Would You Take A Class In Reading Dog Body Language?

[newfoundlandandus]

Yes I would love to CESAR MILLAN has given me a lot of inspiration but I would love to learn from someone along his lines

Thanks

newfoundlandandus

[newfsie]

I'd be interested but it would depend on the teacher, their range of experience and their education. Turid Rugaas is some one I'd definitely want to see.

Dog body language is something I am very interested in and I try to study it all the time. One of my dogs was extremely Dog aggressive and due to my learning lots from Turid, I am now able to pick her signs early and even prevent/stop her when she is bothered or possibly going to be bothered. I use yawning and licking lips a lot with this girl. It has even prevented her from moving in a sit/stay where another dog came up to her and wanted to play.

Without that knowledge and her personality anything could have happened.

With the right teacher I would be there in a flash........Let me know if there are any planned

[Oscar (AmBull)]

Absolutely YES!

I have always wanted to be able to read Oscar's body language better, sometimes I think I am too harsh on him when he is just trying to play.

[jacqui835]

I watched a lot of Cesar Milan before I got my dog, and that helped a lot. I know not everyone agrees with everything he does, but he taught me to watch your dog, and for me watching all those episodes felt like I was watching lessons on learning a new language. I have always been able to tell how comfortable dogs are with each other - ie I have never been surprised by 2 dogs "suddenly" going for each other, and I feel like a lot of the time I can "feel" the tension, the fear the whatever it is in the air around the dogs and my own. But, a lot I have learned just since having my dog, and there is still a lot I don't know, because I agree with what a few other people have said - there is a lot of common ground but some breeds are a little different. I would have loved a crash course when I first got my dog, probably could have learned what's taken me 2 years to learn in a much shorter time frame and so be further ahead. The thing is as well, it seems to be exponential, ie you a learn a little and you open yourself up to learning a lot more a lot more quickly. So for those reasons I think a class on this material could be very helpful.

A few quick tips about dog posture, intensity in their eyes, learning to tell a relaxed dog from an engaged and tense animal, understanding some of those basic actions such as humping, positioning to be sniffed or to sniff (and the way some dogs refuse to let others sniff them) etc - that could be taught I think quite quickly and would help people to understand more about their dogs. And I think this would help people to strengthen their bonds with their dogs - now that my dog knows I'm paying attention and I step in early, well he comes to me and works with me.

[sandgrubber]

I think it's a great idea, but (as my primary thesis advisor told me) "great ideas are a dime a dozen". Not sure of the market. Not sure of how to pitch it. Details are important.

I've worked with a couple of people trying to get started as dog trainers. Both of them were much better than I am at communicating with dogs. Both taught me. Both had a lot of trouble communicating with owners. One ended out doing a large amount of damage in my boarding kennel by permitting interaction of dogs who should never have come close to one another.

It's a hard row to hoe.

[dasha]

I do agree that most pet owners need to be more aware of reading dogs body language. This includes their own dogs as well as other dogs body language.

I don't think it is necessarily something that can be taught in a class though.

I think that interpretation of the body language is more important than recognising it and as there is a multitude of reasons a dog a dog displays a behaviour, the correct interpretation is difficult to portray to people that have not recognised the other behaviours that accompany it.

For example if you had 10 dogs that all reacted fearfully to a loud sound, the 10 dogs would all give a different response even though they were all scared.

I think that body language is too complex to be able to explain in a class environment. I think that reading and interpreting body language and behaviour is MOSTLY intuitive. And intuition cannot be taught, it is a feel.

That is why some excellent dog/horse trainers are great at their craft but can be not good teachers. If you ask them how they knew,did,saw,reacted etc they don't know as they just do it. It wasn't a conscious decision for them.

In order to accurately teach a basic body language class, you would need a range of demo dogs to show people what different signs to look for.

The use demo dogs, you would need dogs that reacted 100% consistantly to a stimulus so that you can predict the response to use it in order to show people.

As any dog person know, dogs are consistantly inconsistant.

As behaviour and responses are made up of a range of things going on at any moment, it would be very difficult to teach anyone other than the dangerous basics of wagging tail is generally friendly, rolling over is submission etc. As we know these are not the cases and can get people in more trouble.

If people can't read their own dog they live with, they certainly won't be able to interpret the behaviour of a dog at the park that they have had 2 mins exposure to.

Like I said I do think that people need to improve their general reading of dogs etc but as explained, I don't think it can be done in a class to a good level.

If someone was to do a class though, it would need to be done by someone that has a lot of credentials in the area of training and behaviour modification in my opinion and so a whole range of causes and effects could be taught as well as the dangers of interpreting things wrongly. Not just a basic overview.

[Greytmate]

Big subject Corvus. Reading a dog's non-verbal communication and knowing how best to respond to it or alter it are two different fields.

I don't think a class situation is ideal for setting up some of the communicative behaviours, and forcing a dog to display some of them would be considered unethical. But a basic video or online visualisation that is simple and engaging for the average pet owner to watch could be used to show the behaviours in fine detail and explain what they all might indicate. It would be a great resource, something that could be recommended in a lot of the threads here to people who may be unsure about their dog's emotional state.

Might not be as good a business as classes are, but I wouldn't recommend people pay for training advice from anyone that didn't have a lot of years of experience in working with dogs.