Halo's doing much better with the Impulse Control/Moving Food exercises. Due to the way my little camera was set up you can't see how quickly my hand was moving (you can see a little bit in the reflection in the glass door behind me) but I'd basically cranked it up to full-speed and she was still holding her uncommanded, offered sit.
On to that "Get It" practice. That's just Step One of "Get It." Step Two involves you doing your verbal cue -- but then waiting just half a beat or so before flipping your hand over. The dog is learning the verbal cue as distinct from the "hand signal" (which here is really more of a clue than an actual signal.) I tried Step Two with Halo (not in this video as it's from a couple days ago) and she was conflicted like, "Your voice says go but your body says Leave it." When dogs are getting mixed messages, they will ALWAYS go with what your body language is saying, not your voice. So there's more practice of "Get it" just to establish that muscle movement pattern.
Finally there's the "targeting" of the cookie jar. Remember how I said that I take these classes just to see if there's anything interesting in them for students? So sometimes I get into a class and am like "Ummmm...what is the purpose of this exercise?!" I'm starting to realize that it does take a certain leap of faith to go into a new dog training program and be willing, not suspicious, to go in full-throttle and actually do the exercises! Even if you're not sure what's going on! Anyway, so the homework "targeting the cookie jar." For some reason Halo seemed nervous of the cookie jar. She's such a confident dog in general that I made the decision to just try again tomorrow and see if she was better -- and lo and behold, she was!
We finished off with some obedience and heeling, just because we like doing it.
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