For Jean

Hi Jean! I hope you're doing OK. Are you back in London now? I hope your friends are taking good care of you.

Anyways, since you asked:

Clicker training is a positive reinforcement technique used to train dogs do do a variety of commands, from sit to complex work performed by guide dogs.

In order for a dog to understand a command, a reward (in most cases a food treat, sometimes a toy) must be given to the dog within 3 seconds of his performing the command correctly. After 3 seconds, the association in the dog's brain between the command and the performance is broken. So, for example, if I tell Franklin to "sit", and he sits, I need to give him a small bit of hot dog (or freeze dried liver, but we won't get into that!!) within 3 seconds, otherwise he won't know that it was his lovely "sit" that earned him the treat.

But if you think about it, it can be difficult sometimes to get the treat to the dog n that limited time frame, especially if you're working with Joel Walton's "All or Nothing" technique (more on that later...but remind me to do it).

That's where the clicker comes in. A clicker is a small piece of plastic that makes a clicking noise when pressed. A trainer can hold it in his or her hand the entire time while training their dog (you can't do that with food...your dog will snap it right out of your hand!). When the dog performs a command correctly, the clicker is clicked, and the dog is also given a food reward. Eventually, the dog learns that the clicking sound means he did the right thing. Once the dog learns to associate the clicking sound with the correct action, it becomes much easier for the dog's trainer to reward the dog within the 3 second time limit.

You can see that this would be great for training guide dogs, because a lot of the time, the guide dog won't be near the trainer when doing a command, making it impossible to get a food reward to the dog within 3 seconds. But, the dog can always hear a click from across a room!