Why Clicker Training ?

Kay Laurence

Clicker training falls within a philosophy I have subscribed to for over 25 years. I do not see dog training as that of a trainer who has rights over the learner - human or canine. I see the process as one of discovery, exciting opportunities and pure enjoyment from both teacher and learner. I see dogs come to the learning full of natural enthusiasm and their body language displays pure joy when asked to show me what they have learnt.

Dogs are very, very good learners for the whole of their lives. They welcome learning, relish problem solving and finish satisfied happy dogs.

This is a process which will enhance and deepen your relationship with your dog, through greater understanding, good communication and with absolute trust.

Using the clicker helps you understand exactly what it is you are trying to communicate to the dog. The click is never ambiguous, as the voice can often say “good boy” but with a less than enthusiastic delivery it will sound false, and the dog will sense it. We talk and talk and talk to our dogs and the click successfully cuts through all the waffle.

You have just come home and wearing your posh frock, yes you are pleased to see the dog, but only if they don’t jump at you. Asking them to sit, hang on there for a moment, will allow you to slip your hand into their collar, give the greeting they have been yearning for and prevent them from jumping up - THAT sit, that allowed a successful result, gets a click. It is followed by a moment of reunion, great reward. Good job!

To begin with it seems an unnecessary training device that is more stuff to get your head around.

No worry. All our classes follow the clicker philosophy and you can pick up a clicker at any time to suit you. If you want to learn the skills we recommend the Clicker Trainers Course or the books. It is truly a fascinating journey that will affect communication at every level with people as well as your dog.

The Clicker Philosophy

When we use clicker training we look for situations that encourage the dog to teach themselves what to do. We all remember the self taught lessons for life, sometimes they are quite painfully experienced, but they stick with us, whereas advice given to us from well meaning predecessors seems to get forgotten quite easily.

We take every care to avoid making a dog’s lessons painful, they can be quite brain taxing, but never painful.

Just the other day I found a piece of chicken skin - ideal for sharing. The only dog around was my 16 week old pup, Flink. She was watching this morsel with keen eyes, I made a deal - “if you can remember what YOU have to do when I say “Hello” then you can have this piece of chicken”. She looked at the chicken, looked at me, consulted the data base and came up with the right answer ... she sat!

This was her choice, solved her way and worth all the effort. The sit would get the “click” and she would earn the piece of chicken.

Every day life is full of small rewards. We learn to look for those moments and teach the dog how to earn them.

My dogs love to charge out of the door into the garden first thing in the morning. Pheasants seem to enjoy browsing the shrubs, and of course the Gordons are outraged at this. To enjoy that opportunity to chase out of the door, ALL the dogs have to stand or sit under control before the door is opened. This means no whining, door scratching, bouncing up and down or barking. When every one has their enthusiasm under control, I click, and the door opens.

Clicker Magic

The clicker lets you separate the behaviour (leaving the rabbit chase) from the reward, (arriving back with you for a Big Hug).

The clicker works the same for everybody in the family.

The clicker lets us teach the dogs tricks that we never thought we could - “sleepy” (place your chin on the floor and look at me in a very sad way)

The clicker works for EVERY dog. It is science, not myth or legend. In fact it works for every animal, including fish, rats, dolphins, killer whales, horses, pigs, sheep (how did you think they trained all the sheep in “Babe”?).

We say clicker training is simple, but not easy. The principle is simple, using it with full efficiency and effectiveness can take time to learn ... but it is a great learning journey, one of the best you will ever travel.

Clicker Training clicks itself. This method is SO effective the dogs get it super quick, and you can have a sense of achievement very, very quickly. The more you learn, the more you teach which builds a desire to learn and teach more

What do you want to learn?

When I first started to learn about clicker training I could see it was going to compliment my existing training, deepen my understanding and skills. Oh boy, I should have seen the spades coming as well! Nobody told me it would significantly alter my behaviour, push my learning to such a depth I could never have imagined, and the more I learn the more I see I still have to learn. It is an exciting time and highly motivating.

The nearest analogy I can use is to that of cooking. You can either learn it as a career, with the full intention of immersing yourself into every aspect, developing your own interests and happily spending your entire life in the kitchen, or, you can learn sufficient to meet your current interests, perhaps feed your family, or dinner parties. Some us only learn enough to provide the daily fuel (me). Clicker training is similar, you can just learn enough to manage your dog, prevent problems and share a mutually satisfying life together, or you can make it a career choice. Most folk live somewhere in between.

Give yourself a chance to look and sample some clicker training with the Introductory Day or follow the Getting Started tips at home.

If you know you want to train your dog for something specific, such as a dog sport: Gundog, Obedience, Heelwork to Music or work, clicker training will provide you with an excellence foundation in the science of behavioural teaching.

If you want to just learn more about your dog, how to teach and understand him or her better, then through learning to communicate with a clicker and reinforcement you will learn how your dog responds to their environment, how they view different behaviours, and how to teach a few VERY cool tricks to impress the innocent, dog-less folk.

Either way your relationship with your dog will change. It is fascinating, challenging, demanding, satisfying and you will discover a whole new social life where we talk about “clickable points” and “reinforcement patterns”.

Yeah. So cool!

All these pictures on the right are my dogs with their clicker trained behaviours.

Clicker Courses