By Heather Mastel
From the Summer 1999 issue
Those of you who were fortunate enough to participate in the “Click & Reward" seminar held on May 1, are pretty fired up your new found knowledge. Jim and Amy Logan spent an entire day teaching and the results and the overall enthusiasm is quite remarkable. “What a concept”, “They made it so easy to understand!” “I can’t wait to get home and try this on my kids!“ Clicker training, (C/T), is revolutionary. It is changing the way we think and therefore respond to not just llamas, but all of our animal friends.
Jean Donaldson in her book Culture Clash states: “If it has a spine and a brain stem, you can clicker train it.” It is a technique used in animal husbandry in zoos around the world. I have been so impressed with the stories we continually receive about abandoned “rescue” animals who respond so very favorably in unbelievably short periods of time. Remarkable results are being obtained. Karen Pryor, scientist and “Mother of Clicker Training” is presently working with autistic children and they have developed the concept to further include pilots testing in Right simulators to acknowledge the precise behaviours they are trying to achieve in training.
What is a clicker? A clicker is a small plastic box with a strip of metal inside which when pushed down rapidly creates a sharp metallic “clicking” sound. It is this crisp distinctive sound which makes the clicker such a good, wide ranging teaching tool, because you can use this distinct and abrupt sound to “mark” to your pet that this is the behaviour which you want. Furthermore, it is a sound which will only be used for training, so it is a signal to the animal that training is now in progress.
History. In concrete terms, C/T originated from dolphin training in the early 1960s. Training dolphins was problematic, since they do not respond well to punishment (it confuses them and they tend to cower), and further it is relatively difficult to catch and spank a dolphin. How much easier and better to simply reward these wonderful creatures for the appropriate behaviour or the approximation thereof. And how exciting to realize that if Flipper can be trained to do all those wonderful eye popping stunts without punishment, then surely to goodness we can train our llamas or Rover to sit, stay, come, roll over, or anything else they are physically capable of without reverting to brutalities.
The Proof of the Pudding. If you’ve studied other training methods, you’ll know that they mostly suggest not starting training until your subject is no longer a juvenile. This is simply because traditional punishment-oriented training simply confuses young animals. Like dolphins, they are not very good with punishment. But with C/T there are trainers now able to train very young animals (almost from birth!), because learning is now all fun and games. And why not? Doesn’t that sound like a method worth trying?
RULES: Here is a short list of do’s and don’ts:
(1) A click always means a treat. If you click give a treat. You don’t want to weaken this reinforcer. However, a treat is not always edible. It can be many things, a pat on the head . . . (yes, llamas can be clicker trained to actually ENJOY having their heads touched), to you turning and leaving. Ultimately you give the animal what it is it wants.
(2) Do NOT give a name to your trick until it is solidly and reliably being performed. You do not want to get into the habit of saying “Down, down, down, down ....doooooowwwwwwwnnnnnn!” “DOWN” should be all that it takes. Until you get there, the only sound used is “Click.”
(3) NO Choke Chain. Or whatever other euphemism you use for those ancient strangling tools. You do not need to use force. Let it go.
(4) Jackpot! When your pet gives you an approximation of what you want, give her a Jackpot - a big reward. Five or ten times the amount your normal reward. Big, high pitched vocal praise, a handful of special treat, and a load of pattings. This says “Hey, this is what I want. Isn’t it fun? And aren’t you brilliant?”
Treats. To begin with find an edible treat your friend finds irresistible. Our llamas will work for one tiny grain of alfalfa pellet. With dogs, we prefer to use small morsels of dry cat food. It’s a bit special, the flavour is different and they are not too big. If you are using a treat, don’t make it too large, Kibble sized is perfect.
Training. There is no one way to train. There is no one right way. It’s like climbing to the top of a mountain . . . many paths lead to the same end result.
Clicker Basics:
Contracts. Let’s make a contract between us. I like to verbally say to my pet, “Okay, this is what I want now. I want you to stay and then I’ll click and treat.” KEEP THE CONTRACT SIMPLE. Ask one thing at a time. Once you get
one behaviour you can then try for another.
Say Cheese. Think of the clicker as a camera. What you want to do is take a picture of what you want the animal to be doing. Timing is everything in C/T. This cannot be emphasized enough. Luckily, it is also very forgiving, so don’t be too hard on your animal, or for that matter yourself. Remember, the beauty of the clicker is how precise the sound is. I want you to do what you are doing - NOW!
Shaping. You may not get the exact behaviour you want right off the bat. Take an approximation. You want your llama to lie down? Take any movement downward and reward it. Slowly take only the deeper downward movements, to the point where the llama can only but lie down. Then . . . JACKPOT!
When my husband was a kid they inadvertently shaped their mutt to ring the doorbell to come in. The family was immensely proud to have friends over and the doorbell would ring. His father would ceremoniously check his watch and then say to one of them, “Hmm, right on time. Will you get that please. Scamper wants in and he doesn’t like to wait.” And sure enough there would be Scamper at the door to the amazement of all including us. But how? Well, he probably started by jumping up to scratch the door more effectively and one day he inadvertently hit the door bell and magically the door opened. Hmmmm, perfect. Next time he jumped up, nothing. Then up again, the door bell rings and he gets his reward. Hmmm, if I jump up over here somewhere the magic bell rings and then the door opens. I’ll just keep jumping until the bell rings. Get it? The door bell is the clicker. Well at least the dog understood ! And if I’d only been wiser I could have invented operant conditioning instead of that Skinner guy.
Generalization. Animals do NOT generalize well at all. Just because your llama is trained to load into the trailer next to the barn, doesn’t mean she’s trained to load in the field. The training for the second and third and fourth area will be swifter, still it requires training anew!
Human Generalization. Although animals do not generalize well, homo sapiens can be pretty good at it. So although there are only limited examples of C/T here please be creative and use it on other wanted, or unwanted behaviours. Good trainers are observant, sensible, sensitive, gentle, firm, and creative.
Gently Gently. If your friend just does not get it, here is the secret. Psssst:
(1) Roll up a good thick newspaper.
(2) Put heavy, rubber bands tightly around each end.
(3) Whack yourself a couple of good ones up side the head.
NEVER hit your friend. Somewhere, somehow you are doing it wrong. It is that simple And there is no excuse for getting physical. They don’t get physical with dolphins, you don’t with your buddy be she llama, dog, cat, horse or ferret, etc.
Resources. By the end of reading this work, I hope you will be able to understand the theory of C/T and be able to generalize from the training examples given in order to attain the behaviours you want from your friend. There are numerous books and videos of much greater breadth available, so if this is your first brush with clicker training please let this only be the beginning of your studies. We can be reached toll free at Canada’s own Clicker Connection at 1-877-554-2522 or email Clicker Connection or visit our website at www.clickerconnection.com.
Jim and Amy Logan’s
Click and Reward Llama Training website is also worthwhile visiting.
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