The Adventures of Alaric Part 5

Adventures of Alaric  Part 5

By Michele Forto

This week Alaric has been brushing up on his manners in public, around other dogs, and other people.  He went out to the Aurora Mall and underwent his first pre-test for public access.  If he had taken a real test, we require at least an 80% to be registered as “in-training”.  Alaric has been out of practice publicly for about 4 months.

Alaric entered the mall at the food court, and was received by lots of stares and snickering but we pressed on.  He stayed in a good heel position and at times hugged his handler by walking closer.   As we progressed through the mall we walked him closer to the glass barrier, he was afraid at first but calmed down after a few feet.  We met a nice elderly couple who commented on Alaric’s behavior and after a few moments with them answering questions and visiting we moved on.

Alaric entered the elevator which has an open view and did great, he laid down on the floor and relaxed.  He did not run or pull once the door opened, he waited patiently for his handler to lead him out.  Alaric allowed strangers to walk by while he was on a down stay and did not startle when a toddler ran by on the tile floor smacking his flip-flops as loudly as he could.

We then went back towards the food court, stopping at a few stores along the way that had tight areas for the team to maneuver through the team did great, even passing stuffed animals!

The food court can actually be a tougher test on a dog than a regular restaurant; there’s lots of people and kids and many different smells in a small area.  We placed Alaric under the table on a down stay and tested him with small pieces of chicken and French fries falling to the floor – he looked but didn’t touch.  Alaric did however become nervous as a large crowd of people approached and he sat up from his down, we let him know it was okay and he returned to a down.  Now I say nervous but he could have been alerting his handler to the crowd approaching her from behind as well.

All in all, Alaric performed well for his first pre-test scoring an 80%!

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Michele Forto is Denvers Dog Training Examiner, a certified canine trainer at Denver Dog Works and the co-host of the Dog Doctor Radio Show

The iPad and How Denver Dog Works will Utilize It

The iPad and How Denver Dog Works will Utilize It

By Robert Forto

As many of you know we offer a course at Dog Works Training Centers to teach people how to become the best dog trainers in the world. In our course we provide an interactive learning environment that is partnered with cutting edge technology and over nineteen years of living with dogs.

With the recent release of the iPad, Denver Dog Works and Dog Works Training Centers plans to include an iPad with every course and include it in the student’s enrollment package.

Our next canine trainer career course starts the week of September 5th, 2010 and is a 24 week course that consists of three days of training every two weeks on Friday-Sundays. You can find out more information on our canine career courses by visiting our website athttp://www.denverdogworks.com and http://www.dogworkstrainingcenter.com

Over the next couple months I will be re-writing our companion course book to include video links, .pdf exams and projects, interactive lessons and more. A perfect partnership of class lectures, our video library, and the iPad technology.

You may think I am crazy to jump on the iPad bandwagon. To the contrary. We have always offered a low-end net-book computer to our canine trainer students but with the release of the iPad it will take our training school to new heights.

Use of the iPad in our every day business operations at Denver Dog Works

We at Denver Dog Works also plan to utilize the iPad in our every day business tasks such as credit card processing through Cynergy Data’s Lucy Gateway and Paypal as well as training contract review with clients, training plan utilization and more.

If you would like to have a career that you love and want to become one of the best canine obedience instructors in the world, give us a call at 303-578-9881 and speak to Robert Forto or Michele Forto anytime.

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Dr. Robert Forto, PhD is the training director of Denver Dog Works and the host of a weekly radio program The DogDoctor Radio Show. Dr. Forto can be reached through his website at http://www.denverdogworks.com