The other night I didn't have much time to train. So I decided I would train all three dogs at the same time. Warning: This only works for certain exercises, but it can work well, and can even build a dogs confidence that they are doing an exercise correctly (when dogs around them are doing the same thing) or increase their drive and motivation (if they decide they are competing with the other dogs around them).
We were doing signals. I left all three dogs standing, walked across the room, signaled down, they downed, signaled sit, they all sat, and I released them (my release command is two hands raised in the air often accompanied with a verbal "hurray").
And than something interesting happened . . .
Rosco ran straight to the kitchen and positioned himself in front of the cookie jar.
Lola ran to me for a snuggle and some pets.
and Gwyenth happily jumped around in circles and grabbed a toy off the floor.
I repeated this experiment and the same thing happened.
It was funny watching the dogs running off in three different directions after the release and it was really interesting to see the dogs choose their own Rewards.
Remember that what constitutes a Reward is defined by your dog, not by you, and also keep in mind what you can and can not bring into the ring with you.
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