Morey and I have been working on a training project for several months and it's finally to the point where I am able to use this task. Even though you start out knowing that you are training a task for a service dog, it can be easy to start thinking of it as a "trick"-something cool to show off what your dog can do. However, when you actually need your dog to help you with something and you can use that new task to get it accomplished that is pretty cool.
I have always wanted to teach a dog the concept of "right" and "left". I decided this would be a good challenge for Morey and I to figure out together. I began shaping (using a clicker with food rewards when he does a behavior close to what I am looking for and then gradually getting more strict about which behaviors get rewarded) it this summer and it's been a work in progress ever since.
At first it was clicking him for simply looking left. Then I transitioned to items on the ground and clicking when he looked at the one on the left. I had to switch the items frequently so he didn't think he was getting rewarded for always choosing the glove or sock or pencil, but only for choosing the item on the left. This was sometimes a challenge when he would move around and suddenly the item I wanted was now on his right side!
I initially started teaching this task because I tend to have more than one thing in the area when I am asking Morey to retrieve. I thought it would be nice to be able to direct him to the thing on the left or right instead of having him retrieve each item until he gets to the one I really want. I started with left and we will introduce right in another month or two.
I knew we had successfully perfected the task the other night. I was in bed and wanted Morey to retrieve one of my socks that was across the room (next to a pile of other things). He went over and I said "left" and then gave him a "that's it" to get him to know he was correct. He picked up the sock, ignoring the other items, and brought it to me. Success!
You could use sled dog terms. I remember when Steve was training his lead dog, many years ago, the command was "gee" or Haw". Can't remember which was which - you will have to ask him but it came in quite handy when sledding and you wanted to turn left (or right) at the T in the trail. I thought it was a pretty cool thing for a dog to know..little did I really know.
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