Clicking with Your Dog: Step-by-Step in Pictures [Paperback]

Peggy Tillman (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1890948055 | ISBN-13: 978-1890948054 | Publication Date: March 1, 2001

"Clicking with Your Dog" is the answer for all pet owners who want a dog to be a real partner and friend. The author's step-by-step illustrations explain the clicking process more clearly than ever before. Soon you will truly understand your dog, and thanks to the clicker, your dog will understand you!

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Clicker training is a method of teaching behavior to dogs using positive reinforcement. The successive approximation of desired behavior is marked with a clicker and rewarded with a treat, a toy, or a pat. Inappropriate behavior is ignored, not punished. In 1985, Karen Pryor published the seminal work on this method, Don't Shoot the Dog (Bantam), and issued a revision in 1999. Both editions are highly theoretical and are aimed at the educated, informed lay reader. Tillman, an ergonomics illustrator as well as a dog trainer and clicker-training instructor, has made Pryor's principles and techniques accessible to the rank amateur. Using easily understandable text and clear, step-by-step drawings, she guides the novice through all the steps necessary to teach dogs almost 100 different behaviors, from basic obedience to housebreaking to tricks. She also applies the principles to the elimination of problem behavior. While Paul Owens's The Dog Whisperer (LJ 10/1/99) covered much the same subject matter, Tillman's book teaches the skills through illustrations. Highly recommended for public libraries. Florence Scarinci, Nassau Community Coll. Lib., Garden City, NY
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Peggy Larson Tillman, with her husband Barry Tillman, is a pioneer in the science of ergonomics; designing machines and environments to fit humans. They have written two leading books in the field.

Peggy Tillman also worked for many years as an elementary school teacher. She discovered clicker training when she acquired her standard poodle, Charles. Clicker training fit exactly with her concept of how children should be treated --- fairly, and with lots of opportunities to succeed. Charles endorsed the clicker approach. Peggy went on to teach classes to pet owners, and in the process evolved her own visual instructional material. This book is the happy result.

Peggy Tillman's drawings, behaviorally sensitive, often truly beautiful, and always highly informative ---- are the heart of this book.

The Tillman's and Charles live on an island in Puget Sound, near Seattle.

Product Details

• Paperback: 200 pages
• Publisher: Sunshine Books (March 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1890948055
• ISBN-13: 978-1890948054
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 7.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (54 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #994,975 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Peggy Larson Tillman, with her husband Barry Tillman, is a pioneer in the science of ergonomics; designing machines and environments to fit humans. They have written two leading books in the field.

Peggy Tillman also worked for many years as an elementary school teacher. She discovered clicker training when she acquired her standard poodle, Charles. Clicker training fit exactly with her concept of how children should be treated - fairly, and with lots of opportunities to succeed. Charles endorsed the clicker approach. Peggy went on to teach classes to pet owners, and in the process evolved her own visual instructional material. This book is the happy result.

The Tillman's and Charles live on an island in Puget Sound, near Seattle.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

153 of 157 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars ... Great book for anyone wishing to start clicker training, February 25, 2002

By 

Yeoh Siok Kee (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Clicking with Your Dog: Step-by-Step in Pictures (Paperback)

When I wrote the first review on this book in May 2001, I had been using this book for a month or so and was suitably impressed. I was also just beginning to invest in clicker training.

9 months on (many books later), and having trained (or at least partially trained ... *grin*) 3 dogs, I'm no longer as convinced that newer operant training methods have as distinct an advantage over classical/traditional methods, as some writers would have us believe. We are discovering that all training methods (including the clicker method) have their respective strengths & weaknesses. What many writers don't say is that much depends on the dog itself or that combination training methods work well too.

But that being said ... the clicker is still the most effective way I have discovered of informing my dogs when an action is approved ... its quick, extremely simple & precise ... one click and the dog knows that it has done right ... no buts, no ifs - that's it!

Depending on time, mood and disposition, voice commands can vary in tone and quality - the clicker is consistency paramount.

When used properly, the clicker is one heck of a communication tool ... and this book's value is that it teaches a beginner very quickly how and when to sound the clicker ...

This is a book consisting primarily of drawn illustrations ... very few words ...

And they say a picture is worth a thousand words - therein lies the secret and effectiveness of this book ... the illustrations are as precise and clear to the reader as the sound of the clicker is to the doggie ... The pictures convey in quite a remarkable manner - a clarity of timing to the reader that might otherwise have been lost had words been used ...

The reader will find all basic commands such as sit, heel, stay & come dealt with in the book, including aspects of (a) how to 'shape', namely, to lead a dog progressively towards a behaviour that is acceptable to the trainer; and (b) targetting, which is teaching our doggie friend how to nose or touch anything we indicate ... teaching a dog to target, allows us to then teach the dog more complicated commands, such as closing doors and turning switches on and off ...

This book is great investment for anyone wishing to start clicker training ... If the reader wishes to progress beyond basic training, or wishes to learn more about how and why a clicker works, then the reader may have to get other books ...

But as start-off manual - this book is one of the best!

68 of 68 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Both the dog and I love it!, July 26, 2009

By 

Timothy B. Riley (San Antonio, TX USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Clicking With Your Dog: Step-By-Step in Pictures (Karen Pryor Clicker Books) (Paperback)

Length:: 4:00 Mins

I have a "joint custody" arrangement with a neighbor for her Toy Yorkie. I make a reference in my video to the book that inspired me to get this one, but I gave the name incorrectly. When I read "Reaching the Animal Mind" by Karen Pryor I decided that clicker training was the approach that we should take with Bella and my neighbor agreed.

Bella wanted to play-bite way too often, so we taught her how to play-bite on command and then gave her the command for "don't bite". It has worked in real life. The same with barking and some other puppy issues.

This is not a quick-fix (although they do learn the tricks in an amazingly short time frame) but instead it is a template for teaching your dog some alternative behaviors. Bella knows quite a few additional "tricks" but here I show some of her favorites. I hope that this video is helpful.

Reaching the Animal Mind: Clicker Training and What It Teaches Us About All Animals

90 of 93 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Super Book on Dog Training!, March 11, 2001

By 

K. Weaver (Farmers Branch, TX United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Clicking with Your Dog: Step-by-Step in Pictures (Paperback)

Clicking with Your Dog is the absolute BEST dog training book I've ever seen. That tells a lot because I think I have the majority of dog training books published in the last 10 years, and have had my hands on the rest (usually those who don't say anything new at all, are the only ones that do not end up on my shelf).

Step-by-step instructions do not describe this book at all. The directions are clearly written and suitable for those from about 5th grade on up to the most educated college professor. It is the illustrations though that make this book. Anyone can literally take this book and a dog, and figure out how to teach each behavior with no problem. It is better than a video tape (while those are good), since the illustrations freeze the position the dog, trainer, and other objects in time.

In other words, each behavior is not only described in words, but the individual components of the behavior are broken down. There are seven illustrations alone for teaching the sit.

I really cannot praise this book high enough -- if you want to train a dog, but have no conveniently located classes, or if you want to try clicker training, but can't find someone to teach you, this is the book for you.