretty, is good, especially for the families of the patients (who often do more petting of the dogs than the patients themselves), especially when they are kids and can't get close enough to pet the dog. 

If you've got a "scary" or large breed like a shepherd (German or Belgian), Rottie, pit bull, etc, it's optional, but I think it's great if they can wear a fun collar, bandana, or even a costume. That really makes people much more likely to open up to them and pet them as a LOT of people are still terrified of large "scary" dogs.


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

I used the "sit pretty" as Abby's "say hello" command. She was overeager to jump on a bed after the first few therapy-dog-ice-cream incidences. Darn cute too and it got her in a good place for petting.

Teach your dog some cues that will help you manage the situation. Like "back up" or "lie still" and simply "look" can help. Or just using a couple cute tricks to blow off a bit of your's dogs hi-how-are-you energy.


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Anne Vaini said:


> I used the "sit pretty" as Abby's "say hello" command. She was overeager to jump on a bed after the first few therapy-dog-ice-cream incidences. Darn cute too and it got her in a good place for petting.
> 
> Teach your dog some cues that will help you manage the situation. Like "back up" or "lie still" and simply "look" can help. Or just using a couple cute tricks to blow off a bit of your's dogs hi-how-are-you energy.


One last question (for now)- 

Are there any books/resources you would recommend for training basic obedience? I'm particularly interested in understanding how motivational training works in terms of getting very specific behaviors (such as teaching a "sit pretty")- I've read a bit about clicker training, but for some reason I've never really felt like I understand it well enough to break down a task and apply the clicker concept.

My dogs now walk on a leash properly, and sit, and have a basic stay and that kind of daily-life type thing, but it seems like there should be a more effective way of communicating specific goals. (For example, they know to pause and wait for permission to cross a street, which we've taught just by being consistent about stopping at the curb and saying 'wait' and then 'go ahead' every time we cross a street on a walk- if they go into the street they come back up and then we wait longer before we continue- but that's not as precise a behavior as sitting up or doing some kind of trick.)

(I will add that we teach them about streets and cars just in case they were to get loose, rather than because we let them run around unsupervised and uncontrolled. I'd rather they had some idea cars were something to be wary of and streets were not to be run off into.) (Someone on another forum freaked out at me when I mentioned teaching them about streets, as if I was advocating letting dogs walk themselves or something.)


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

Clicker training is actually SIMPLE. There's just a learning curve for both the handler and the dog. 

First skill - handler: Break down a behavior into litlle parts (splitting). "Sit pretty" is to sit squarely and lift both front baws off the ground. So do a little visualization here. First, you want the dog to sit. Next to lift a paw off the ground - even the tiniest bit. To lift both paws off the ground and it gradually progresses until you get a nice, straight sit pretty (see my avatar pic).

Second skill - dog: The click means "hey I did that right and I'm gonna get a treat" 

Get a clicker, noisemaker or just use your voice "yes!" and get started. The best thing about clicker training is that if you mess up you're gonna have a chubby happy dog. You can't do any real damage with clicker training unless you're trying to use it to solve fear or aggression. As you learn by doing, remember that too few clicks is better than too many.

Wait for your dog to sit - don't use a command. Click immediately when your dog sits and offer a treat (or toy). Repeat 10 times in a row. When your dog looks at you and sits without any cue, your dog is ready to move on. This shows that your dog understands that it must DO SOMETHING to get the click/treat.

You're well on your way. Now to go back to the way you visualized breaking down the behavior. There are infinite ways to break down or set up any behavior. You'll learn how to communicate with your dog and be able to predict the most effective way to break down behaviors. 

Some dogs don't need behaviors broken down my pit learned to wave like magic. I was using her as a demo in a class. The class picked a NEW behavior to train her. They picked ""wave." I looked at my dog - she was focused on me. She sat, I nodded. I pointed at her paw and beckoned and she waved. Click/Treat! Repeat 4 times. She's never forgotten how to wave. Breaking down a trick doesn't HAVE to be tedious. But in case you get stuck on a behavior, you need to be able to break it down and make it simpler.

Here's a tutorial for getting your dog's attention and recall: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S224wnlt2Ps 

And for the down: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9QvoiiO6_8&feature=related

You'll start the sit (as described above) like in the second video. Wait for the behavior, mark it treat, play, reset and repeat.

The very best tricks are behaviors your dog does naturally. When your dog understands your click or marker, you can "capture" anything your dog does that you would like it to repeat. My dog twitched her head funny when she was really amped up - I taught it on cue and it's definitely a crowd-pleaser. Same dog was in a crate and rooting around in the blanket for treats. She put her head in between her front paws and under her body trying to get a treat. I got her out of the crate, trained it just a tiny bit more - and now she does a somersault.


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Anne Vaini said:


> Clicker training is actually SIMPLE. There's just a learning curve for both the handler and the dog.
> 
> First skill - handler: Break down a behavior into litlle parts (splitting). "Sit pretty" is to sit squarely and lift both front baws off the ground. So do a little visualization here. First, you want the dog to sit. Next to lift a paw off the ground - even the tiniest bit. To lift both paws off the ground and it gradually progresses until you get a nice, straight sit pretty (see my avatar pic).


Okay, another couple of silly questions. 

Can larger dogs do the 'sit pretty' thing? I've only really seen it done by smaller dogs- we have an american cocker spaniel and a rotti mix of some type, and I can't quite picture the rotti doing that. I don't want to ask it of him if it'll be putting strain on his joints in some way due to his size, you know?

Also, any suggestions for cute tricks larger dogs can do? He came to us knowing 'sit' and 'please', but I'm drawing a blank on cute stuff. (One of our previous dogs did 'math'- he barked regularly until you looked away- but Pirate doesn't vocalize very much at all, so getting him to do that one will probably take a while, since I have to get him barking first!  )


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

Everytime I read your posts, it reminds me of the book "Teach your Dog to Talk." It's really awesome with TONS of tricks and some help for how to get started training them.

The "sit pretty" isn't a question of size, but of strength. It takes some time for dogs to develop enough muscle for a solid "sit pretty." The longer-backed the dog, the more difficult it is. My avatar dog is very long-backed and it took a very long time for her to get a solid "sit pretty."

Watch your dog for trick ideas. Maybe your dog thumps his paw on the ground, play bows or likes to pick up things you drop. Cue off your dog's abilities.


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Anne Vaini said:


> Everytime I read your posts, it reminds me of the book "Teach your Dog to Talk." It's really awesome with TONS of tricks and some help for how to get started training them.
> 
> The "sit pretty" isn't a question of size, but of strength. It takes some time for dogs to develop enough muscle for a solid "sit pretty." The longer-backed the dog, the more difficult it is. My avatar dog is very long-backed and it took a very long time for her to get a solid "sit pretty."
> 
> Watch your dog for trick ideas. Maybe your dog thumps his paw on the ground, play bows or likes to pick up things you drop. Cue off your dog's abilities.


I'll have a look for it, thanks.  (I'm one of those people who quite enjoys reading training books and the like even if I don't actually use them, just for ideas about approaches to problems.)

So when clicker training, do you focus on one exercise at a time? For example, you said it took her a long time to build up the muscle- could you work with her on some other trick in the meantime, revisiting the 'sit pretty' regularly, or do you have to wait until you can name the 'trick' before you can move on? (I anticipate it taking a good while for Pirate, because he's pretty long-backed for his size- he looks kind of like his legs should be a couple of inches longer than they are.)

I'll keep an eye on what he offers that could be turned into a trick. At the moment he's a little subdued yet- I kind of get the feeling that at some point in his life, he was very restricted in the ways he could express himself. He doesn't really understand how to play, and when he arrived he didn't vocalize at all. Lots of positive rewards when he does anything- making a movement towards catching the ball, barking when our other dog altered at the door- seem to be encouraging him to be more expressive.

He does have a pretty good 'please' gesture (offers paw) in response to food+'say please' and also understands 'shake' if you offer your hand to him, which he arrived with. Is there some way I should work from that towards 'sit pretty' or is it better to start from nothing' and not cue him to do any of the steps, to avoid confusion?

(Also, while I'm asking about marker training- would marker training work well for trying to encourage the 'play' behavior? I was thinking that if we had a charged 'marker' then we could mark more accurately when he's doing the good thing- making an effort to catch- than what we manage currently.) (Part of the reason for wanting to develop the play behavior is that right now, play situations are a source of anxiety for him, because he gets all worked up about not knowing what to do.)

Thanks again for all your help, btw. I used to work for someone severely disabled and spent a LOT of time in the hospital and rehab with him, so I know how dreary the places can be, so it will be really nice to be able to do something to cheer places up a bit if one or both of the dogs work out.


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

I clicker trained play and prey drive movements (and the result was a tiny bit of REAL prey drive. Very cool. 

When clicker training, you train the behavior before you name it. You only work one _un-named_ behavior at a time, but you will be working the un-named behavior along with familiar commands.

The process for naming a behavior and moving on is:
1. Dog learns that behavior is rewarded and dog repeats behavior independently.
2. Handler puts name on behavior.
3. Handler stops rewarding behavior when handler didn't use command. Big reward the first time dog does the behavior with the command only the first time.
4. As soon as the behavior is on command, start switching between the new behavior and one or two old behaviors to clarify to the dog what is expected.
5. Review the new command in 1 - 24 hours. If dog remembers, then you're free to start a new behavior.

Some dogs go so fast through this - my avatar dog could pick up a new behaviors/commands every 10 minutes. Some dogs are much slower - my disc dog takes about a week to comprehend something.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

Teaching a dog to sit pretty is NOT funny when your kids, unknown to you, teach it to your AKC competition dog and he come in on a recall and does a sit pretty. 
Judge just looked at me and said "I have no idea how I'm going to score that". 20 + yrs ago and I still get pissed at my kids when I think about it. #-oThe crowd loved it! :-x 

"Say your prayers" is another that is fun/easy to teach. The dog is sitting in front of a chair, the front feet go on the chair and the head is put between the paws. Break it all down!


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Bob Scott said:


> Teaching a dog to sit pretty is NOT funny when your kids, unknown to you, teach it to your AKC competition dog and he come in on a recall and does a sit pretty.
> Judge just looked at me and said "I have no idea how I'm going to score that". 20 + yrs ago and I still get pissed at my kids when I think about it. #-oThe crowd loved it! :-x
> 
> "Say your prayers" is another that is fun/easy to teach. The dog is sitting in front of a chair, the front feet go on the chair and the head is put between the paws. Break it all down!


The mental image I have of that AKC incident is really quite hilarious. Watching dog shows would be much more entertaining if the confirmation dogs were likely to occasionally burst out a trick.  (Though I have to confess to not being much of a dog show watcher anyway, as my experience with a show-line cocker soured me. She was an excellent example of what happens if you breed for a certain exaggerated 'look' with no consideration of health, temperment, or 'working' ability. By contrast the field-line cocker I have now, while probably not high enough drive to really be a legitimate working gun dog, is a heck of a lot more intelligent and extremely easy to train.)

I'm working on a good 'down' right now with Pirate (the rotti mix) because while he was clearly taught 'sit' at some point, and also 'say please'/'shake', apparently they skipped down? Or used some weird word for it that I haven't thought of yet. The "say your prayers" is a great suggestion, though, because he's actually been offering some behavior I can see using as a starting point, so that'll probably be next once he gets the 'down'.


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## Bob Scott (Mar 30, 2006)

Another "cute trick" I taught one of my Kerry Blues. After giving him bath I would hold him till I got outside. Then I would say the word "shake" and turn him loose. He did and I rewarded it with praise. He learned that fast and people really did a double take when they reached down and asked him to shake.  :grin:


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

I gave up on OB with my stunt dog after she did a pretty for every sit in novice OB. :blush: :lol:

I've always wanted to teach that kind of "shake"! I thought it would be cute.

Kris - I suggest that you DO NOT train a potential therapy dog to shake. Try training a wave (doesn't touch the person). You wouldn't want your dog to try to "shake" and injure a person with delicate skin.


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Anne Vaini said:


> Kris - I suggest that you DO NOT train a potential therapy dog to shake. Try training a wave (doesn't touch the person). You wouldn't want your dog to try to "shake" and injure a person with delicate skin.


That's one of the ones he arrived with- it's cued from the hand gesture of actually holding your hand out low for his paw, rather than any verbal command, as far as I can tell. (If you say 'shake' he looks at you in total confusion, but if you put your hand down and hold it out expectantly, he does it every single time. I haven't actually run through all the possibilities I could think of someone might use as a verbal cue for that, though.  ) 

I suppose he could be worked with to give it some unlikely verbal cue, so that he DOESN'T respond to someone putting their hand in the wrong place? (I.e. so you'd need to present your hand AND give the verbal cue for a 'shake'.) I mean, he doesn't offer it randomly if your hand is near his legs, it has to be in the right position, but I can see how you wouldn't want him to think he was supposed to shake and end up scratching someone.


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## Kris Dow (Jun 15, 2008)

Bob Scott said:


> Another "cute trick" I taught one of my Kerry Blues. After giving him bath I would hold him till I got outside. Then I would say the word "shake" and turn him loose. He did and I rewarded it with praise. He learned that fast and people really did a double take when they reached down and asked him to shake.  :grin:


That's cute.  I knew someone once who had a long-coated collie or something similar who taught that trick mainly as a house-and-clothing saver- so the dog could be outside and the bather at a safe distance before the water started to fly.


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## Maren Bell Jones (Jun 7, 2006)

My dogs don't baths much, but they do get wet a lot going swimming. I've heard a good cue word for that trick is "rock and roll!" 8)8)8) I may have to try that!


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## Anne Vaini (Mar 15, 2007)

Kris - how is training going?


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