FF410: Cognitive Challenges: The Key to How Your Dog Thinks

I think an important part of the learning process is having the confidence to make mistakes and learn from them. That means going ahead with a theory or idea of how to solve a problem, fail and keep trying.   

This is a key character trait in resilient people and dogs.   

Failure is not a commentary on intelligence or ability, however I do believe how one deals with failure is a commentary on mindset and beliefs.  What most people don’t realize is that the most successful people have failed more than most people have ever attempted anything.  

Yes, please read that again:  What most people don’t realize is that the most successful people have failed more times than most people have ever attempted anything.  

As children we fail all the time, especially when we are infants learning everything for the first time.  How may times does a baby fall before they learn to walk?  How many times does a baby miss their mouth with the spoon when they are learning to feed themselves?  The list is endless……………..but they don’t give up, they may get frustrated, but they don’t quit and they don’t have beliefs or judgments about all the failures, they learn from their mistakes and move on and build on their successes.  And in this process they become resilient and develop grit.  

Grit is a form of determination that is strengthened by failure and it will cultivated a desire to succeed.  And this is where I want to lead you and your dogs, into developing Grit via Cognitive Challenges.  

The purpose of the challenges is not for your dog to nail them the first time around, the goal of the challenges is to test your dog’s ability to solve problems independently.

Once you set the challenge up and observe your dog, if your dog nails it……..that is excellent.  It means your dog has understood the challenge and has the ability to act independently towards the solution.  Then we can confidently increase the difficulty of the challenges. 

If your dog struggles and fails, now you have just been given important information about how your dog thinks and I’m here to help you figure out the best way to offer the minimum amount of help to your dog to gain the maximum amount of success.

I would encourage you to think about your role in these challenges as the “Set Director”

You set up the Challenges for your dog in the same way a Director “sets the stage” for an actor to do their job.  Your role as Set Director is to create an Optimal Concentrating environment for your dog, whereas your dog is the Main Actor and needs the stage to do their job.  

HOMEWORK 

Our first Challenge is called “Break In”

This challenge is designed to test your dog’s ability to interact with something familiar to them, their crate/kennel and access a reward

The set up

You will need a Crate/Kennel, large pieces of food.

1.  Get some fairly large pieces of food that your dog absolutely loves
2.  Let your dog know you have the food and walk over to the crate 
3.  Make sure the crate door is slightly ajar 
4.  With your dog watching throw pieces of food through the slightly open front door
5.  Step back and let your dog figure our how to get the crate door open to access the food inside.
6.  Observe your dog with a neutral mindset, try your best to be a silent observer.  
7.  Once your dog has opened the door enough to get the food, toss more in from the side  

Possible scenarios and trouble shooting

Your dog does not attempt to solve the problem because they are trained to wait for a release cue or start work cue ~ if that is the Optimal Condition for your dog to Solve the Challenge, please incorporate that into the exercise, then step back and observe

Your dog approaches the crate to sniff and accidentally closes the door more and will not attempt to open the door because they believe it is closed.  Open the door slightly and let your dog see you throw a few pieces of food in the crate close to the very front and then step back 

Your dog approaches the crate but is so over aroused they start barking and can’t think.  In this case, throw a food scatter behind your dog to divert their attention and while they are eating the food scatter, open the door enough so they can get the treats with little to no difficulty.  

Repeat the procedure but each time close the door a little bit more so eventually your dog knows they can problem solve and use their paw, head or nose to open the door by themselves.  

Your dog is sensitive and will not open the door even though they want the treats, in this case, open the door wide enough so their head will clear, and then make a treat trail into the crate to a jackpot in the front of the crate.  With each successive repetition close the door just a little bit, almost so that it is unnoticeable to your dog 

As your dog works through this Challenge and is solving it with confidence, to increase difficulty, leave the crate unlatched but the door almost completely shut.  

I would strongly encourage all students to video all the challenges with you and your dog in the frame.  This will be very valuable for proper evaluation.  

Gold students please post your videos in the homework thread for feedback and Sliver & Bronze, remember, we have a TA to do video evaluations too.