Jigsaw training

When clicker training came on the British dog training scene some 20+ years ago it refined and informed a lot of training people already did, but more importantly brought a whole new orderly, science based approach to it. One technique we learned about was ‘chaining’, especially back chaining. Where the dog learned it needed to carry out linked behaviours in order to get the reward. It was – and is – a very linear process. 

But rather than seeing the process as linear it is often more useful to view the end result you want as making a jigsaw. The final picture not made up of a chain, but a more complex composition of individual pieces perfectly formed, ready to just slot together to make the final picture. The more perfectly formed each piece is, the better the end result will look.

When you break down an exercise, you are working on individual pieces of the jigsaw. Once you’ve formed a piece perfectly, you can just put it on one side to take out and dust off later on, maybe polishing off any rough edges, when you’re ready to put the whole picture together.

Take the retrieve for example.  One piece of the ‘retrieve’ picture is the ‘pick up’. In most competitive activities HOW the dog picks up the article is important. Clicking for just the pick-up – clean and fast – may be one piece of the jigsaw. The ‘hold’ – well, that can be broken down too. Where the article is held in the dog’s mouth, how much pressure is exerted – those may be 2 different pieces. You will have a load more criteria to add to your particular ‘jigsaw’ depending on what purpose you are teaching it for and what you want your particular jigsaw to look like at the end. Moving with the article towards the handler – how the dog returns may be important. Does it need to be fast? Do you need to work on the ‘recall’ as a separate piece of the jigsaw?
Sitting holding the article – that may be another piece. The action of sitting – another.

Once you’ve formed all the individual pieces, how you put them together – well that’s another lesson entirely – but there’s little point in trying to do a jigsaw where the pieces aren’t the right shape or size. It just won’t turn out right.