Karen Pryor Clickertraining - Shaping and Targeting

Targeting vs. Luring

Gale Pryor — Wed, 01 May 1996 00:00:00 -0500

Soon after learning that a click marks the exact behavior and tells the animal what earned its reward, newcomers to clicker training wonder how to go about getting that clickable behavior. On this point, the answer they hear depends on whom they ask.

Stepping on the Food: A Memo from Karen

Karen Pryor — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0600

You're training "leave it." You drop a bit of food, the dog lunges toward it, and you cover it with your foot. Are you just managing the environment, or is this negative punishment, taking away something desired?

What is Microshaping, Anyway?

Kay Laurence — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0600

This month I'm welcoming a guest author to the Letter from Karen, British clicker training innovator Kay Laurence. Please enjoy this wonderful discussion of what Kay has dubbed "microshaping."—Karen Pryor

The Sea Food Circus: Training Fish

Karen Pryor — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 00:00:00 -0500

Are fish trainable? And if they are, why bother?

How Shaping Develops Learning

Kay Laurence — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 00:00:00 -0500

Free shaping sessions give us a window into the thought process of learners. We can see how learners make choices toward solutions, and we can see when they have run out of ideas.

How to Teach Your Dog Left and Right

Aidan Bindoff — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 00:00:00 -0500

This is a fun exercise that is handier than it seems at first. You'll set up two targets at a distance, and teach your dog to go to either target—left or right—on cue. Later, you will set up similar exercises to bring more general meaning to the cues "left" or "right."

A dog that understands "left" and "right" has a terrific skill for many competition venues including agility, herding, mushing, water dog, and retrieving. This understanding would also be handy walking on trails—and service dog owners could think of a dozen or more applications for "left" and "right."

Lessons from Llamas

Karen Pryor — Sat, 01 Sep 2007 00:00:00 -0500

Newcomers to operant training may place superstitious value on the specific tools they see others using, not realizing that it's the process, not the equipment, that counts.

Chasing Squirrels

Karen Pryor — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 00:00:00 -0500

In April of this year there was a discussion on the ClickerExpo Yahoo Group e-mail list about squirrel chasing. It became a hot topic, generating many opinions and replies. I responded to the ruckus with this post.

The Shape of Shaping: Some Historical Notes

Karen Pryor — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0500

Shaping is a concept that many pet owners find hard to grasp. We're used to making animals do things by leading them or pushing them into the behavior we want—and it is hard to believe that there is another way. Common sense tells us that there is no possible way to get an animal to do something it has never done before, doing nothing yourself but reinforcing spontaneous movements.

Train Your Bunny to Sit in an Easter Basket

Joan Orr — Sun, 01 Apr 2007 00:00:00 -0500

Enjoy spring with a real Easter Bunny—yours! Here's how to train your rabbit to climb into a basket and stay there, as excerpted from Getting Started: Clicking with your Rabbit by Joan Orr and Teresa Lewin.

Reinforce Every Behavior?

Karen Pryor — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 00:00:00 -0600

In September I gave a workshop at the annual meeting of the Association for Pet Dog Trainers, always both an honor and a pleasure. In the workshop I demonstrated an exercise I'd learned, at an earlier APDT meeting, from Massachusetts trainer Tibby Chase, for teaching inattentive dogs to walk politely at a person's side. The exercise involves targeting and shaping, and works even if neither the handler nor the dog know anything about clicker training. APDT had arranged for a pet owner to bring three friendly but largely untrained dogs. None of the dogs were accustomed to being in public, and while they were fairly quiet they were of course trying to smell everything and greet everyone, pulling on their leashes and paying very little attention to the person holding them. The owner found a volunteer handler for each dog so I could put them through the exercise, one at a time.

Shaping Your Way to Success

Karen Pryor — Wed, 01 Feb 2006 00:00:00 -0600

"I can train ANY behavior that the animal is physically and mentally capable of doing."
—Keller Breland

Let's Get Clicking! From "Clicker Training for Your Horse"

Alexandra Kurland — Wed, 01 Feb 2006 00:00:00 -0600

Abridged from Chapter 2, Clicker Training for Your Horse

I like to start with something that's very simple and easy to understand. I'm going to teach the horse to touch his nose to an object. I've found this works really well in part because it is outside the horse's normal training program. It's so different from anything else he's been asked to do, he has to pay attention to figure me out.

Helping Shy Dogs Blossom Using Targeting

Dee Ganley — Tue, 01 Mar 2005 00:00:00 -0600

Shy dogs are an especially difficult challenge in the shelter environment because it is so hard for them to establish trust. We have found that teaching these dogs to target our hand can help many shy dogs develop confidence with people fairly quickly. You can't begin to try this method until there is at least one person (staff or volunteer) the shy dog has a little trust in.

Target training teaches the dog to touch his nose to some object or person for a click and then treat. (If the shy dog is very noise reactive, you may choose to use a "soft" voice marker or a muffled clicker)

Beyond the Target Stick

Karen Pryor — Tue, 01 Jun 2004 00:00:00 -0500

Q: I have started target stick training with my 4-year-old lab, Carter. He is very quick to learn and really enjoys it. I've gotten him to touch the stick in many situations, and have shortened the stick, but he still wants to touch the end of the stick when I say "target." Where do I go from here? How do I teach him to touch objects and not the stick each time? I would like to teach him to maybe turn lights on and off or something challenging and interesting. He learns so quickly he needs a constant challenge. Any suggestions?

When B.F. Skinner Discovered Shaping

Gail Peterson — Thu, 01 Jan 2004 00:00:00 -0600

Note from Karen Pryor: This paper reveals a fascinating piece of scientific detective work by Gail Peterson, Ph.D., a professor of behavior analysis at the University of Minnesota. During World War II, Skinner and some of his graduate students conducted classified research on pigeon-controlled guidance systems, at a secret laboratory in Minneapolis. One day, while waiting for government approval on their next steps, they decided to pass the time by trying to train a pigeon to "bowl."

Speed Shaping

Debi Davis — Tue, 01 Jul 2003 00:00:00 -0500

I have a young Papillon, Harry Potter, in training to be Peek's replacement as a service dog. At 13 months, he's showing extraordinary potential. He is a master at throwing behaviors to be reinforced, and picks up stuff so quickly at times I look at him and wonder if he's a Border collie.

Clicking with Cats in the Shelter Environment

Karen Pryor — Tue, 01 Oct 2002 00:00:00 -0500

With cats we need not use the clicker to 'train' the cat in the traditional sense; we can use it to enrich the cat's environment, to give it some control over its world, and if possible to widen its own perceptions of that world. We are communicating to the cat so the cat can learn healthy ways to communicate back.

Target Training

Karen Pryor — Tue, 01 Jan 2002 00:00:00 -0600

Targets can be a versatile training aid. Dogs, cats, and other animals easily learn to touch a target for a click and a treat. Touching a target is also an easy behavior for new clicker trainers to teach.

Utility Ring Problems: Do Variable Schedules Help or Hurt?

Karen Pryor — Sun, 01 Apr 2001 01:00:00 -0600

Random or variable reinforcement is a useful procedure in making a given behavior resistant to extinction, for example in the shaping process, when one wants to raise criteria. To go from reinforcing every response to selectively reinforcing stronger responses you need to develop enough resistance to extinction so that the animal neither changes the behavior instantly upon going unreinforced once or twice, nor quits altogether. Resistance to extinction is also important in maintaining long duration behaviors, as in searches, field trialing, and so on; and can be developed gradually. Bob and Marian Bailey might consider this simply another example of a shaping schedule.