---

For those of you training your dog for agility and who are clicker aware you may like to consider using the following method for touchpoints.

First acquire a carpet square roughly 46cms (18") in diameter.
Place the square on a hard floor and with your dog on the lead walk him over the square and when his front feet are actually on the carpet immediately Click and Treat. Continue until Fido realises that when his feet hit the carpet he will get a Click and a Treat.
They soon catch on! Now add your cue word such as mark, point or whatever word you want to use when he is actually on the carpet.

The next step is to try this exercise off lead.
Say your cue word and when Fido steps onto the carpet C/T.
Do not hurry any of these exercises, if your dog does not understand when off the lead go back a step and do it on lead again until he does get the idea!
When your dog really understands this exercise you can start to transfer it to agility training.

Start with the Dogwalk.
Put your carpet on the bottom of the touchpoint 2/3rds on the equipment and 1/3rd on the ground.
With the dog on lead walk him over the equipment and when his feet are on the carpet in the position you want, say your cue word and Click and Treat.
Continue this until you feel confident that Fido knows what he has to do.
Now try off lead.
At this stage he will probably be some way ahead of you so when he is threequarters way down the descending plank say the cue word and if your dog fully understands this exercise he will stand on the carpet and wait for you to Click and Treat.

When you are getting consistent results cut the piece of carpet in half and continue training. Gradually make the carpet piece smaller and smaller and eventually dispense with it completely.
At this stage continue to Click and Treat every time.

You can do the same for the A-Frame.

For the See-saw you will have to use a smaller piece of carpet with some double sided tape to keep it in place at the end of the equipment but the training method is the same for all three pieces of equipment.

After a long period and when you feel the time is right you can then phase out the Clicker and just use the reward for the correct behaviour.
To do this start randomly Clicking and Treating as set out in the previous pages on basic clicker training.
Always remember to use the cue word.