Jj And Sit Left/sit Right

tylerthegiant

Well-Known Member
I was thinking I'd like to train JJ to do this, just for fun, and I'm trying to get my head around the easiest way to do it.

If I give her the sit command and stand right next to her, click and jackpot treat, rinse repeat, and then huge jackpot and party when she orientates to sitting on my left lets say in the future how do I cue that so it's differentiated from sitting in front of me, or eventually on my right? When she sits left do I add the cue, click and treat and repeat? Will that be confusing because I already cued a sit to train the left sit?

Or should I lure her with a treat on my left side, click and treat when she finally sits (it's a default behavior so I'd expect her to do it fairly quickly), rinse, repeat, and when she'd orientated to my left side and sitting then add the cue "left sit?" She's pushy enough to orientate fairly easily to wherever the treat is LOL For Apollo that wouldn't work, because he'd never try and orientate to my left side just because I had a treat there. I think he'd just sit in front of me expecting the treat for sitting patiently in front like a good boy. With him I think I'd have to do it the former way.

What do you guys think? I hope that made sense.
 

sara

Moderator
Staff member
Well, I taught Oliver to do this. I taught him using the elephant trick/rear end awareness trick. (front paws on an object, back legs move around it one way and the other, so they learn they do have back legs LOL) I would stand in front of him with his paws on the book, ask for a spin (clockwise) and click when he ran into my right leg, then I'd ask for a turn (counter clockwise) and click when he ran into my left leg. eventually I added the cues "get in" (for left side) and "get right" for the right side.

the finished product is on this video at 00.35 :) and the elephant trick is is at 8.58
 

tylerthegiant

Well-Known Member
What do you think of Caesar! :LOL:

Well, we don't have that foundation work to get the behavior that way. Although I just tried it with her using the methods I described above and she wasn't getting it, may be the elephant trick would be easier to train. She was clueless, trying everything trick in her bag but just not orientating to my left at all! She doesn't have ANY cues that orientate her to the side of me. Since she's good at mat work I wonder if that might make it easier too.

She will 'touch' something she's directed to touch, but I have not taught her yet to hold that position, I think that would be easy for her too.

Tried this with Apollo and he was actually getting it. Lured him (he works great with lures but not not much free shaping like JJ is), tried it from different starting positions, in different rooms of the house. I'll try it again later and see if it's actually sticking. Lucas is sleeping, may be I'll try it with him later.
 

sara

Moderator
Staff member
See, I taught the "get in/get right" trick even before I taught Oliver to heel, because it's a fantastic way to teach heel if they're already oriented to your side, and one of the first behaviours I ever taught Oliver was to put his feet up on something... so we had alot of foundations ready to put more complicated tricks together :) I have used/use the rear-end awareness trick as a foundation for alot of different behaviours, so it's one trick that I always recommend teaching early on :)
 

tylerthegiant

Well-Known Member
Just for kicks I just tried it with her again and she was better this time. I typically do nice short, multiple sessions with her because she gets so wound up the first session she often doesn't think totally straight. She's got it in one spot in the room LOL, if I got to another spot I lose her. Weird.

I will have to try that rear end awareness trick. I think it would be especially good for Lucas because he has somewhat body awareness. JJ's is excellent.
 

blacknym

Experienced Member
Sounds like your on your way. LOL.

I used luring for Deja. She got way to frustrated with free shaping positions like heel and side.
 

tylerthegiant

Well-Known Member
Apollo's got it! :)

He works excellent with luring, not nearly as well with shaping because I used luring to teach him everything for two years. Sometimes shaping things is really hard and luring is so much simpler, but sometimes I find the only way to get a behavior is shaping it. Like with Lucas, he did NOT want to learn down, just felt like a position he did not want to be in, all the luring in the world couldn't convince him to do it, but shaping eventually got the behavior down! Just weird, you really have to think of your feet, luring, shaping, free shaping, I think it really all depends on the situation.
 
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