yeah thanks for sharing this collie Man! What a superb training session! I am now inspired to teach this trick to my dog, as he is certainly tall enough to close kitchen drawers too. How useful would that be! Already he goes around using his nose to push everything that he thinks might produce a treat, so I might as well put his nose-targeting skills to good use around the house, hehe!
I also found it very interesting how in the beginning in the video the dog was always doing a turn or a spin prior to doing anything else. Is this a "superstitious" behavior, as some trainers call it? but then towards the end of the session when the dog was getting a better idea of what to do then this superstitious behavior decreased.
Then I also noticed how some times the dog was making little noises like grunting and excited whining. My dog does that too when he's very eager, whether in training sessions or not. Often when he just wants me to play he will come up and start making those exact same noises to initiate play.
But I also want to caution that sometimes these little vocalizations during training can also be a sign of frustration. Frustration is not always a bad thing, many trainers deliberately build frustration in the dog to get a more intense performance like for competition, or to build drive for a certain toy so they can use the toy as a super reward. (I do that too.) But I personally think that frustration levels should be kept low during the shaping process, by increasing the criteria very slowly and incrementally, and by being super consistent with timing the clicks. If the dog is getting agitated during the shaping process because he is confused, then it is possible that he is NOT having fun if he really can't figure out what to do to get the treat yet still wants the treat desperately. I don't think that's what's happening in this video at all, I think this trainer is definitely very good because the dog "got it" and was always successful in earning the click/treat and so I think his little vocalizations were indication of happiness and eagerness.
But I have run into some problems during shaping in the past, if I was too ambitious in raising criteria too soon and ended up accidentally making my dog confused and thereby frustrated. If the animal is getting too frustrated (like if the whining persists or increases in intensity AND the dog is still not 'getting it' after a few tries) then he would not be able to concentrate anymore and I think he is not having fun anymore. The dog should always be set up to have a good chance of succeeding very often. I just wanted to add that as something to consider or remember when doing shaping sessions.