Here is your chance to get help with you dog’s Open and/or Utility training. Whether it is a big or small issue, Nancy will isolate the details that need attention. Then she will help you develop a training plan for your dog that will move you forward towards the desired behavior. Nancy brings a lot of judging (20+ years) and training experience (4 OTChs and many national rankings and tournament placements) into her teaching. Her problem-solving classes are wonderful opportunities to learn lots of great training exercises, handling tips, and tools.
Gold Students - You decide which areas that need help. We will start with one training issue and when you have a training plan, you can address additional problems.
Silver Students – Silver students will be able to submit 2 short videos - one minute each - during the 6 weeks session. Nancy will analyze each video and help you develop a training plan. As always, you can also ask any question about the training that the Gold students are working through. There will be many interesting training topics. If you aren't sure, sign up at bronze, get a feel for the class and then if you want to upgrade to silver, come back here.
Bronze students: There is a WEALTH of information being discussed in this class. Once the Gold students introduce themselves during the first week and decide on a problem, Nancy will update the class syllabus with a list of the dogs that are participating as well as the training exercises or areas they plan on working.
Registration
There are no scheduled sessions for this class at this time. We update our schedule frequently, so please
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Gold Level includes access to all course materials and the ability to post questions and videos to the course forums. Students will receive instructor feedback on written and video assignments.
Silver Level includes access to all course materials and the ability to participate in the discussion forum. Students may ask GENERAL questions about course materials and may submit two, one-minute videos for instructor feedback. Any questions specific to your dog MUST be accompanied by a video.
Bronze Level includes access to all course materials and the ability to read all questions and answers posted in the class forums. Students will not post questions or submit written or video assignments.
For more details, refund policies, and answers to commonly asked questions see our FAQ page.
Syllabus
There is no syllabus for this class. The Gold and Silver students will determine what the content will be in this class.
Here is the list (as of 11/27) of the breeds and the areas will be addressed initially when the class starts on December 1st. This list will be updated as the Gold students introduce themselves. There are 12 Gold students registered. For now, we have:
Beagle – Putting all the exercises together to get the dog ring ready, including transitions from one exercise to the next.
Labrador – Fronts and Finishes, Drop on Recall, Retrieves (playing with the dumbbell), more consistency to a few exercises in Open.
Australian Shepherd – Open ring confidence, transitions between exercises, ring readiness.
Australian Shepherd – Drop on Recall
Samoyed – Drop on Recall, Open Position changes, More drive towards the dumbbell on both retrieves.
Pembroke Welsh Corgi - Increase distance on Utility exercises, add distractions, longer intervals of work before reinforcement.
Border Collie - Strengthen the Open & Utility exercises. Ensure a consistent and confident performance.
Cocker Spaniel - Broad jump, heeling, enthusiasm and confidence in the ring.
Prerequisites & Supplies
You must be training your dog in Open and/or Utility exercises to take this class. You do not have to have any titles and you do not have to be trialing or even close to trialing. This course is not intended as a teaching/skills building class. It is intended to help guide students with training they are currently doing. However, there might be opportunities to start over and retrain certain behaviors, if Nancy feels that that is the best solution.
Sample Lecture
Due to the structure of this course, it will not have lectures.
Testimonials
A sampling of what prior students have said about this class ...
Nancy, Thanks so much for offering this terrific class and for sharing your vast knowledge. It's just cool to see the many options and suggestions you can provide. I hope to see you at gold next session! Clarissa
Loved this course! I have put OTCH titles on two dogs and am working with my third dog. I learned an amazing amount in this course, so many new ways to train the Utility and Open exercises. Nancy was wonderful. Her clear and detailed instructions, tailored to suit each dog, were just what I needed. The Gold and Silver students were a positive and supportive group.
This class tops my list so far! Nancy's expert and very detailed coaching coupled with an amazing group of gold and silver trainers made it just spectacular. I was able to mine tons of valuable information for my own use through Nancy's coaching of each of them. I went into it with high expectations as I have worked with Nancy before, but this time it even exceeded those.
This course is unquestionably the best dog training instruction I have ever received, and I've been taking occasional "live" classes for almost 20 years.
This class was amazing and just what we needed, too bad it doesn't keep going on longer. I know I loved the class but even better is my dog loved it too. Nancy, thank you so very much for helping us. I feel like we have improved so much and I have a better understanding of my part so I can help Duke. I was at the point where I was thinking maybe he didn't like doing this but you showed us how much he really does like it. I love to see him get so excited about his go-outs. Thank you again :)
This class is one of the best I've taken (and I fall into the category of haven taken so many, I can't even count them). I've learned so much not only from my own work with Nancy, but from following my fellow students' threads. I didn't feel bad about not being able to work on every obedience exercise with Nancy, because I can apply the instruction to other students to myself. It was so worthwhile to spend (in my case) 3 solid weeks working on one exercise, followed by 3 weeks on another exercise that I really felt I made progress. Nancy is phenomenal about reading a dog and handler and picking out what they need to do next to succeed. And Nancy is SO supportive- I felt myself smiling every time I read her responses to me. Thank you Nancy! This class is worth its weight in "Gold." Molly B
