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Hi There!
Thanks for dropping by and taking an interest :-)
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I started learning about formal dog training in 1981,
when I first joined
a dog training class
with my dear Rio, an
all black GSD I had
acquired from an
advertisement in
Exchange&Mart
(!!!).
It was all very
traumatic back then,
with choke chains
and so much shouting
and negativity, and
not just at the
dogs, I may add. The
brutal methods used
at the club I was at
didn't work for me
at all; they made my
dog depressed and
unwilling to do
anything much. But I
really wanted her to
show that she was
just as clever and
wonderful as those
dogs in the top
class, because I
KNEW she was. So I
started learning
about dog training
and behaviour, and I
experimented at home
with what worked and
what didn't. |
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After a short
time, I became an
instructor at that
club. That lasted
only for about two
months, before I was
hauled in front of
the entire committee
and accused of
"ruining
everything with my
new fangled
ideas" - I had
suggested to a
beginner's class
that their dogs were
more likely to lie
down if they were
offered a food
reward. Funnily
enough, I hadn't
read or heard about
that as a method at
the time. I had
worked it out for
myself using left
over pieces of toast
from the breakfast
table!
I realised I
couldn't stay and
resigned. Another
lady, Rowna Wyatt,
who was also deeply
unhappy with having
to yell and shout at
and wrestle with her
dog all the time,
left with me.
Together, we hired a
small hall in a
Sussex village
called Berwick to
practise on our own,
and somehow, after a
few weeks, people
from the village
came and asked us to
help with various
problems.
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One evening, there were 8 of them, all at the same time,
because the lady at the post office had told everyone
"there was a dog training club in town"!! And so
and entirely by accident, Berwick Obedience
Association or BOA
for short, was born.
In time, BOA would
become the largest
training
organisation in the
South, with over 20
venues, 7 senior
instructors and 30
assistants. There
are now BOA trained
instructors running
commercially successful
professional dog
training and
behaviour practises
all over the UK, and
some in the US and
on the continent,
too. |
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From Left To Right:
Me, Olive Winterbourne, then Chairman of
Eastbourne & District DTC and Rowna at one of our first
official progress tests in Berwick. |
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So Rowna and I began to build up the club. A lot of what
we did at first was based on what I had learned at a Roy
Hunter course I had attended the previous autumn - there I
had for the first time heard about structured classes and
step by step learning. At the time it seemed impossible to
take it seriously because the club we had come from didn't
work like that - it was all haphazard and just basically, a
mad barking mess of a chaos, week in, week out.
But here, with these people who stood there all
expectantly and thought we were experts (!) we had a chance
to start with a blank slate and to see if we could do any
better.
And I can tell you, yes, we could.
We looked upon the owners like you would treat customers
or clients - respectfully, with a friendly attitude. We
never said anything cynical or nasty about their dogs and
really tried to be all that we had so wanted from our old
club but had never received - proper help and advice,
congruent between the instructors, homework assignments and
most of all, methods that worked and didn't traumatise the
dogs.
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The Gang Of 6!
Rowna with Petra, Michele
Boys with Elsa who was our first assistant and first
instructor trainee and me and Rio at Hartfield BIPDT.* |
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BOA outgrew the little hall in Berwick
and we moved.
We gained our first assistants and the
good reputation of our training classes began to
spread.
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All of us who
were involved in BOA
at that time
(Michelle Boys,
Wendy Hanson,
Marilyn Pawson,
Elisabeth Kroell
plus Rowna Wyatt and
myself) were
determined to be the
best we could, and
to this end we took
any conceivable and
available training.
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We went to the British Institute for Professional Dog Trainers - Obedience
Division
( I stopped with a
1st Hons).
We
attended talks,
lectures and
organised our own
trainings as well.
We acquired
virtually every book
ever written on the
subject of dog
training and
behaviour, and
behavioural science,
and anything else
that would help us
create classes and
strategies that
would really work
for any kind of
owner with any kind
of dog.
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A Proud
Picture! Michele Boys and Elsa and me and Rani
in BOA uniform showing off our 1sts With Honours
from the BIPDT for the local press
photographer. Not often two instructors
from the same club get that on the same
course. |
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We talked
endlessly amongst
ourselves, tested
approaches,
discussed methods
and argued furiously
on occasion.
We
experimented with
our classes and with
our own dogs and
continuously tried
out new ideas. What
worked, we kept and
shared, what did
not, was ruthlessly
discarded. As the
venues expanded, I
was becoming the
referring behaviorist and at
that time, also
became an associate
of the APBC Association of Pet Behaviour Counselors which
was newly founded
then, and was a
referring practice
member of John
Fisher's.
My first foray
into writing full length, personal and practical dog training manuals for companion
dog owners came
about as I found
myself pregnant. The
feedback I received
from nurses and
health visitors
because, at that
time, I had a house
full of rescued dogs
of various disturbed
behaviours, was
shocking.
They tried to
make me feel uneasy,
tried to make me
afraid "of all
the possible
dangers", one even tried to threaten me with social services.
Further, and thus
sensitized to the
problem, I began to
take note of how
many of the
telephone calls I
was receiving had to
do with women and
grandparents being
worried about
dog/children/baby
related issues.
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So, and right in the middle of
training my own dogs in preparation for my (second)
baby as my other son was already 9 by then and the
newer ones didn't remember him as a young
child, I
wrote "Your Dog
& Your
Baby" and mailed
it off to John
Fisher for feedback.
He phoned me right
away to say he thought it was great and
offered to write a
foreword. For a year or so I tried to find a publisher for the manuscript but
was told that "no-one needs that kind of thing" and there was no
"customer base".
I self published the first edition and it sold out
within the year and is still one of the most popular books I've ever
written. |
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The next project
arose from the
instructor's courses
we were holding for
our own assistants
at the time, to make
sure that BOA
classes were taught
by people who really
knew what they were
doing. Our in-house
manual was expanded
and updated to
become "Take
The Class!"
which proved to be a
huge success and has
sold thousands of
copies, in spite of
the fact that it is
such a specialist
publication. |
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(1993) I was developing my own theories and
approaches, backed up by the continuous study of
what was available in the field up to that point and
the fact that I was seeing behavior clients all day
long and was taking dog training classes at night,
with courses, shows and lectures at the weekends.
Some of the underlying theories I was developing
were at right angles with much of the commonly held
beliefs in the field and still are today, based, as
they are, on relationship dynamics with real people
and their dogs rather than on laboratory beagle
experiments or crass over-simplifications of
observations about wild canids.
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A Most Extraordinary Moment
In 1996, I gave a day long lecture called
"Dynamic Dog Psychology" to an audience of
about 60 top behaviourists and obedience instructors
in the UK, containing the principles of my original
work in the field. Amongst the participants that day
was my own first teacher in dog obedience
instructing, Roy Hunter. He had come all the way
across the country with a broken leg which rested on
a second chair throughout the day to hear me speak.
I can seriously say that this was one of the most
extraordinary days of my life so far and absolutely
underlined for me what an amazing person Roy is - he
is *still* willing to learn new things and *still*
has an open mind to new ideas. I can only hope that
when the time comes for me, I will be as gracious. |
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Rowna, Roy & Silvia at
Horam 1996 |
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I try to communicate what I have learned and observed as clearly and simply
as I can.
I have found that theory is great but when tempered with some common sense,
it gets to be a great deal better.
No-body is perfect.
There is no such thing as the perfect dog or the perfect
owner, and in combination, boy do we get to have some fun
trying to understand each other and get along!!
I've been very blessed with my friends at BOA and in the
dog training world in general who have helped me test my
(often unconventional) ideas and who helped me develop the
confidence to stand up and say things such as,
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"Dogs have
emotions." and
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"Dogs and people
form meaningful, mature relationships with all the
complications that entails." and
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"Without love
between an owner and their dog, you might as well give
up and go home - it's the most essential ingredient in
all dog training and behaviour modification
attempts." and
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"Dogs understand
much, much more than just simple command words."
and
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"If you speak to
dogs in real language, with real meaning, they do
understand you on a very profound level." and
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"Dogs are not just
stimulus-response robots." and
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"They're smart and
they have their own agenda, and each one is an
individual in their own right."
-
"There's no way I'm
going to treat my dogs as though I was a wolf in a pack.
They're not wolves - they are my companions, my charges,
my friends."and
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"Dog owners aren't
stupid, uneducated, deluded. They're people, for God's
sake. Take time to listen to them and find out their
point of view, their own strengths and beliefs, and make
your advice fit in so it works FOR THEM and THEIR DOG
and you've got dog training that actually works in the
real world."
... out loud, in public, and if need be, I can support
these statements with very long and complicated words
and "et al" studies from neuro-physiological
research and quantum biology insights that have recently
been discovered and turn the old Skinnerean worlds upside down
- at last.
If you want to learn about my kind of dog training and
behaviour, you're welcome. It won't suit you if for you dogs
are nothing but stimulus-response robots, or if you like to
think of them as machines or privates in your army.
If you have dogs for the love, the relationship and the
challenge of communicating with another species on the other
hand, and you're a fallible human being, then be most welcome.
You might just have found the right place here with us.
With best wishes,
Silvia Kent,
http://www.A1Dog.com
PS: Life after dog training? You'd be surprised but yes,
there is. Plenty of it at that :-) Check it out at
http://SilviaHartmann.com (I got divorced in 1997 and
reverted back to my maiden name after that).
PPS - Here are some very good (I daren't say old!) friends
of mine. I recommend them highly.
Joyce
Stranger Books
Joyce Stranger
has written about
the life she leads
with dogs and other
animals for many
years. Especially
for beginners in the
field, but also of
interest for even
the most experienced
people, her novels
and factual texts
are full of
insights, wisdom and
most importantly, a
deep love for dogs.
I defy anyone not to
be both touched by
her words, or to
learn from them.
Roy
Hunter Books
(for details go
http://www.howlnmoonpress.com
)
Roy Hunter was
using treats in
training forty years
ago, when everyone
else still beat
their dogs with
sticks. He is a most
amazing man, one of my first instructors and my
personal hero as far
as dog training is
concerned. From
Police Dog Training
via Working Trials
to Companion
Training, he's been
there, done it and
has had the
T-Shirts! He has
written two
unbelievably
comprehensive books
on games with dogs,
Fun&Games With
Dogs Parts 1 &
2, and a terrific
introduction to
professional scent
work. He also edits
a most useful
quarterly newsletter
- make enquiries to ACA, Dyers End,
Stambourne Nr
Halstead, Essex CO9
4NE, United Kingdom.
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