Packs, Puppies, and Practice

Whereas yesterday’s Juno walk focused chiefly on the student practicing commands and getting used to the harness, today it was all about the instructor.  The dogs have already been selected, but the instructors want to make sure with a last minute test that the notes they’ve taken on your previous Juno walks were accurate—just in case.  While the instructor led me around the campus with the harness I had to practice using the appropriate commands to direct my “Juno”.  “Forward” with a  waist-level forward hand gesture means “go”, “left” and “right” with the traditional hand-wave at waist-level (doggy eye-level) are fairly self-explanatory.  There’s no command for “stop”, you just plant your feet and the dog gets the idea, but there are two words for correct.  “Leave it” is a warning meaning “get your nose back on the job, please” and “pfui”, the German word for “not good” means “ya done messed up now, honey!”  But, as with children, you should never discipline in anger.  Be firm and consistent, but don’t yell at your dog.  They genuinely want to please you, but can get distracted.  “Pfui” is a scolding, not a punishment.

While not the greatest part of the day, the obligatory fire drill was certainly the most exciting!  TSE uses an alarm that sounds something like a battle klaxon from Star Wars or Halo, and blind students and employees can locate fire exits by listening for the constant hissing sound emitted by devices planted above the doors.

Once outside we all assembled on the front sidewalk for a demonstration of the hybrid “quiet car” that TSE purchased for safety training purposes.  While I could see the silver Prius approaching us with my limited vision, our “total” (totally blind) students only discovered the car’s presence by the softly crunching gravel underneath the tires as the car arrived directly in front of them—only detectable at a distance of roughly 5 feet!  This is disturbing to the blind and visually impaired community as a whole, but should concern the children of aging parents who may experience age-related vision deterioration as well.  The older community that loses its vision is now at more risk than ever because of these near-silent vehicles.  I personally was amazed at how quiet these machines are, and am very thankful for althea effort TSE does in training our dogs to handle these dangerous vehicles.

Today’s lecture focused on two topics:  Pack mentality (doggy psych 101) and Intelligent Disobedience.  There’s a lot to say on both of these so I’ll break it up for you.

Pack Mentality

Dogs like an organized pack structure.  The Handler, you, is Number One.  You are, in essence, the god of this canine’s existence. Everybody else around you gets to be various orders of priests above the worshipper, the dog (to continue the religious metaphor).  Dogs don’t mind being low-man on the totem pole, though.  They don’t view it as “bottom”, but “their special place.”  “I am the service dog.  That is my job description, and only I get to be that. You are the person that I work for.  They are the people we spend time with.”  This neat, organized structure gives dogs a sense of belonging in the ‘pack’ of your family and friends, and order means met expectations.  When the dog tries to nose into someone else’s place and gets scolded (climbs on a piece of furniture, for example) the scolding is a reminder of belonging.  “This is not where you belong, dog.  Your place is here.”  To help emphasize this, the instructors highly recommend providing a “place” that is special to your dog.  Be it a pillow or a crate or blanket that the dog sleeps on, having a “place” gives the dog a concrete reminder of structure in the pack.  The command “go to your place” is not a punishment but a suggestion for the dog to remember where he or she belongs.

Intelligent Disobedience

This is where most of your dramatic stories about heroic service dogs come from.  I talked to one of the “retrains”, returning students, who had returned for her seventh dog about intelligent disobedience after the lecture and she and her other retrain colleagues shared dozens of stories where their dogs refused to obey commands because doing so would endanger the handler.  For example, a dog will refuse to obey the “forward” command if a car is about to cut you off in a crosswalk, or won’t turn left if there’s a brick wall or uncovered manhole in the way.  Teaching the dog self-preservation isn’t necessary, they have some basic instincts.  But a dog cannot be taught the concept of “death” or “not living”.  Instead, artificial dangers such as cars must be introduced as “pain causers”.  An instructor will walk up to a car, hit the car with their hand or pretend to trip into the car, and act as if the car has hurt them.  This is repeated regularly with more and more dramatic acting until the dog understands that moving vehicles are dangerous.  However, the balance here must be walked carefully because you don’t want to give the dog an unrealistic fear of stationery cars or car rides.

This month’s class consists of 24 students, which have been split into six 4-person teams and an instructor or apprentice/instructor team.  In my team I am one of two rookies, and the other two are both retrains.  This kind of split is done deliberately so that the retrains can share their experiences with the rookies, adding to the curriculum.  Today the teams were doubled up, 8 people, for the hands-on learning exercises.  While one group of 8 practiced harnessing a stuffed dog reminiscent of Rowdy from Scrubs, the others played with a string of six two-year-old dogs in training, familiarizing themselves with the dogs’ energy, coats, and physiology.