Originally Posted by
TuMicks
You could be right. To tell you the truth, I've read the +R, -R, +P, -P QRSTUV stuff and I understand it when I'm looking at the page (that is to say it makes good sense as a learning construct) but after that... pffft. Right out of my head.* So, I am inclined to agree with you, or certainly defer to you.
Here is why it might be +R, but I don't know. Rocket Dog is insane to retrieve. She MUST run. She MUST snatch what she's looking at up in her mouth. She MUST deliver so that she can run and snatch the next thing. She wants to do that more than she wants to breathe. It is undiluted joy for her. So... (here is where Hillmann might fit into the +R category) when RD figured out that the vibration meant that she was doing the right thing and that doing the right thing would result in a retrieve... I saw her begin to relax and be less panicky.
She was breaking because, in my simple minded way of thinking, she figured she better get the bird quick because ultimately I might not let her. Rather than take the chance on being deprived... BOOM. She was gone. NOW, using this method, she's like... "Oh, cool! Really good stuff (the retrieve) happens when I'm getting the buzz."
Would connecting the buzz with this powerful reward (release/retrieve) classify as +R?
If you recall, I once tried to describe how I'd never feel confident I had the timing right with the clicker or the cookie to really follow some of the +R demos I've seen. Motor moron here. Since the timing between buzz and release/retrieve is not immediate... maybe that disqualifies the Hillmann method to true +R status. But, ultimately, I see it as more similar to +R than the other categories (to the degree that I understand them.)
It sure does have one thing in common with +R. It's incremental and tedious! And you absolutely cannot give in to frustration.
* BTW. Evan Graham does a really good job of explaining the meaning of +R, -R, +P, -P. I think if I got his DVD out again and listened carefully to it, I'd get it.