20. SitStay

20. SITSTAY

LEVEL TWO

Dog Sits and Stays while partner walks 20’ away and back. Partner may give extra cues while away. An official “return” is not required.

DISCUSSION: The good thing about teaching the DownStay before the SitStay is that the DownStay is easy for the dog to understand. The bad thing about teaching it first is that it will be natural for the dog to think that any duration requires a Down. Important not to get frustrated here! This is a very difficult concept to get across – I don't mean Down, I mean hold whatever position I put you in.

EASY BEGINNINGS: Ask for a Sit, then Rapid-Fire ten c/t in a row while she's sitting, just to get her thinking about the Sit. Then start 300-Peck Sits – ask for a Sit, count to one, c/t. TRY to put the food right in her mouth after each of these counted Sits. If you can't, it's not the end of the world, but try. Sit, count to 2, c/t. Sit, 3, c/t, and so on. Your criteria are important here. Under no circumstances do you want to tell a dog that she can move ANYTHING but her head or tail during a Stay, so if she moves ONE paw, or shifts her bum, she's broken the position. Under 10 seconds, if she breaks the position, give her a Rapid-Fire X5 and start your count over again from one second. Over 10 seconds, you can leave out the RF and just start from one again.

PROBLEM SOLVING:

SHE GETS UP WHEN I CLICK!

a) No problem, the click ends the behaviour. That means that when you click, she ALREADY did what you wanted her to. Problem solved.
b) If you think it would be best if she didn't get up when you click, stand closer, be ready to put the treat right in her mouth when you click. Try 10 one-second stays, then 10 two-second stays, and build up that way until she's decided she might as well remain sitting. Ailsby's Principle of Laziness says she WILL decide to remain in position if she knows the next thing you're going to do is… lemme take a wild guess here, 217 Sits in a row, maybe it'll be another SIT?! Why bother getting up when you're just going to ask her to Sit again? ALWAYS REMEMBER, though, that the click ended the behaviour. If you're too slow and she does get up, just ask her to Sit and start again.

WE'RE UP TO THREE MINUTES AND I'M SO BORED WITH INCREASING ONE SECOND AT A TIME I COULD SCREAM! Okay, okay. Dogs don't get bored but people certainly do. When she's reliably and cheerfully doing a solid 60-second SitStay, you can try increasing your duration five seconds at a time. Of course, if it doesn't work, you're back to one second at a time!

SHE MOVES WHEN I'M AWAY FROM HER! A real strong point of the clicker is that you can reward behaviour that's happening when you aren't right with the dog. If she SitStays for 10 seconds at 10', you return, click and give her a treat, you're rewarding her for staying when you're right in front of her. The whole ten seconds and ten feet distance was incidental. Fine if she's understanding it, but it doesn't give you any way of fixing a problem that doesn't involve you right in front of her. For instance, if she's standing up when you take the first step to come back to her. With the clicker, though, you can fix this easily. You KNOW when she's going to break. It isn't random (if it IS random, you're probably dealing with an attention problem, or why the heck are you asking for so much? Go back to whatever time and distance gives you ten times right!). She breaks when you take the first step to return? Fine. Click and THEN return X10. Then tighten your thigh muscle in one leg, click and return X10. Then tighten, lift that leg just off the floor, click and return X10. Then tighten, lift and plant that foot, click and return X10 (oh my gosh, you just took a step and she didn't break!). And so on. And if she breaks after the click? Of course she can, the click ends the behaviour!

ADDING A CUE: When you have the behaviour the way you want it and up to at least twenty seconds, start telling her that it has another name besides Sit. I use Stay (I don't bother with Wait, myself), and my hand signal is a fist with a thumbs-up, though a more common one is showing the dog your flat palm.

CONTINUING EDUCATION: When the dog understands that you're paying for her to remain in the Sit position until you click, start doing the "stay dance" – move to the left, to the right, clap your hands, wave your arms, do jumping jacks, turn around. Start moving away from her – remember, though, that when you make one part of a behaviour more difficult, you make everything else about it easier. That means if she's doing a ten-second SitStay with you right in front of her, and you want to move a step away from her, you lower the time to two seconds, or however long it takes you to take that step out and back.

LEVEL THREE

Dog Sits and stays while the handler walks 20’ out, stays away for 30 seconds, and comes back. One cue is allowed for the Sit, and two cues for the Stay. There will be one mild distraction.

DISCUSSION: Be careful here. You're laying foundations – either for a lifetime of frustration over broken SitStays, or for a lovely, solid, reliable behaviour. Go slow and get it right!

EASY BEGINNINGS: You have three criteria here – distance, time, and distraction. Of course you'll need time to get your distance, but as much as possible, work these three things separately. It doesn't matter what order you train them in, as long as you keep them distinct (although, for the sake of your sanity, I'd work the time first).
So – time. You've already got enough time for you to walk 20' out, now let's build it up to 60 seconds. No, that's not required by this Level, but let's get it solid while we're here, and Level 4 won't be such a big jump. Build to 60 seconds right beside the dog, or possibly a foot or two in front of her. 300-Peck this. Since you have the 20' walk, you can probably start at about 10 seconds, and you can probably build up your time in 5-second increments – but go back IMMEDIATELY when she hits a snag. I've seen people with exceptionally well-trained dogs who spent the dog's entire life arguing with them over the kerflushinner SitStay, all because they didn't bother getting it solid in the beginning.

Distance. You already have 20', now let's start adding the time. Tell her to Stay, go out 5', count to five, come back, c/t. Stay, go out 5', count to 10, come back, c/t. Stay, go out 5', count to 15, come back, c/t. Continue until you're back up to 60 seconds, being sure to go back to the beginning immediately when she breaks her SitStay in any way. When you've got your 5' Stay up to 60 seconds, drop your time again and increase your distance – go for 10' and 5 seconds, and build up again. A variation that you need to practise as well is to click when you're the full distance away from her, then return to give her the treat, rather than waiting until you're with her to click. What's the difference? What you click is what you're rewarding, so when you're away from her and you click, you're specifically rewarding the Stay at a distance rather than the whole thing.

Distraction. Again, cut your time and distance down as much as possible. The idea is to teach the dog to handle distractions, not to get her to make a mistake so you can/have to correct her. If you have a helper, get her to walk past at a distance while you click the dog for noticing her but not breaking the Stay. Gradually, the helper gets closer and more attractive – showing food, staring, making sucky noises – NOT saying the dog's name or giving a Come cue, that's cheating. If you don't have a helper, you can start at home by having a toy or treat already nearby when you start working on the Stays, and progress to tossing one nearby. You could also go to a park where you can work your Stays off the path while people and dogs go by (starting WAY off the path, of course).

PROBLEM SOLVING:

NO MATTER HOW FAR AWAY I START, SHE CAN'T STAY WHILE ANOTHER PERSON WALKS BY! OK, some dogs find it very difficult to hold still while they're thinking about something else. Between Zen and your Leash behaviours, though, you have the answer to this problem. She can do a Loose Leash with a distraction, right? That's a Stay! To make it a SitStay, all you have to do is add a Sit cue. If she breaks, back up some more and try again.

Another way to solve it is to stay with her and Rapid-Fire ten as soon as she sees the distraction, then hold for a second, Rapid-Fire another couple, hold for two seconds, RF another couple, hold for three seconds, etc. Pretty soon you can slow down enough to start clicking her for SEEING the distraction but not responding to it in any way but either continuing to stare at it OR looking at you with a "Hey, dad! I saw a distraction! Where's my click?"

ADDING A CUE: Use your Sit cue to get the behaviour, then your Stay cue once she's actually Staying.

CONTINUING EDUCATION: Different directions, different locations, different distractions, different distances, different times. Start each of these things from scratch. Just because she can hold 30' for 60 seconds in your back yard when the garbage truck goes by doesn't in any way mean she can hold 10 seconds at 5' while you hang up your coat in puppy class!

LEVEL FOUR

Dog Sits and stays for 2 minutes while the handler walks 40’ away, turns and faces the dog, and makes a formal Return. There will be two distractions.

DISCUSSION: You've spent a lot of time teaching the dog to hold eye contact. Now you want to walk around behind her, and she needs to let you go. Naturally she'll want to get up to watch you all the way around. Fortunately, clicker training is very good at explaining what you want here!

In obedience trials, the Novice Sit Stay is only for 1 minute. This may be the first time you've asked your dog for MORE than a competition behaviour. Exciting stuff, but you've got a lot to work on here. Returning around behind her, increasing the duration of the behaviour, and increasing the distance. You've got an excellent start, though, with what you've taught her already about the Sit Stay, and with all the other duration behaviours you're working on in this Level.
Before we go any further, let's develop some actual criteria for the SitStay. Up until now, we were just trying to get the dog to stay THERE, but now we can get a bit more picky. The butt is on the floor. The elbows are not. That seems simple enough, but there are a lot of things that can go wrong. Excited dogs, for instance, can pretend they're sitting with the entire length of the back leg, from hock to paw, flat on the floor, but the knees almost straight, so the butt isn't on the floor. NOT a Sit! Relaxed dogs can "Sit" from the Down position by tightening a couple of muscles and raising their elbows off the floor. NOT a Sit! My dog can whine. NOT a Sit! Some dogs can scoot slowly around the floor without seeming to get out of position. NOT a Sit! Some dogs keep their butts down and their elbows up and stay in place, but dance their front feet around. NOT a Sit!

So we've got lots of NOT Sits. What's a Sit? The dog's butt is on the ground, or as close as it can get given the musculature and structure of the dog's rear. The butt stays still, though the tail is welcome to wag. Elbows are off the ground, with the front feet as close to the back feet as is comfortable for the dog, so the front legs are almost perpendicular to the ground. Front feet do NOT move. Some dogs are more comfortable if they slide back off their hocks so their weight rests on one hip. Some people don't mind if the dog looks around the room, others want total concentration on the handler. Others don't mind the odd weight shift as long as the paws don't move.

EASY BEGINNINGS: You have 20' and 20 seconds. Work those a few more times just to be sure they're solid. Now, decide which of your criteria you're going to work on in this one short session. It doesn't matter which one, but do NOT work on more than one in a session. Of course, you can have ten sessions a day, if you like, and work on one different criteria in each session. Just don't get into the very bad habit of increasing time and distance together!

a) I'll start with time (you're welcome to choose distance or the return if you like). You have 20 seconds. From here, you can probably up your "peck rate" to every two seconds, so you'll be increasing your stay-away time: 20 seconds, 22 seconds, 24 seconds, etc. When the dog fails – that is, breaks the Sit Stay by getting up, whining, lying down, moving her front paws, sliding out of place on the floor, or whatever – go back to an easier level – maybe 15 seconds, or even 10 seconds, and go up by 2 seconds again. When you get to 30 seconds, try going up in 5-second increments BUT drop back to 2 if she can't handle it!

It's hard to practise these long-time behaviours, I know. It's boring for you (it isn't boring for the dog because she's working toward an immediate goal). I always start thinking of all the "more useful" things I should be doing. What keeps me on track best is deciding on some really ugly chore I'll do as soon as I finish practising Stays – like cleaning toilets. With incentive like that, I could practise Stays for HOURS!

b) Distance, is, of course, partially dependent on time, but keep resisting the temptation to do them both at once. Try to stay around, say, 10 to 20 seconds for your time as you increase your distance. Again, use 300-Peck to get you where you're going. 20', 22', 24', 26', and go back to 10 or 15' when she makes a mistake. It's quite possible for her to lose her nerve in here somewhere (or in a) ). If that happens, don't be afraid to go right back to Rapid Fire for a simple Sit.

c) If you haven't done the Level 4 DownStay yet, I'd suggest you go and do it now before you start returning around behind her on the SitStay. It's easier for her to learn this in a Down than a Sit, and once she knows how to do it when she's Down, it'll be easier for her to stay Sitting as you return around behind her.

She's used to you approaching her while she's Sitting, and giving her a treat in that position – her in a Sit, you in front of her facing her. Now you need to be able to step to your right, go around behind her, and come up into Heel position with (still Sitting) on your left. She's going to want to get up to turn with you as you go behind her – after all, we've been teaching her that through all the Levels. You're going to have to dance around, to the left, to the right, back up, come forward, one step toward her tail, back to the front, one step toward the tail on the other side, and so on. Click when you're in different positions, and have the treat ready to pop in her mouth before she has a chance to get up. Of course, if she DOES get up after a click, that's OK, you'll just have to be faster next time.

As a bit of a reminder, once she kind of understands that she's to continue to hold the SitStay as I walk toward her and then around behind her, I like to give her a treat as I start to walk by her. That lets her concentrate for a second on the treat, by which time I'm coming up the other side, where she's going to get another treat. Pretty soon I can eliminate the first treat and she knows she's sitting there waiting for me to get into Heel position.

d) Finally, you can start putting all the elements together. Again, don't increase the difficulty of the whole thing by too much at any time. You've got 20' AND 20 seconds, and you've got 40', and you've got 2 minutes, and you've got the return. You could then take your 20' and start increasing from 20 seconds to 1 minute. Then go back to 20 seconds, and increase your distance from 20' to 30'. Then build up your time to 1 minute again. When she's really solid, throw in your return, and use it most of the time from now on.

PROBLEM SOLVING:

WE CAN DO THE STAY, BUT SHE WHINES EVERY FEW SECONDS AND SHUFFLES HER FEET! No, actually, you CAN'T do the Stay. Treat whining and/or shuffling exactly as you would treat getting up to go play with another dog. Whining and shuffling are NOT a SitStay. I can't think of any venue, from pet to competition obedience, to Service Dog, to agility, where whining and shuffling are an acceptable definition of a SitStay. Eliminate them NOW before you have them permanently. When she whines or shuffles, she has failed to do the behaviour. Go back to ONE second and build up again. Every time she fails, go back to ONE again.

CONTINUING EDUCATION: Different locations. You can practise your Stays in public places by carrying an extra leash with you. Put the extra leash around a solid object like a park bench, then go do a bit of Heeling or something, then come back and with minimal fuss attach the bench leash to your dog. Ostentatiously take off the leash you've been using and put it on the ground behind her or take it with you. If she fails, she's still attached to the bench, but if you're working correctly, chances are she'll never realize it at all.

LEVEL FIVE

Dog Sits and stays for 30 seconds with the handler out of sight. Appropriate cues.

DISCUSSION: As with the out of sight DownStay, it's really important to have SOME means of being able to tell whether the dog is actually giving you a SitStay when she can't see you. Mirrors, helpers, reflections in windows, holes drilled in walls, even remote cameras playing on your TV – use your imagination. I know one handler whose dog invariable lay down the instant she was out of sight, and sat up the instant before she returned.

LEVEL SIX

Dog performs a full out of sight Sit Stay for two minutes. Appropriate cues. This is an optional behaviour.

DISCUSSION: Increasing the time is boring for the trainer, but well worth the work you put into it if you're planning on competing.

LEVEL SEVEN

Dog performs a full out of sight Sit Stay for three minutes. Appropriate cues. This is an optional behaviour.

DISCUSSION: The full competition behaviour. Many trainers put an enormous amount of work into producing an excellent working obedience dog, only to have them fail repeatedly at the out of sight SitStay. Maybe people with the energy to get to Open don't want to bother working the duration?