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OB140: From Pivots to Practical Heeling

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OB140: From Pivots to Practical Heeling

Course Details

If you feel overwhelmed when you think about teaching your dog to heel or you simply don’t know where to start, this is the class for you. Instead of obsessing about every little detail (also a wonderful path for those that want that!), this class will offer a simple yet effective way to teach practical heeling. We will start with the pivot bowl and establish value for being in heel. Next we’ll fade the props and you’ll be left with awesome rear end movement. Finally we’ll get moving! Throughout the class we’ll use a combination of luring and shaping to get your heeling kick-started and moving forward in 6 weeks! Whether you’re brand new to heeling, can’t get off the pivot bowl, or aren’t sure how to progress to moving forward, this class will help you get to that next step. If you want to get out in the ring but heeling is holding you back, the answer is right here! Join us today to go from pivots to practical heeling!

Trailer for this class:

 

Teaching Approach

Lectures will be released weekly on the first day of each week.  Each lecture contains written information with short videos to demonstrate.  Videos do not include captions or voiceovers.  This class would work best with students that do well with written out instructions with video examples of each step and prefer a systematic approach to training.  I will provide written feedback with video examples if necessary. 

 

This class will have a Teacher's Assistant (TA) available in the Facebook study group to help the Bronze and Silver students! Directions for joining will be in the classroom after you register.

Nicole Wiebusch Instructor: Nicole Wiebusch

Nicole Wiebusch CPDT-KA (she/her) has been competing in dog sports for over 25 years.  Starting in 4-H, Nicole quickly became addicted to the sport of obedience and has been showing in obedience, rally, and agility ever since.  (Click here for full bio and to view Nicole's upcoming courses)

Syllabus

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(Subject to Change) 

 

Pre-Lecture: Props Recommended for this Course

 

1.1 Pivot Bowl Introduction

1.2 Starting Movement on the Pivot Bowl

1.3 Pocket Hand Introduction

1.4 Placement of Reward for Heel Position

1.5 Nose Touch

 

2.1 Sustained Nose Touch For Tuck Sits in Heeling

2.2 More Movement on the Pivot Bowl

2.3 Pocket Hand on the Pivot Bowl

2.4 Find Heel with Platform

 

3.1 Get Off the Bowl

3.2 Pocket Hand with Heeling

3.2 Setups in Heel

3.3 First Steps from Stand

 

4.1 Reward Markers and Strategies in Heeling

4.2 Turns

4.3 Pace Changes

 

5.1 Starting From a Sit

5.2 Halts

5.3 Fading Pocket Hand

 

6.1 Increasing Number of Steps

6.2 Resets

Prerequisites & Supplies

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 There are no pre-reqs for this class.  A lecture on the props being used and how to teach them will be released prior to the start of class.  Supplies recommended: pivot bowl, sit platform.  Optional: full body platform.

Sample Lecture

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Teaching a Nose Touch and Adding Duration

 

Nose touches can be so useful for a variety of behaviors.  It’s one of the first things I teach to my puppies.  It can be used as a target behavior for recalls, and we often use it in a reward chain for heeling.  When it’s transferred to a physical target, you can use it for go outs, contacts, and so much more!

 

In this class, we will focus on using it for heeling.  We will be teaching a sustained nose touch to assist with teaching tuck sits in heel and teaching head position. We will also use it throughout heeling to encourage upward attention.

 

Nose Touch to Palm

 

I start by teaching my dog to touch his nose to my palm.  With treats in one hand, I present the other empty hand (with a flat palm) a couple of inches from my dog’s nose.  I am careful to keep my hand still and not bop the dog on the nose - he should be doing the touching!  Most dogs will reach out and sniff your hand, and as soon as you feel the contact mark and reward.  I frequently switch hands at this stage.  If the dog doesn’t touch the hand, I try to get him moving.

 

 

Adding Duration

 

As my dog starts to understand hand touches, I will start to only reward the ones that are harder.  I very systematically do this; I don’t just stop rewarding the soft ones, but I try to gradually shape the dog to punch my hand harder. 

 

Typically if you withhold the click, the dog will touch with more pressure.  As I start to think about adding duration, I will start withholding the click until the second nose touch.  What ends up happening is the dog hits your hand harder, and therefore a little longer.  After a few reps, I will start to click every third touch.  Typically around this time the dog gives you a longer nose touch.  At that point I start to very incrementally add duration by delaying the click a millisecond at a time.  When you first start adding duration, you must split it into fractions of seconds, but as the dog starts to understand, you will be able to add seconds at a time instead of 10th of seconds.  Be sure that you are ping-ponging the time, to make it easier in between the harder reps.

 

There are other tricks you can use to help the dog understand duration.  Sometimes if you pull your hand away slightly the dog will push harder to get to your hand, and therefore longer, and you can click that.  I like to teach my dogs to maintain contact with my hand as I move it around because that will come in handy later.  If your dog is struggling, try to play with them a little bit to get the arousal level up.  That will often cause the dog to touch harder.  If the dog comes off my hand before I click, I just wait and click when they touch it again, then slowly work the duration back up over the next few reps.

Testimonials & Reviews

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A sampling of what prior students have said about this course ...

This was my favorite heeling class I’ve taken at FDSA. The progression to get away from the pivot bowl made sense. We’ll still be working through the lectures when class ends, but I’m optimistic we’ll be heeling with this class. I’ll definitely be watching for more classes from Nicole! I’d love a continuation of this class too….hint hint. 😀


This class has logical step by step information. The video lectures for demonstration provide a great resource. Nicole's feedback for the golds is nice and detailed. And very important: while this stuff asks for a lot of patience handler wise Nicole's comments are very motivating and helpful for staying in the game. I recommend this class to everyone to get a clean start into heelwork.


Great class, lots of games to make heeling fun!


Nicole did a great job of breaking the process down into manageable steps. I'm pleased with the progress we made and expect to keep using this from my library as a resource.               


An excellent course! I was pleased with the way we progressed through the topics. They were paced well. We stuck a bit in week 3, but worked our way through to the end of week 4, ending with heeling successfully. Nicole was super supportive, with lovely, encouraging feedback!

Registration

Next session starts: June 1, 2023
Registration starts: May 22, 2023
Registration ends: June 15, 2023

Registration opens at 11:30am Pacific Time.

OB140 Subscriptions


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Tuition $ 260.00 $ 130.00 $ 65.00
Enrollment Limits 12 25 Unlimited
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