Initial Results of Days of Kathy Sdao

I’ve just had two days of Kathy Sdao talks at a vet conference. And wow! I’ve only previously been to two of her lectures at ClickerExpo.

It was a great experience, not only does she have a ton to say, not only is she super experienced, but she was extremely generous with her time and answered a TON of questions after the talks!

Unfortunately I’ve not got very far through my notes yet. I’ll be making some changes to my classes now, seriously considering other changes, and applying a lot of it with my own dogs.

I have higher expectations of my students and my teaching than many, but it’s really just not enough. My students can be doing better. I can be teaching better. My dogs can be learning more. My training can be better. I can be learning a lot more.

One of the things I’ve gotten less proficient at over the years…is shaping in classes. We’re doing more luring and prompting than we probably should in group classes. The basic manners classes I teach have a wide range of students, but I really should use the adult dogs, dogs with other learning histories, impatient people, etc make me compromise good training.