Training animals is the easy part and teaching people is the hard part! In this section, you’ll find articles and advice that will help you improve your own training skills and that will help you if you teach other people how to train animals.
I have some exciting news today! During the last part of 2022 and the beginning of this year, Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz and I were busy with a writing project. And, the article we were writing is now published! The article, which is titled “The PORTL Laboratory,” was published earlier this month in the journal Perspectives […]
Want to improve your training sessions with your horses, dogs, or other animals? Start by practicing without your animal! What is a dress rehearsal? In my Shaping Skills Workshop courses, I encourage my students to do dress rehearsals without their animals before their training sessions. Here’s how to do a dress rehearsal: Step 1: Get […]
As some of you know, I serve as the president for the Art and Science of Animal Training. In addition to organizing the annual ASAT conference, I take care of all of the behind-the-scenes administrative duties, including managing the website, answering emails, and paying the bills. Even though nonprofits don’t pay taxes, they still […]
At the end of September, Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz and I gave a two-day PORTL shaping workshop in San Diego. We had an awesome group of participants, and it was a really great weekend. Emily Larlham, who hosted the workshop, posted a video with some highlights from the event. (In the photo to the right, Emily’s […]
Last week, I wrote about how I learn the names of the students in my undergraduate class. This week, I’d like to share some thoughts with you about how my students learn my name. This may seem like it should be pretty easy for the students. However, for some of my students, I’ve realized that […]
Every semester, I have somewhere between 30-50 students in the undergraduate course that I teach. That’s a lot of names to learn! I’m not good at learning names. I’ll get “Mike”and “Mark” mixed up. Or, I won’t be able to keep straight the two students who always sit together. And never mind the student who […]
