Course Details
3 WEEK CLASS - Touch is an important part of how we interact with our dogs on a daily basis. So let’s get really good at it! In this class, we’ll explore three avenues of touch:
Language:
Touch is an extremely salient channel of communication, and your dog takes meaning from how and where you touch them. What if you could use your hands to communicate safety and comfort? And what if you could use your hands as a listening instrument, a way to give your dog a voice beyond basic consent checks?
Reinforcement:
If a dog doesn't accept food rewards, there are systems and strategies to solve that problem. We are mindful of our mechanics and the value of our treats. What if we dedicated that same level of care to the way we pet our dogs? How can we protect the reinforcement value of our bare hands, and open our dogs up to not just accepting, but actively wanting pets in more situations?
Relationship:
Refining our attunement improves our ability to give and receive affection, so our dogs can co-regulate with us. As we develop a more sophisticated sense of our dogs’ wants and needs, they begin to seek that connection more and more. There is plenty of research that shows the positive impact of touch in both the dog and human, but the true benefits are beyond measure.
Teaching Approach:
This class has two instructors and you will get the benefit of our combined expertise throughout the class. We (Amy and Josefin) have developed this system together, and are collaborating in teaching it to you throughout the term. We may vary who types the answer to you, but you can rest assured that the answers you get are from the both of us. You may ask us specific questions about technique and timing, but we do hope you'll want to engage with the underlying concepts as well and will welcome discussion around the foundation of this approach.
We will release lectures throughout the week, and there will be assignments with video support for you to follow. Some of those videos have a voiceover, but they also have captions. The videos get you started, and we fine tune in the gold threads. Each week will also have lectures without assignments, for us to expand on certain concepts we want to highlight.
Our feedback to the golds will be detailed and supportive, and broad enough for others to learn from, thus we highly encourage that to get the best from the class that you make time to read at least the feedback on all the gold threads. We have mainly indoor exercises, but potentially an outing with some light leash walking. There will be food and possibly toys involved as we explore our hands and their favorite things.
This class does not have a TA as this is the first time it is offered!
