Thoughts and ideas on people and technology.
October 21, 2024
Last week our household acquired a dog. I’ve had and trained dogs before; four in total over the course of about 20 years. But it’s been about 6 years without one, and this one is an inside dog, which is completely new to me. Old habits die hard though and I’m finding nuggets of skills and knowledge slowly returning.
I was lucky enough to get some formal training in dog training in my early teens, and I remember noticing some of the base training methods we used with dogs matched the human learning methods our family talked about. When I later joined the workforce this idea was reinforced during onboardings and later when I was asked to train others on technology platforms. People and dogs learn best with repetition, reward (also known as positive reinforcement), and a combination of learning styles.
You’ve probably heard of the classic learning styles framed one way or another depending on the book, workshop, or TED Talk you experienced that one time. The three core styles of auditory, visual, and kinesthetic overlap in training people and dogs. (I feel the need to pause and reiterate that while I am comparing people to dogs, I’m not conflating the two. You are not a dog. I might be, because on the internet nobody knows you’re a dog, but I’m not calling you one.) For people, auditory may be a professor lecturing or a friend explaining a new board game. For dogs, verbal commands such as “Fido, sit!” fill that role. Visual for people could be a diagram or demonstration, while for dogs a hand signal does the same. Kinesthetic is a bit different; for people we sometimes call it “hands on” or the 4H motto of “learn to do by doing”, while for dogs it might be physically placing them a sitting position while giving the sit command.
Combining the styles is the best way to achieve maximum effect. With people we usually do this for efficiency’s sake (especially in groups); auditory and visual at the same time, followed by some hands-on activity or practice. For dogs, especially for new commands, we’ll say “Fido, sit!” while showing the hand signal, followed by placing or gently pushing if needed.
Repetition is a necessity; I’ve never seen a dog learn a new command after a single exercise, so don’t beat yourself up if you don’t learn that new thing after one try! (I will admit to projecting hard on that one; raise your hand if you’re a former gifted child!)
Lastly, use positive reinforcement. It sticks (pun fully intended) a thousand times better than negative reinforcement with dogs and people. Treats following successes work wonders with dogs. Ours likes these tiny cubes of dehydrated beef liver. A direct analogue may not exist for people though. I can’t see myself having a single raisin every time I write a few words in a post. How do you “treat” yourself for learning?
Want help with training the technology dog in you or your staff? You can find us a scalebright.ca.
©2024 ScaleBright Solutions Copyright All Right Reserved.