Behavior Shaping
In the Foundation and Trick courses you will see I use a lot of techniques that are based in behavior shaping.
What is behavior shaping?
Have you ever played the Hot/Cold game as a kid? That game where one person thinks of something they want the other person to do and using only the words “hot” when they person is getting closer to the thing or “cold” when they person is getting further away from the thing you play until the person figures out what the thing is. This is essentially what our behavior shaping is, we use “yes” or a click and a treat to say “hot” and the abscence of that marker and reward says “cold” for us and our dogs try things until they get that positive marker.
So behavior shaping is when we reward small steps along the way to an end goal. And we can use “free shaping” where we just see what a dog offers and see where that takes us.
Shaping differs from luring in that we wait for the dog to offer a behavior and then we present the reward, with luring we present the reward and then move that reward in a way that creates what we want.
Many people think: clicker training, when they think of behavior shaping because it is the primary technique used in clicker training, but as I like to show, you can do all of this training without a clicker, using your marker word or just the food to reinforce without the clicker. I do use clickers but also I often just use the food and marker words, especially when it’s inconvient to hold a clicker or if the dog has a negative response to the sound of a clicker.
Why use behavior shaping?
Many folks wonder why would you use shaping when you can more quickly just lure and show the dog what to do? It can be a very hard transition for people who are used to taking a more proactive position in training and don’t want to wait for a dog to sort something out. For example I can lure a sit or down in seconds, why bother shaping it? It’s true there are many behaviors it’s simply more effective and faster to lure, but with shaping, a dog is problem solving and thinking their way through the game which can ultimately be faster as the dog can often generalize something they have thought their way through.
I like to use a blend, I lure easy positions like sits and downs, but then like to shape behaviors where I want more thinking (place/settle, targeting, cooperative care, etc).
I LOVE shaping for giving a dog confidence, allowing a dog to guide the training and them making a choice to take each step builds confidence and trust. I love how shaping creates creative dogs that are not afraid to try new things.
In the courses you can download PDFs and go into more details about shaping behaviors but I will share the video of Julia’s first shaping session and give some basic bullet points.
I start with two shaping games.
Game 1, go around a cone.
I place out a cone
I mark and reward anytime she moves near the cone
She doesn’t have to circle the cone to start as I am breaking down the steps to that
I am essentially using where I reward to make it easier for her to take the next steps, but the timing is those rewards don’t happen until she has offered movement
I would usually stand still but because she is so sensitive to my body pressure I place the food down and then move away, usually I would just stand in one spot for the whole game
So I watch her feet, if a single foot moves at all I mark with my “yes” and I place food down by the cone
Game 2, feet up on a block
This is an easier game as I can use my position and how I give the treats to help her quickly get to the end behavior
I sit with the block between us, with treats in my hands
If she sniffs the block, of touches it, I mark and reward
When I reward i hold the treat a bit high so it’s easier to grab it if they use the block to stand on
After feeding the treat for the behavior I toss a treat away to keep my dog moving
Using physical props like these are easier ways to get started with shaping as the object itself inspires some exploration which gives you more things to mark and reward.
Let’s see if you can give shaping a try!
Shaping game ideas:
Box game
Touch a target
Cone or block like these games
Get Creative!!!