HEART Presents KATHY SDAO

What Not to Err: Training Mistakes That Create Headaches for Dogs

Seminar Topics

• Wasting reinforcers
  
• Missing opportunities to capture
  
• Allowing dog to go over threshold
  
• Getting the sequence wrong
  
• Confounding reinforcers and punishers
  
• Confusing friendly vs. safe
  
• Unbalancing physical and mental exercise
  
• Weakening/poisoning cues
  
• Misunderstanding schedules of reinforcement
  
• Overlooking the role of agency
  
• Plenty in Life is Free: An Alternative to Rank-based Training Models.

About Kathy Sdao:  Kathy Sdao is an applied animal behaviorist who has spent more than 30 years as a full-time animal trainer, first with marine mammals and now with dogs and their people.  After receiving her master’s degree in experimental psychology, she was hired by the U.S. Navy to train dolphins and then spent five years as a marine-mammal trainer at the Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium.  Kathy has trained animal actors, written for the Clicker Journal and Seattle Times and consulted with Guide Dogs for the Blind.  She is one of the original faculty members for Karen Pryor’s Clicker Expo and has taught at 29 of these conferences since 2003.   

Kathy has traveled extensively across the United States, Canada and Europe, and to Australia, Israel, Japan and Mexico, educating students about the science of animal training.  Her first book, Plenty in Life Is Free: Reflections on Dogs, Training and Finding Grace was published in 2012.