Are Secondary Reinforcers and Chaining Behaviors Necessary in Positive Reinforcement Training?

Becoming advanced at R+ training… we hope to encourage people to want to think a lot bigger than has historically been done in the past. It's possible to even have a successful career in R+ training with all the support necessary to thrive… but I digress.

Before you watch this video of Shawna speaking at our under saddle webinar this past weekend, let us preface by saying that secondary reinforcers and chaining behaviors are for the advanced learner and should be taught by trainers who have excellent timing, skill, and ability to read a horse's emotional state.

We are always sure that horses we introduced to these more advanced concepts have relaxation built into the criteria of each behavior they've learned, to help them to stay settled and focused. We must avoid frustration at every turn and yet, we don't want the training to become boring for them.

So how do we keep criteria high and learning fun? Variety. And this includes adding in keep going signals, behavior chains and secondary reinforcers as the video talks about.

The fact is, there is a lot of science to support the efficacy of variety in training. Think about it in your own life… if you love playing a game on your phone, it's the variety you like isn't it? If they kept giving you the same puzzle to solve, do you think you'd want to keep playing it?

It takes astute observation to establish and maintain this balance between making the game fun and also maintaining relaxation throughout.

When Shawna was working with marine mammals, she was immersed in the highest caliber of training in the world. In fact, all of her friends were trainers as well and even in social settings, it was all training talk. It was an all-consuming life style!

Using these principles is imperative to achieving high criteria in your training. We want the horse world to develop a large repertoire of behaviors and to reach high criteria with horses remaining calm and focused. It's why we created our certification.

Of course we fully recognize the horse's emotional state is paramount. Many horses have faced trauma and their unpleasant histories cause us to work through those issues first. Once they've moved past that though, we want our horses to keep learning and growing and we want you to recognize that a giant world awaits you if you are open to raising your own criteria.

Consider becoming certified with us! There is a need for this more advanced learning and this is a quickly growing area that is much needed in the horse world. We are doing the interview process starting now and throughout December as the certification starts off January 1st! Go to Becoming advanced at R+ training… we hope to encourage people to want to think a lot bigger than has historically been done in the past. It's possible to even have a successful career in R+ training with all the support necessary to thrive… but I digress.

Before you watch this video of Shawna speaking at our under saddle webinar this past weekend, let us preface by saying that secondary reinforcers and chaining behaviors are for the advanced learner and should be taught by trainers who have excellent timing, skill, and ability to read a horse's emotional state.

We are always sure that horses we introduced to these more advanced concepts have relaxation built into the criteria of each behavior they've learned, to help them to stay settled and focused. We must avoid frustration at every turn and yet, we don't want the training to become boring for them.

So how do we keep criteria high and learning fun? Variety. And this includes adding in keep going signals, behavior chains and secondary reinforcers as the video talks about.

The fact is, there is a lot of science to support the efficacy of variety in training. Think about it in your own life… if you love playing a game on your phone, it's the variety you like isn't it? If they kept giving you the same puzzle to solve, do you think you'd want to keep playing it?

It takes astute observation to establish and maintain this balance between making the game fun and also maintaining relaxation throughout.

Of course we fully recognize the horse's emotional state is paramount. Many horses have faced trauma and their unpleasant histories cause us to work through those issues first. Once they've moved past that though, we want our horses to keep learning and growing and we want you to recognize that a giant world awaits you if you are open to raising your own criteria. Come learn from us! Get immersed in the growing community we have. Surrounding yourself with likeminded people who can support and engage us is key.

And do consider becoming certified! There is a need for this more advanced learning and this is a quickly growing area that is much needed in the horse world. We are doing the interview process starting now and throughout December as the certification starts off January 1st! Go to www.shawnakarrasch.com/certification