Engagement: A foundation For Behavior Change
Training sessions with your dog should not sound like or look like you are trying to wrangle a lost dog unbeknownst to you into your car off the street. Far too often, well intentioned dog owners and trainers attempt to train complex behaviors without a foundation of engagement. Engagement is defined as active participation or involvement. For dogs, this means having generally positive feelings about training with you, opting into their session, and offering attention without constant prompting or coercion from the handler.
What is Engagement?
If you’ve been training your dog without a foundation of engagement, know that I say all of this with love- not judgement. Also know- that we all start without it which means it is possible to build and you and your dog can learn to work together effortlessly with the right interventions. If you’de like to avoid constantly cueing your dog to come back to you mid- training class or your dog running away from you on course- this post is a good starting point for you.
I like to start every dog I train with simple patterns that require very little effort on the dog’s part in order for me to produce reinforcement for them. Usually, this takes the form of simply facing me with a loose leash- and soon enough I will be asking for eye-contact too. The part in which I think many people get stuck on- is that this training doesn’t involve active cueing or prompting of the dog. Instead, the dog will prompt you to do a behavior (mark and feed) by facing or looking at you. If you are used to constantly cueing your dog for behaviors, this will be an adjustment for you. You will need a functional marker word and to understand how markers work before jumping into these exercises. If you aren’t familiar, watch the video on Marker timing first.
Training Eye Contact
I start by placing a piece of food at my feet with my dog standing in front of me, facing me. I make sure the dog sees that I’ve placed this piece of food- which sometimes means showing them by pointing at it or putting it near their nose then slowly lowering it. After placing the food on the ground, stand up and face your dog. Wait for your dog to finish swallowing their food, and be ready to mark when their nose points up at you. Keep yourself still and with your hands behind your back, then mark when you see their nose point at you and drop another piece of food right in front of your feet. Repeat this process until your dog is consistently offering the behavior of pointing their nose at you. Then, you can begin to wait for their eyes to meet yours. Just make sure there is no food in sight for them to fixate on instead. Once eye contact becomes consistent, you can slowly move your hands a little closer to your sides each repetition, only moving an inch or so each time. Only click when your dog’s eyes meet yours, not your hands or treat pouch.
Training A Dog To Face You
The next thing I will work on with a dog new to engagement or new to training entirely is re-orienting to me. This behavior loop serves as a foundation for any training loop I may use in the future where my dog must complete a task or move away from me. This training will teach them to come back to my front and (you guessed it!) offer eye contact before proceeding. I like eye contact as a default behavior because it ensures my dog will be at attention and ready to take the next instructions from me.
This pattern will look and feel very similar to training eye contact, the only difference being the location of your reinforcer. Instead of dropping the treat in front of your feet, the treat will land behind the dog- requiring them to turn back towards you for the next repetition. This requires just slightly more effort on the dog’s part than the previous exercise, making it a great natural progression.
Now that your dog is proficient in offering eye contact, your dog should be the one initiating the first treat. Get setup, stand facing your dog, and wait for offered eye contact. When their eyes meet yours, show them a piece of food by putting it in front of their nose then gently move it to their shoulder and toss it a few feet- aiming for 2 feet behind their tail. Stand up strait with your arms behind you or at your sides and wait for your dog’s nose to point at you, once again. When it does, mark and repeat by showing them the treat and gently tossing it just behind their tail. Once they can consistently do this, you can then ask for their eyes to meet yours as well.
Troubleshooting
If your dog is unable to face you or won’t pay attention to food, you need to make sure to lower any possible distractions. Start this at home with the TV off and nobody around (including other pets) to bother your dog. The most valuable and exciting thing in the room- should be you and your food. If your dog still can’t seem to pay attention to the food or “lacks food-drive”, it’s time to take a step back and reassess your dog’s health and comfort before doing this exercise.
Next Steps
These are the first two exercises I work on but they certainly are not the end goal. Additional skills and exercises in engagement will create the well-rounded dog who enjoys offering their attention to you in training scenarios and in daily life- but it certainly won’t happen overnight. Once you and your dog can do the above skills, you can begin to work in new environments, around distractions, and while facing different directions, adding movement, etc. Then, get creative with other ways of rewarding offered engagement. Once your dog knows how to do this, you can “turn on” the moment they face you or offer eye contact, rather than begging them for it.
I highly recommend Leslie McDevitt’s book, Control Unleashed if you want to continue building you and your dog’s skills. It includes a variety of similar “pattern games” that will help your dog learn the value in engaging with you.
