In this week’s Pet Connection newspaper feature, Mikkel Becker wants to know: Do you “click with your pet”?
No, I’m not talking about getting along well, although I sure hope that you do. When I say “click,” I mean a training technique that’s easy and fun for all.
Clicker training is a no-force technique that works on animals of all sizes, ages and abilities. And that’s also true of the people who would administer clicker training, since it doesn’t require strength or much coordination on the part of the trainer.
A clicker is a small plastic box that fits in the palm of your hand. You press down on the metal strip inside the housing and quickly release it — click-click!
The clicker itself doesn’t have any magic powers. What it provides is timing — it allows a trainer working with a pet who understands the game to let the animal know the behavior he’s doing right now is the one that’s being rewarded. And that means the behavior will be repeated. The clicking noise becomes a reward because in the early stages of training, the sound is linked to the delivery of something a pet wants, usually a tiny but yummy treat.
Does this sound familiar? Like from a psychology class, perhaps? It should ring a bell, because the underlying principal of clicker training is scientific (Pavlov’s drooling dogs, and all). But you can be excused if you don’t want to know the ins and outs of the science and just want to cut to the chase.
So cut to the chase already — here!
And from Dr. Marty Becker and Mikkel Becker, news out of Cornell University:
To teach veterinary students to handle emergency situations without harming a pet in critical condition, the first-ever sophisticated critical care dog dummy with a software program has been developed by a veterinarian at Cornell University. Speakers and actuators within the dummy send out heart and lung signals, and a pulse can actually be felt. A balloon-like structure with air mimics breathing. The system monitors blood oxygen monitoring, blood pressure and EKG as well. Dr. Dan Fletcher, a professor at the Cornell veterinary school who teaches emergency medicine, noticed that students would freeze when first handling a critically ill pet. The dog dummy responds like a living, breathing critical pet, providing an environment in which students can learn, as well as make and learn from mistakes.
Read this week’s entire Pet Connection here!
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