enhancing agility focus

I have a fabulous 2 year old working dog who has just started basic
agility training. She's doing great, mastering the obstacles, however
she lacks focus. Half the time if she does an obstacle right, it's
incidental rather than deliberate. She goes completely vague every so
often and appears to just totally not concentrate. We're repeating the
beginner agility class to work on these issues, but can anybody suggest
some ideas of games or things that I can play with her to increase her
attention span, and encourage her to focus on what she's doing a bit
more? Her basic training has been erratic, so I'm also working on
improving her stays and other basic exercises.

She's more motivated by play and toys than by food, however if there's
toys around, she sees nothing else and becomes quite obsessed, so she
can focus if she wants to. I just need to capture it and direct it where
I want it to go...

Thanks

Scotia

TOTE.DeleteThis@dog-play.com wrote:

>
> How long are the training sessions? Are you doing sequencing? How long
> are your sequences? If you are repeating obstacles how are you doing
> that? If she does a great job on an obstacle do you celebrate and move
> on or do you ask for a repeat of that great performance?
>
> How much of the lesson is new stuff, and how much stuff she is familiar
> with? How much of the lesson is focussed on obstacle performance and how
> much is focussed on handling?
>
> When she gets animated and interested is it in doing the new or doing the
> familiar?
>

Thanks for the reply :-) Training class is one hour long but I don't
work for that long in a row. Usually no more than say 5 minutes "work"
at a time with several minute rest or play in between, then either
repeat that obstacle or move onto another obstacle depending on the
instructors direction.. if she does a great job, I'm done! We have a bit
of a cheer and move on..end on a positive..we're not doing sequencing at
the moment, as it's a beginner class to learn each obstacle. The most we
do is half a dozen hurdles in a row, or the pipe tunnel followed by the
cloth tunnel.

The lesson is primarily familiar stuff with an increasing degree of
difficulty. For example, she's learned the tyre and then it goes up a
little in height. She's learned to jump so she'll then do two or three
in a row. She's learned the dog walk so it goes up in height a little.
When she gets animated, it could be either new or familiar. For example,
last class she started out really on the ball, and switched off half way
through class and was firing again by the end.

I feel a little that with this particular dog, she doesn't get enough
time to reinforce the previous level before she's asked to do more. For
example, she's happy to trot along the dog walk at half height but less
so at full height, but with 8 others in the class and a fixed 6 week
course, I can't go back to doing it half height without inconveniencing
everyone else. Perhaps I need to get my hubby to build me some gear at
home!!

We use clicker training in class, and she learns well with that, our
rewards are treats and toys, and she can at times be so focussed on the
reward that she doesn't think about what she has to do to earn it. My
last dog virtually trained herself so this girl is a challenge that's
quite new to me, but I'm enjoying it, she's a wonderful little dog.

Thanks again

Scotia