8 Months: Training - Day 95

Emma taking a pencil from my hand.

In the afternoon Emma's owner called to say she would be picking her up shortly and I was a bit confused, having forgotten she was picking her up a day early and would be taking her the next morning to a very early grooming appointment.  It dawned on me why a few minutes later, but with all the issues with the server from my other job, it had completely left my mind.

Emma had been enjoying playing in the yard and really just relaxing.  Before entry into my yard meant a mad dash to find trouble somewhere, but now it means to find something to chew on (I am determining if it is appropriate or not and trading her when not) and relaxing with the other dogs.

She has a cute habit of sticking her nose through the holes in my chain link fence and watching the neighbors down the street, or sitting on the ramp on her rump and watching them intently.  She's not barking or reacting, just curious.

Three times a day a school bus goes by my home and running, screaming children come out of it and race around the neighborhood on their way to home.  She's still a bit barky about that, but I catch her attention and play the "Look At That Game" until she turns her back on them and watches me instead.  Once we were able to do this while the bus unloaded and we were by the front gate.  She's doing better and better with children at a distance and is slowly learning to be okay with strangers and children up close.

She does become shy and worried about strangers sometimes.  She hides behind me and refuses to move forward to greet them.  This is okay, but something to take into account when she's finally working in public.  She may be fine seeing and even walking around strangers, but not okay with a lot of them greeting her.  In public life I am asked if someone can pet Max at least six or more times per outing and I generally say no.  In her case, I would just make it standard practice -if wearing her working gear, no petting or greeting strangers.

Though I had stated earlier I would work on Lazy Leash this week, my plans changed.  My need to be available for the server work meant going out and working with the chair was not an option and since she's taking a Loose Leash class she doesn't need me working it this week until we have her homework for the class and can build upon it using the Levels Method.

Today's Lessons:

Retrieve

Emma is working on Level 4: Step 4 Retrieve.  In this step Emma is asked to touch three different objects with her nose.  I have been working Level 3 Retrieve with a knitting needle to build a good hold and then work her to the floor, like I did with the pencil.  Today she progressed very  nicely.  I trusted she understood what we were working on and she was able to hold the knitting needle in her mouth for 15 seconds.

Over the course of the day we got to her happily going to and trying to pick up the knitting needle.  Though she hasn't picked it up yet, she is progressing nicely on this skill.  After she can hand me the knitting needle I will work on her handing me a plastic and then a cloth object after this.

Observations

Emma has made some amazing progress on Retrieve, but she is not ready to start picking up and handing objects to me or her handler yet.  She's still working out the concepts of the process and by the end of Level 4 Retrieve we'll have a solid retrieve, but right now, she's still working on building and expanding her understanding of the retrieve process.

I believe her working on her other basics with her owners during the weekends and taking a class with them will help her transfer what she knows and display the same level of confidence and focus she gives me.  I look forward to hearing how they are doing in class with her.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	Completed	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	1	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0

8 Months: Training - Day 94

Emma holding a pencil in her mouth.

Yes, I know I am behind on posting for Emma.  I have a part-time day job that requires my attention, though some weeks much less than others.  This week we had a major failure of  a server and have been fighting to get two critical websites back online in a timely fashion.  Unfortunately, that didn't happen - with a full hardware failure we had to wait for the hosting company to rebuild our server and salvage data from the old drives and thus I was placed in a serious holding pattern waiting for my portion of this rebuild to begin.  It meant I was exhausted by the end of the day after spending hours waiting for phone calls and replying to updates and rapid fire emails regarding the issue.

Technically I am still in that holding pattern, since the server is up, but the drive we need is not attached as a remote drive for us to review and work with.  I am spent the past two days waiting with my IPad to hear if I could start my part on website recovery, but today I can park at the desktop computer and wait since Emma went home last night so she could go to a very early morning grooming appointment.

This means this is Wednesday's blog post and Thursday's will follow shortly.  Another reason why Wednesday's post didn't arrive in a timely fashion was because Max has started a class and I didn't get home from that class until 9:30 PM.

With the warmer weather Emma is enjoying longer periods outside playing in the yard and learning basic life skills while doing so.  She's discovered other people and animals can exist in our world and outside our fence and she doesn't have to be reactive.  I spent sometime watching her play with toys or chew on bones or old corn stalks while the neighbors mowed lawns or played nearby without her even hardly glancing in their direction.  I also spent time watching her quietly sitting and watching them without barking under her breath or having a full breakdown and going into a rolling back by the fence.

She doesn't do as well if I am not in the yard with her.  The moments I step into the house to get something or answer the phone real quick have left her feeling a bit insecure and she resorts back to her barking at the neighbors or reacting to sounds in the distance.  It is not as often and with experience and slow introductions to being alone in the yard she'll learn how to feel secure - small steps - she's feeling secure when I am present, so we are halfway there.

I am also enjoying watching her nap in the yard or on the ramp and self entertaining herself.  These are solid skills that will benefit her for the rest of her life.  Learning to be happy and relaxed when outside will make times in the yard with her family easier on everyone.

While in the yard she's learning to recall from distractions and from distances.  She's learning appropriate play, such as not digging in my gardens or chewing or eating things she's not allowed to have.  She's learning to greet people at the fence and ignore cars, cats and other distractions outside of the fence.  Though I may not be clicking and treating the entire time we play outside, Emma is learning through experience and guidance on how to behave when outside and on her own time.

Today's Lessons:

Retrieve

Emma is working on Level 4: Step 1 Retrieve.  In this step Emma is asked to go to and touch three different types of objects on the floor.  I am still working Emma while she's at my feet and have not added distance to this lesson yet.  We started this lesson with a pencil and worked up to her lifting the pencil to my hand.  I have moved to a metal object and am now working on a knitting needle - but to accomplish a solid hold on different types of material, I backed up to Level 3 Retrieve.

Emma is willing to take the metal knitting needle into her mouth and clamp down on it with her teeth, but she doesn't like to hold it in her mouth for any period of time.  In order to help her with this portion of the lesson, I have been working on quality of bite in comparison to length of hold.

By the end of the day Emma was giving good bites onto the knitting needle, but showing some stress signs by lifting her paw to the needle or turning her head away from it.  When she gave me two or more stress signs I would ask for a simple cue she knew and then end our session and when we returned to training I would work on Level 4: Step 1 Retrieve, which was her touching the object on the floor with her nose.  This seemed to relieve a lot of her stress and she continued to progress with the training.

Observations

Emma is not longer completely shutting down and seeking a place to hide when she is stressed, but instead offering paw touches or turn aways to indicate stress.  If pushed too far she'll start to dance and then put her back to me and shrink into herself, so I am working just below that point and building her ability to handle stress daily.  Adding a small amount of daily stress and showing her she can work through it for a tiny bit and extending the amount she can handle will aid her in her future job.

As she grows into a dog her ability to handle stress will continue to improve, as long as we teach her how to cope by introducing it slowly and within her limits.  She's maturing nicely and should soon be able to handle more stressful situations without delayed fallout when training for public access.

Since this week we went to Broadway and worked on dealing with moving traffic while working by the wheelchair, I consider that a public access outing.  Public Access is not only in buildings, but also working in busy and crowded parking lots and city streets.  Teaching her to be comfortable with traffic is vital.  Emma had two outings with me this week and will have a final one with her owners on the weekend when she starts Loose Leash Walking as a class.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	Completed	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	1	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0

8 Months: Training - Day 93

Emma enjoys visiting with my son Walter.  Here she is, just prior to
Attitude's passing, with Attitude and Walter.

What a beautiful day!  I want to clarify that my training Emma is just one job I have currently; I am also a web developer and work for a company that has several key websites.  Yesterday one of the servers suffered a critical failure and we've been in a holding pattern waiting for the hosting company to get the primary OS rebuilt so we can get the websites back online.  The failure left me waiting yesterday for the server to be available and a planned errand was delayed until today as a result.

The server is still being rebuilt, so we are still in a holding pattern, but my need to run the errand over-rode my  need to wait by the computer today.  I worked Emma in the morning for her breakfast and played in the yard while emails shot back and forth between me and the other tech personnel and then I crated her in Jack's crate and headed out for my errands.

On my return the house was way to warm for the dogs to stay in and the day way too nice.  I let everyone out and let them blow off some steam before I set out to train Emma again, but it was also too hot to train her outside in the street without roasting tender feet and overheating a young dog.  As a matter of fact, it was warm enough for Emma that she laid out on her side on my ramp and napped off the afternoon in the shade.

So, we didn't tackle the next training session until 5 PM and by then Emma was ready for a new adventure.  She's truly looking forward to training and I enjoy that happy mood when she realizes we are about to set off on an adventure.  Wait until she finds out WHY we've been working on this particular lesson!

Today's Lessons:

Retrieve

Emma is working on Level 4: Step 1 Retrieve.  In this step Emma is asked to go to three different types of objects on the floor.  Today I backed up to Level 3 Retrieve because I changed from the pencil to a knitting needle instead.  The knitting needle I selected to train with is one that she destroyed when she was around 18 weeks of age.  She found and chewed the tips of both of my #7 knitting needles - the ones that Amy gave me from her deceased mother's collection.  I was angry and saddened that I had let my attention slip at the time and just stuffed them back into my knitting bag and ignored them.

Today I pulled one out, since it was ruined anyway, and used it to teach her to take it in her mouth.  Though she's not up to holding it in her mouth for any duration, she did take it readily into her mouth and gave quality grips on it.  I then set it on the floor and rewarded any interest in the needle.  In short order Emma was attempting to pick it up.

I will continue to work this object until she can pick it up and hold it.

Lazy Leash

Emma is working on Level 2: Step 2 Lazy Leash.  In this step Emma is asked to take five steps beside me and then wait five seconds beside me.  Today I worked on her coming to my power chair by the gate and lining up with the chair so I could clip her onto the chair.  She did this without hesitation.  I then taught her how to exit the gate with the chair.  She did a fantastic job of it.

Once in the street we worked a few steps and then waiting by the chair for a couple of minutes.  She did fantastic, so we set off, at half speed of the chair and went to Broadway road.  This was technically her outing for today.  She sat beside the chair and watched traffic while I gave her treats.  We then crossed Bowman to the opposite corner and I placed her back to traffic and fed her treats while cars, trucks and semis passed beside us.  She is a bit worried about this, so we'll continue to work on this with much higher value treats until she doesn't flinch when traffic goes by.

We then went down the sidewalk with the traffic coming up behind us and that was when two 18 wheelers passed us and she became very worried.  I did rapid fire treats and keep a short lead on her so she wouldn't jut into traffic or the chair and worked her to the corner and away from traffic, where we did a lot of treats for being brave.  The next time we do this she should be stronger at the behavior and able to better focus on the task.

We then finished going around the block at full speed of the chair.  In the end she was tired and started to drift and try to cross before the chair, so we ended the session.  All told she managed a 10 minute training session and ended with her head and tail up.  She then spent the rest of the night playing in the yard while I worked on staining boards for my raised beds.

Emma will need more practice with traffic before she can accomplish our goal of taking a walk with the power chair for exercise.  Her ability to work with and walk with the chair is amazing and she's progressing very nicely.

Observations

Emma is on the outside edge of this fear period and I am seeing a lot of growth as she exits it.  She's able to watch the kids and neighbors as they play and work in the area and she's even recalling away from barking at nearby cats and dogs when she sees them.  She's showing more control when dealing with DJ and Dieter and she's starting to select to settle next to me in the yard instead of eating everything she finds.  She's still ripping and shredding anything she finds in the yard when active and even plucked bark off of my Spruce tree today, but overall, she was calmer and quieter in the yard then before.

It won't be long before she's doing outings with me and the chair and even taking walks in the evenings with Max and I.  She's still a bit "unaware" of the chair and I have to watch that I don't run over feet, but with time we'll accomplish a solid loose leash with the power chair and thus make her workable with a wheelchair.

She does need practice walking beside a manual chair, since that is what her handler currently uses, so she should work with his chair on the weekends when taking her Loose Leash Walking Class.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	Completed	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	1	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0

8 Months: Training - Day 92

DJ is visiting for the next 10 days.

Emma's week has been different than what she is used too.  Instead of being greeted at the door by Jack on Monday morning, she was faced with a new Dachshund in the house.  DJ, Jack's little sister, is staying with me for 10 days while Jack travels to Nebraska with his owner on her vacation.  Emma has met DJ before and though the two are not best friends, they are no unfriendly with each other.

Emma, a typical puppy, still likes to play dash and pounce with the Dachshunds and DJ is not up for that game anymore than Dieter is.  Though Dieter is feeling better since being placed on medications for his arthritis, he's still a 15 year old dog who doesn't want to play with an 8 month old puppy.  DJ, who is 8 years old, has previous had a broken back and yelps and plays Drama Queen whenever she thinks she might be harmed.  After only a couple of high pitched yelps when Emma did a drive by run she has become a lot more aware of the older dogs and is giving them more respect.

But with Jack away for 10 days and our normal routine a bit changed up, Emma is actually doing well.  She's adjusted to the idea my house is a 'guess whose visiting today' home some weeks when I need to watch a friend's dog.  She's adjusted to the idea of staying in Jack's crate when I leave for an errand during the day and in Dieter's crate at night for bed.  She's even adjusted to the change in our going outside every 3 to 4 hours instead of every 1 to 2 hours that Attitude had required.

Emma is learning to adapt to changing environments by watching me and learning to take her lead not from the event, but the handler.  It is nice to see this level of adjustment, it will make her future as a service dog easier on her.

Today's Lessons:

Retrieve

Emma is working on Level 4: Step 1 Retrieve.  In this step Emma is asked to go to 3 different types of objects on the floor.  At this point I don't want to work with distance, but with her noticing that an object is on the floor and examine it.  I used the pencil for today.  I worked a bit on Level 3 Retrieve and then set the pencil on the floor and rewarded any exploration of the pencil.  In short order she was attempting to pick the pencil up, so I rewarded any effort she made.  She picked it up and handed it to me, though not a final and smooth retrieve, Emma did do her first targeted retrieve and I was very happy with her.  We had a small party and ended the session right there.

Over the course of the day we revisited the pencil on the floor and by the end of the day she had picked it up and handed it to me a total of 10 times.  What amazing progress.  Tomorrow I'll work with a metal object and rebuild again from Level 3 Retrieve to build her hold and willingness to hold a metal object in her mouth like I did with a wooden one.

Homework

Emma has been practicing Level 1 and Level 2 Comeafters for Zen, Sit, Down, Target, Come and Lazy Leash at home on the weekends.  I would like her to continue to work these come afters this weekend and have the family think of new and creative ways to test Emma's understanding of the behaviors.  Can Emma Sit while she's in the shower stall?  Can she sit while she's on a stool?  What about doing a down when on the bed or on top of a crate?  Can she come past treats on the floor without stopping for them?  (Cover them so she doesn't get an accidental jackpot!)  Will she come away from a toy in the yard?  Another dog?  Can she shut the cabinet door in the kitchen, bathroom and laundry room?  Can she sit when you are facing the wall or mirror?  Think of new ways to test her understanding and being able to follow your cues - if she can't, don't repeat the cue, just make a note of a new spot to retrain the behavior and do so.

Continue working on Hide-N-Seek, but now when she comes to you say, "Show me."  And walk her back to B and have HIM give her the treat now.

Continue working on B cuing her in behaviors that she knows with his speech machine.

Finishing School

Emma is doing so well at Finishing School.  She barely needs a reminder now to walk beside me and not rubber neck as we go to the back of the building so she can urinate.  She is urinating on cue, even with minor distractions and for the most part quickly, though this time she wanted to sniff for a bit.  She gets a bit excited after the potty break and wants to rush ahead, but even then, one or two stops on my part resets her mind and she walks into the building without rushing ahead and on a loose lead.  She's still very busy looking about, but with experience she'll be less rubber necky and more focused when we go out.

In class she quickly settles at my feet, though it's in front of me still and not beside me like I want to build up yet, and begins to offer focus and ignore the rest of the room for the most part.  When we started this class it took 50 minutes to get her to rest her head on her feet and relax and now it takes 10 minutes.  It's an amazing level of progress and a sign she's learning to relax and wait until she's needed.

We arrived before everyone else this time and went to the kitchen in the building to talk with Stacy, one of the instructors.  She was doing good with the meeting when Carol popped through the back door and Emma got a bit barky and worried, but quickly recovered and greeted Carol.  She was about to show off her hold of the pencil and couldn't focus after the back door spit Carol up, so we went to our spot and she not only held the pencil, but also picked it up a couple of times and handed it to me.

In class we worked on walking nice out of a door and doing a whiplash look back.  In class we were teaching her with her name to look back, but I have decided that could be a mistake for a dog working in public.  What I would like to do is work on a cue for her to whip her head around and make eye contact - I may keep it simple and use the same cue for focus.  Using her name could result in her not paying attention to her handler if someone in public uses her name, even by accident, and she does a whiplash look back because she heard her name.

Emma is a star in class.  Stacy used her as the demo dog for the door behavior and she was focused and offered the same behavior she gives me at the door - sitting and waiting for a cue to exit.  She was a fantastic demo dog.  She did the door exercises with a nice walking out with me at my side like a good little service dog.  During the whiplash look back exercise I saw her offer her sit, down, chin down, eye contact, zen and even shake to get Carol to give her the treats in Carol's hand.  An amazing display of rollerdexing her behaviors to find the answer!

Emma has one more class before she's done with Finishing School.  If possible I think taking this class with the family again would be good for both the family and Emma, since it'll give her a chance to work with them in an environment she's never worked with them in before and would count as an outing for her during the week.

Observations

Emma is maturing nicely.  She's enjoying learning and starting to settle and deal with new situations better each time she's faced with one.  The moment with Carol entering and startling her and even frightening her a bit was quickly recovered from and Emma was able to focus and concentrate afterwards - which was fabulous.  She's still a teenager and the difficult months of major mental and emotional changes lay before us, but she's learning to watch and evaluate before reacting most times now.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	Completed	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	1	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0

8 Months: Training - Day 91

Emma showing off her rad retrieve skills.

What a productive day.  I dedicated this week to one behavior and the result was amazing.  Today I realized that Emma felt that my payment for her learning Retrieve was not high enough, so I cut up some hot dog and cheese and added it to her kibble.  It perked her right up and she became willing to work longer and harder for the behavior.  For a bit, this behavior requires payment higher than kibble alone and over time, as the behavior becomes more fluent, she'll be more willing to work it for kibble alone.

That may also be part of the problem.  I have been working harder behaviors with low value rewards and she's been telling me that by giving me low energy responses.  It took a bit, but I got the clue.  I decided that if a bit of hot dog and cheese mixed in with kibble is what it takes, then by all means, let's do that and build up her eagerness in joining the lesson.

She's about to have her outside world change here.  I have been, over the years, making changes to my yard.  In the beginning my yard wasn't properly fenced, so when I moved in a friend and I finished the fence around the front of the property and then removed the temporary fencing that blocked the side and backyard off.  This gave Attitude and Dieter a fully fenced yard they could play in, which I had promised them.  I then removed the dangerous lean-to that was against the garage, the garbage heap behind it, trimmed the treats and started tossing grass seed out turn the weed patch my yard was into a grass patch instead.  I also added flower gardens and wanted to add a vegetable garden.  The vegetable garden didn't happen until the year I also added grass to the front yard, which had been nothing but dirt until then.  That was the year I got Max.  My final promise to Attitude was that the driveway would stop hurting her feet when she walked on it and when I began converting it to a yard also I kept that promise.

This year I intend to finish that yard, add raised beds along the fence line and fence in my vegetable garden - since one small Labradoodle seems to think jumping in and digging in my raised beds is way too much fun.  The change in the vegetable garden will be what will affect her.  She loves to run the length of my property, jump through my raised beds and then run back through them and return.  Putting a fence in her path will force a change in direction when running through my yard.

It'll be a busy spring and summer for Emma with all the construction and people coming in and out of my home to finish the projects I have set for this year.  It's taken me six years to get to where I am and I figure each year I'll have yet another big project to work on - such as removing my garage and putting a new one in and removing on tree at a time and replacing them with fruit trees.

During that Emma will be learning self control in the yard - that she can and will have given locations she can dig and others she cannot.  That she can't bark at the neighbors who'll be out and using their yards and that people walking by the house are not dangerous and can simply be watched and not barked at.  It'll be a long and fun summer of learning about the world as a whole!

Today's Lessons:

Retrieve

Emma is working on Level 4: Step 1 Retrieve.  No, you did not read that wrong!  Emma passed Level 3 Retrieve today!  Check the video I have attached which shows Emma holding a pencil in her mouth!  What a trooper this week.  She just flew through the whole behavior.  I am very pleased with her.

In this step Emma is asked to go to three different types of objects on the floor - 1 wood, 1 metal and 1 cloth.  Today we worked on the wood object.  I slowly worked Emma to taking the object in my hand closer and closer to the floor.  As the object got very close to the floor she would either paw it or lay down.  I ended up just setting the object on the floor and then clicking for putting her nose on it.  Emma did very well with this step.

Homework

This weekend work on Level 1 and Level 2 Comeafters for:

• Target
• Lazy Leash Steps 1 & 2

Continue Hide-N-Seek homework and build up Emma's ability to find a person on cue anywhere in the house.

Observations

Emma is doing very well and even though my day today was out of whack and we didn't get out of the house, we did get a lot done.  Next week I will work on Lazy Leash and build up Emma's leash skills so she will be ready for walks with Max and I and working on learning to enter and exit buildings with a wheelchair.  Once she's confident with the power chair I'll begin taking her out to new locations to work with it and begin truly training to work beside her handler in public.

Emma is exiting her fear period and I can see her confidence has grown again.  I do believe in the next two or three months Emma will progress rapidly and be ready to work for short periods in public.  I am very excited to see this growth in her and look forward to the work we'll do this summer.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	Completed	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	1	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0

8 Months: Training - Day 90

Eventually, Emma will be able to carry items for her handler.

It's been 3 months today!  Wow!  Emma has progressed so far with her training and is continuing to advance daily.  Just hard to believe where we are at the 90 day mark - she's got most of her basic skills under her belt and is adding skills that will make her easier to manage and eventually work toward her service dog tasks and she's only 8 months old and has 90 days of training with me under her belt.  Remember, Emma also trains on the weekends with he owners, who work on the skills she's has and helps to generalize them for her as well as teach her skills specific to their home - such as Hide-N-Seek and listening to B when he cues her.

She's still very busy and very puppy and very excitable, but even that is slowly evolving into an adult dog personality.  She no longer barks at every sight in the yard; only yesterday she sat quietly on my ramp and watched a neighbor mow his lawn two houses down and the kids riding their bikes on the street without making a peep.

She still barks when people are near the fence, but that too is slowly fading to accepting that people can be on the other side of my fence and the world will not end.  She's still worried about children in general, but not barking or reacting badly to them any longer.  Josh is still a bit of a surprise to her each week, but this week she finally stopped barking at him as we played the "Look at Josh" game and she went to him and gave him a warm greeting.  It's happening, slowly but surely she's developing the self control to see and deal with new situations and not be undone by them.

Her shutdowns are no longer complete, but instead little "this is a bit stressful, can we stop" wiggles which we work through and she finds she can do more and handle more stress each time we manage to pass that moment of "almost" tuning out.

It's happening; Emma is turning into an adolescent and handling the transition well.

Today's Lessons:

Retreive

Soon Emma will be able to hand items to her handler.

Emma is working on Level 2: Step 2 Retrieve.  In this step Emma is asked to hold an object in her mouth for 5 seconds while I hold it with her.  Emma seems to be more stressed by my sharing the holding than she is by my having her hold the object.  With the click for quality of bite on the object Emma is holding onto an object longer and longer and so, I keep my hand near her face, but let her take the object from it for brief periods of time.  She's learning that the behavior happens until the click occurs and I can see the wheels turning in her head and she's getting better and better at it each time we revisit the behavior.  Today she actually held the pencil in her mouth for 6 seconds once.  I am getting a solid 1 second hold 90% of the time and 40% of the time up to 3 second hold.  Emma is progressing nicely.

I will continue with this portion of the lesson while lowering the pencil to the floor until she can pick it up and hand it to me, which is our goal.

Observations

With maturity comes a stronger focus on learning.  Emma is thinking and learning as we work retrieve, and as I suspected, she's very ready to start this part of her service dog training.  She's got a good grip on the pencil, but doesn't put teeth marks in it - which is fantastic.  What she doesn't have is the endurance to handle a lot of training in a single session - about the time I considering ending the session she tells me it's time by putting her foot very gently on the pencil and twisting her head at me.  I can get one more good grip on the pencil after this, thus ending on a good note, but she's still tiring on this lesson within a 1 minute span.

Age will improve training endurance.  With this in mind and seeing how quickly she mentally tires now, I know about how long an outing should be.  Tomorrow, since I have her for the full day, Emma and I will visit the truck stop and work on calm and quiet behavior while observing the action outside of the building.  It should be fun and not take us more than 10 minutes at the most.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	2	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0

8 Months: Training - Day 89

Emma is learning to do this also.

Tomorrow will mark 3 months since I started training Emma.  Has it really been 89 days Emma and I have spent training?  And here she is walking on a loose lead a majority of the time, working beside my power chair, flinging sits and downs and closing cabinets and more.  Doesn't seem long, but Emma has made huge strides in her training since we started and she's got so much more she is to learn, but the foundation for that learning is in place and she's rapidly moving forward now!

In Level 1 Emma learned how to communicate with her humans.  If she offered behaviors we liked she got the rewards she wanted.  In Level 2 Emma is learning patience, which she now applies to a large part of her life when on outings and other adventures with me.  As she progresses through the Level she's learning to learn and think.  I see her problem solve things on her own a lot now and I am pleased with that.

It's time to begin a hard push to two of her major tasks.  One is using Target for a variety of things.  This will include pushing her handler's arms and feet back into position, turning on and off lights (she'll need a stool for this task due to her height) and closing and opening doors.  Later it will work into pushing buttons to let him into buildings and activating elevators.

The other task is retrieval.  She'll help in picking up his room, her own toys, items he's dropped and even paying for items he's purchasing.  She'll be able to help with his getting dressed and undressed and bringing him clothing for the day.  She will also be taught to seek help with he needs it by carrying a bumper in her mouth when he's sent her out to find someone.

She naturally loves to cuddle and that can be built into her giving comfort when asked by "visiting" with him by either sitting in his lap or resting her chin on him.  This comfort and companionship will be a huge part of their partnership.

Right now, Emma should be practicing some of her known skills at her home.  She should be shown and asked to help close cabinet doors and the bedroom door each time it's needed when he's nearby and he should be encouraged to cue her to do it.  The more practice she has at these skills in her real home will make her stronger at them and understand them better.

Emma will be headed for her CGC by fall - I would like the family to work toward taking the test with her.  It will be with him that she needs these solid manners and with him that she'll be spending her life.  It should be his success to have her pass the CGC with him.

Today's Lessons:

Retrieve

Emma is working on Level 3: Step 2 Retrieve.  In this step Emma is asked to hold an object in her mouth while I hold it with her for up to 5 seconds.  Since class on Monday I have been clicking for the quality of grip on the object and today Emma was able to hold the object (a pencil) in her mouth for 3 seconds.  Emma is progressing nicely on this task.

At the end of this mornings 3rd Retrieve lesson Emma became fussy and acted like she didn't want to train anymore.  I suspect she was tired, but she wasn't so finished she couldn't eat.  I did a bit of cheer leading with her and she finished the lesson in good form.  I will have to limit the morning Retrieve lesson to two sessions until she's more confident with the lesson overall.

Observations

I have to thank my friend Robin for her advise on how to handle Emma's Wilting Willow moments.  As I stated yesterday, Robin's dog Jonathon had a similar reaction to stress when he was her age and Robin had found a good solution to help him through it by talking with Sue Ailsby (author of Training Levels: Steps to Success - the book we are using to train Emma with) and relying on her years of experience as a trainer.  When we had chatted about Emma's behavior and what I was seeing Robin had reviewed her training logs for Jonathon and found what she had done to help him.

The trick was to go back to his strongest skills - Sit and Down and Target - and ask for one or two of those and then have a big party of praise and end the session that way.  She said that it left the session on a good note and helped Jonathon deal with stress better each time he returned to training.

That is exactly what I am doing with Emma, but I hadn't been cheer leading and praising with enough emotion to really get her spirits back up.  I have ramped up my joy at her doing a sit, even when stressed, and had a huge party with her when she's on the edge of shutting down and she's recovering nicely now as a result.

Today, when the Retrieve lessons became a bit too stressful for her I had a mini party each time she did a sit or down and then would ask for a grip on the pencil and would praise the heck out of her and give her a treat.  It reset her and let her finish the last two repeats we did and left us on a great note for our next training session.

Thank you, Robin, for sharing your wisdom with us and helping us become better trainers.

Level 1

	Zen	Target	Come	Sit	Down
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed

Level 2

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed	Completed
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	3	2	2	1	1
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Tricks	Communication
Step	1	1	1	Completed	1

Level 3

	Zen	Come	Sit	Down	Target
Step	3	2	0	0	1
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Jump	Relax	Handling	Retrieve	Communication
Step	0	0	0	2	0

Level 4

	Zen	Come	Retrieve	Target	Relax
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Focus	Lazy Leash	Go To Mat	Crate	Distance
Step	0	0	0	0	0
	Handling	Communication
Step	0	0