Today I am going to tell you
about a revolution.
A revolution of communication
a scientific revolution of observation.
With this revolution we become
the dog’s best friends
and we start to truly see dogs
as they deserve to be seen:
as our best friends.
You will see how dog training
can improve your own relationships,
and not just with dogs.
We already have the tools and knowledge,
and it's happening all over the world.
So picture this:
You come home, after a long day at work,
an annoying boss,
a never-ending traffic-jam
and as you reach home, your sanctuary,
you open the door, and instead of getting
that moment of peace and quiet
your dog attacks you at the doorway
jumping on you, barking and bouncing
and loving you to death -
not a fun way to be greeted, right?
So how do we react?
Do we get mad? Yell? Raise our knee?
And us reacting the way that we do
out of impatience, anger or misconception
is only understandable.
Misconception because most of the world
sees a dog's "unwanted behaviors"
as dominance based behaviors
power struggles
where dogs try to take charge
and boss us around.
Out of this misinterpretation
of dog's behavior we, dog lovers,
were convinced our relationship with
our dogs is based on a power struggle,
and that for the sake of our dogs
we should win this battle
assertively handling our best friends.
We had to punish them,
to subdue them, yell at them
and even hurt them
in the name of training.
Pelle, come!
Sit
Down
Good dog!
This is Pelle. Her name means wonder.
Even though she is a wonder-dog,
even Pelle had to be taught
there is a better way of showing
and getting affection than jumping on me.
I like that she’s exited to see me
but I don’t like to be attacked,
even if it is out of love.
So she was taught that the best way
to get the attention she wants,
is to come and sit in front of me
and wait.
And she also learned that
the attention is worth the wait.
Pelle, good dog!
The point is that we should
all know better,
science has proved it to us decades ago
dogs are not dominance driven creatures!
So why do we keep training them
as if they are?
Yet some of us don't appreciate dog hair
on our couch and want the dog
not to sit on it.
We have to understand
that when a dog sits on a couch,
he does it not because it represents
some ideal of control,
some representation of dominance
over our living room,
but because it is the most
comfortable place to lie in.
that is why you bought the couch
in the first place!
So once we understand that,
the dog only wants a nice worm
cozy place to rest on next to us.
Pelle, Place.
Good dog!
Then we can teach the dog
and reinforce the dog,
reward the dog,
for using that nice, warm, soft,
cozy place to rest on next to us.
Dogs should have rules,
and have boundaries,
but how do we do it?
There's a great example
that dog behaviorist, Kathy Sdao
uses to explain what usually happens
when people try to set boundaries:
Say you need to get somewhere,
so you hail a taxi, you jump in,
you close the door, you buckle up,
and you tell the driver:
"Don't take me to Tel-Aviv,
And also don't take me to Jerusalem,
And don't take me to Haifa".
Do you think the cab driver
will have any idea
where you want him to take you?
Of course the driver’s obvious question
would be "Where do you want to go?"
And dogs are just like that,
they want us tell to them
what we want them to do,
in fact they are desperately waiting
for our guidance.
It’s so easy when we tell people
what it is we want,
and then we get what we want.
People are no different:
I have this friend,
and I'm not going to mention names,
but she had this boyfriend,
and they were going out for about a year,
and things were about to get serious,
but the guy had this one trait
that drove her mad:
the guy possessed the incredible ability
to completely ignore a messy house.
I mean piles of laundry everywhere,
dishes in the sink overflowing,
stuff on the table – the works.
It drove her insane
and they used to fight about it
all the time.
And then, tired of fighting,
she decided to try a different approach.
Mine.
So she started capturing behaviors
she wanted him to keep,
small stuff at first,
when he put
his socks in the laundry basket,
when he washed one cup.
She rewarded those behaviors
with things he liked:
a hug, a movie,
anything that made him happy.
Gradually the house got cleaner
and less messy,
which was great!
But what was really amazing to her was
the affect this had on their relationship.
She started noticing
the things he did right,
and she found herself liking him more.
Today they are happily married.
And our graduates of the
Marker Training institute here in Israel,
led by Nuvi Carmel,
will testify the same thing:
how learning to train dogs
has completely changed their perspective,
not only in the dog training world,
but everywhere: their relationships with
their partners, their parents,
their neighbors, their children.
They stopped looking for what everyone
was doing wrong, and started
seeing the things that were right.
And that's the trick basically:
focusing on behavior you want to keep
and encourage,
then helping your subject -
whether it's a dog, or a person, or
any living being - to learn to offer it.
That's what the revolution is all about:
helping them learn.
Sounds simple in theory, right?
But what about the extreme cases?
Let's get back to dogs.
There’s a common example
that happens in many homes:
Let's take a ten month old
Golden Retriever mixed, "Keila".
Now Keila is your common house dog:
happy for attention, loves to be petted,
great with children.
The problem with Keila starts
when there's food or bones around.
Whenever anyone comes close
to her and her bone,
the dog tenses up and growls.
According to what we were lead to believe,
in order to take charge of a growling dog
and control the situation,
we had to punish them
every time such behavior occurred.
We had to raise our voice,
we had to yell: "Stop it Keila, bad dog!”
But is Keila a bad dog?
The truth is she is just a frightened dog,
terrified of the possibility
that someone might take her food
or her bones away.
In the past
we would have punished the growling,
the symptom really,
but in Marker Training
we want to treat the cause of the problem,
the emotion that is behind the behavior.
If Keila could speak our language,
this would be easy -
“Hey Keila, you have nothing to worry
about, we’re not going to take your stuff,
everything is OK!” -
But she doesn’t.
So let’s communicate with her
in a way she will understand.
Let’s teach her she has nothing to fear.
We’ll use classical conditioning to teach Keila
that every time we come close to her
and her bones,
we give her good things.
Good things happen
and we’re not taking anything away.
Then soon Keila will start to look forward
to us coming closer to her,
and the growling will disappear.
But most importantly – so will the fear.
How easy it is when doing it right.
It’s so simple without using force.
It’s such common sense, it’s so obvious.
So how come we still use force
as a dog training method?
The truth is a lack of knowledge.
And false believes about
what truly motivates dogs.
And this is what we’re all here to change.
The thing with dogs
is that they learn all the time,
they learn from us and about us.
And if they show this amazing ability
to learn, don't we owe it to them
to take responsibility
and teach them properly?
Our revolution is ongoing.
Dog lovers all over the world
have found a better way, a way to
establish constructive communication
with our learner,
to read their body language,
relying on studies that help us
to better understand dogs,
so we can help them
to better understand us.
And for those who found this way,
the results are amazing!
The dream of having a dog in our home
stopped being a nightmare – no more having
to be the ever vigilant "pack leader"
forever engaged in a battle for control.
It brought peace and love
back into our homes,
the way only dogs can.
The revolution is going on as we speak.
We have the tools and knowledge.
You can start doing this yourself.
With your spouse, your dog, your child,
start small, and you will see
big change happening.
Our dogs deserve it. And so do we.
Thank you.