Monthly Archives: November 2013

Allynwood Academy presents CHAT(c) Seminar

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CHAT Seminar-13

Allynwood Academy hosted its first all day CHAT(c) Seminar last weekend and we had nine 2 legged visitors and four 4 legged visitors. Part of the canine copilot pack was there to help work with the 4 legged guests and they were able to meet and greet, and work with a few slightly reactive dogs. In the picture above Kaze is meeting Scooby a shy scared 8 month old Jack Russel. Scooby along with 3 of my pack Annastasia, Kaze, and Franky, worked together for almost an hour helping her emerge from her shell, sniff and play with other dogs and approach people more confidently.

The day passed quickly with a balance of power point presentations from Dr. Rita Argiros and Richard Reeve broken down by hands on attunement work with the owners and canines. I provided a free behavioral consult for each owner and dog and based on our feedback each one went home with a new ability to read and communicate!! Exactly what we strive for at EIK9 now being branched out and intertwined with some of the newest human and canine brain science and groundbreaking work of Dr. Beebe. Can’t wait for more of these workshops in 2014.

CHAT Seminar-15 CHAT Seminar-14 CHAT Seminar-10 CHAT Seminar-9 CHAT Seminar-7

Aaaaand thats a wrap!

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dc and dogs-9

As 2013 comes to a close i must stop and reflect on what the year has held for us and even more exciting is what 2014 has in store.

2013 brought us a newly certified trailing K9 Miss Emeline and an additional certification on Raina through IPWDA as well. It brought us 2 more certified therapy K9s Anna and Frank. It brought us two newly certified water recovery K9s with Raina and Max both passing on the same day. It also brought us the addition of Annecy to the pack and Diva to the program. I feel like 2013 brought us a lot of twos!!!!

As the sole handler and trainer of all the canine copilot dogs (with the exception of Max and Mia whom i assist in training plans but they are handled by my better half) I feel like 2013 has been just a glimmer of what i can achieve.

So with that 2014 will focus on the following.

-The A litter of vom Kugelblitz Kennels. This highly anticipated litter between Raina and Soren is going to bring us a some of the top SAR, IPO and Police dogs in New York State.

-Annecy as what we hope to be the first certified Airscent dog in New York State with a bark and hold indication.

-Annecy’s CGC, Therapy certification, narcotics certification and BH. vom Kugelblitz’s first Malinois has a lot to accomplish and we know this little girl can do it all. Please keep an eye out in 2015 for our B litter of malinois’s at vom Kugelblitz kennels.

-Soren’s therapy certification,BH, Show rating, and IPO1 come this spring. This boy will be busy between raising his offspring.

-Kamikaze’s therapy certification.

-Diva’s therapy certification, BH, airscent and HR certification.

– Mia’s CGC, and HR certification.

– Anna, Frank, Abby, Eme, Max, and Raina will all get to relax and take the year off, just performing there typical jobs on a daily basis (and Raina being a mom of course!)

and of course we will continue our rescue work with Life Long Tails helping local canines who cannot stay in their current homes and continue to maintain our roster of students for private and group training.

Keep an additional eye out on Allynwood Academy and the new CHAT(c) program that Jenn has been appointed training director of. Parts of 2014 will be traveling doing seminars on our breakthrough new Canine Human Attunement Training. We were able to give one presentation in North Carolina in 2013 as well as hold our first all day seminar in November at Allynwood, both of which where a huge success! Very excited about this new venture, and the ability to continue helping people develop the ultimate relationship with their canine copilots.

❤ so with that, we are ready to proceed to the last month of 2013 and ring in the new year!!

Welcome to EIK9

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Elite Instinct Canine Training Logo - Revision 222

*ANNOUCEMENT AREA*

Please check out vom Kugelblitz Kennels page for our planned upcoming “A” litter with Raina and Soren.

Welcome to EIK9, home of the Canine Copilot pack and vom Kugelblitz Kennels.

We are located in upstate NY and offer a variety of training including basic and advanced obedience, behavior modification, agility and other fun sports, detection and protection with a focus on canine Search and Rescue. We occasionally have adult green or trained dogs for sale, as well as litters of pups raised for working detection or protection homes. We stress quality not quantity. When you train with EIK9 you have a partner and friend for life.

Jenn currently handles numerous certified SAR K9’s in every discipline possible, and has trained dogs for detection in everything from tracking and trailing to narcotics, bed bugs, explosives and more. Her life is all about dogs, but it is not how she makes a living as it is instead her passion. She has been told by many other handlers, clients, and trainers that she has a gift with dogs and it is her intention to share that gift with all who wish to receive it.  Holding certificates from Certification Council for Professional Dog Trainers (CCPDT) International Associations of Canine Professionals (IACP), and American Kennel Club as a certified trainer, behaviorist, and Canine Good Citizen evaluator, Jenn shares almost as many accolades as her canine partners. Currently a member and K9 Handler with International Police Working Dog Assosciation (IPWDA) as well as secretary of the New York State Federation of Search and Rescue teams. Holding a degree in Accounting and currently finishing up her AAS in Veterinary Technology so that she may add License Veterinary Technician to her ever growing resume.

You will not find a more knowledgeable active handler/trainer in the area. Whether you have an out of control pet dog, need to learn how to have a better relationship with your companion for you and your family, or wish to add a new working dog to your home we do it all with care and compassion.

Our training philosophy 

Our main goal is to ensure you have a successful, fulfilling life with your K9 partner. We believe that having a solid foundation with your pup will lead to that  ultimate K9 relationship. Training every dog is different and we do not have any set method or curriculum. Everything is tailored to each individual dog or pack and its needs.

We do maintain a philosophy throughout working with canines, this has come after years of experience working with thousands of dogs, studying body language and canine communication. You must have a FOUNDATION laid so your dog understands what you want, you must COMMUNICATE effectively to your dog and keep it CONSISTENT. You must RESPECT your dog and you must require the same RESPECT.

We will teach you how to read your dog, how to communicate effectively and consistently with your dog, and how to use everyday life as a training session. Dogs do not put training life “on paws” and only pay attention and learn when you want them to, everything you do, everything yous aw, and EVERYTHING you reinforce every minute is you training your dog. Behavior is not static- it is always changing and evolving.

We rely on the basic reinforces in dog life, food, water, social interaction, and exercise and will teach you many other secondary reinforces that you can use with YOUR dog. We primarily train by direction, not correction and we hold true to our statement that there are no disobedient dogs, only unclear human communication. Remember dogs see the world differently than us, the past is over for them, and the future is inconceivable, they only live in the moment.

Our German Shepherd Breeding Program

At vom Kugelblitz German Shepherds we have one main goal, and that is to breed the TOTAL German Shepherd Dog as Max Emil Friedrich von Stephanitz envisioned and spoke of years ago.

“The most striking feature of the correctly bred German Shepherd are firmness of nerves, attentiveness, unshockability, tractability, watchfulness, reliability and incorruptibility together with courage, fighting  tenacity, and hardness.”

We are not a kennel, and we only have a litter once every few years. Our foundation dogs are health tested, hips and elbows xrayed, are either certified search dogs, IPO titled, herding titled or a mix of all of the above. Our dogs do it all, they are working, biting powerhouses with insane drive but great control, who can be found in a room full of kids providing canine therapy in their off time at a therapeutic boarding school. They are family members and live in the home as we do not believe in keeping kennel dogs. Please check out the canine copilot tab for more information on Raina and Soren our current foundation female and male. Both dogs have great drive, but there ability to think while working in real life situations is what makes them exceptional shepherds.

Allynwood Academy Presents: The Theory and Practice of Canine Human Attunement Training/Therapy (CHAT®)

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Allynwood Academy Presents:

The Theory and Practice of Canine Human Attunement Training/Therapy (CHAT®)
A one day seminar at Allynwood Academy, Hancock, New York
Saturday, November 23, 2013 9:00 am – 4:30 pm
RSVP: to Jennifer Culver by November 21th (jennifer.Culver@allynood.org)

Presenters
Dr. Rita Argiros, Executive Program Director at Allynwod Academy and Founder and Program Director of CHAT®. Rita has crib memories of her first dog, Doc, and has never been without a dog. She is the oldest daughter of the founders of The Family Foundation School, now Allynwood Academy. She drafted the first program handbook in 1978 (a very primitive 12 page document). Rita studied sociology at Binghamton University receiving her PhD in 1992. She was an Associate Professor of Sociology at Saint Cloud State University in Minnesota from 1989 until returning to New York to take up her leadership role at what is now Allynwood Academy. She is currently Executive Program Director of the Allynwood programs. Her sociological perspective informs everything she does at Allynwood as she is no stranger to dialogic, dialectical and systems perspectives of all kinds. In Rita’s world, everything is always “in formation.” Rita started working with dogs and students in 2003. She is a certified SAR dog handler, fielding both search dogs trained to find live people and human remains detector dogs. She has had various leadership positions in the New York State Federation of Search and Rescue Teams including K-9 coordinator and vice-chairman. She is the president of Eagle Valley Search Dogs, a Search and Rescue team that has helped resolve a number of cold cases in New York and New Jersey. She has worked with the Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the New York State Missing Persons Clearing House, the New York Department of Environmental Conservation, New York State Police and numerous county and local law enforcement agencies. Students in Dog Corp (a part of the CHAT program) almost always accompany her and the dogs on searches.

Mr. Richard Reeve, Head of School at Allynwood Academy and 5th year psychoanalytical candidate at The C.G. Jung Institute of New York, he is currently writing his thesis on early relational trauma, shame and addiction. Richard has been listening to Rita chew his ear off about her observations of the interactions between dogs and students and the changes she was seeing for several years. When he was introduced to the work of Dr. Beatrice Beebe and early relational trauma, he brought to Rita’s attention the parallels and correspondences between the discoveries made concerning human attunement and the most recent research on canine learning and cognition. The outcome of those discussions led to the creation CHAT®.

Jennifer Eckhardt, CPDT-KA, IACP, gifted canine behaviorist and the CHAT® program Training Director. Jennifer is the founder of Life Long Tails, a 501c3 non-profit animal rescue organization which she founded as a teenager. She has been training client’s dogs for the past 8 years and has been working with adolescents in her current capacity for the past two years. Jennifer is a member of Eagle Valley Search dogs and has certified 3 search and rescue dogs (live find, human remains detection, trailing and water recovery) and has two more in training. She is currently training a narcotics dog as well. She shares her home with 11 dogs of all ages and sizes. When Rita and Rick approached Jennifer with the idea that attunement might be the explanation for the patterns of healing we were all seeing in our students, her response was-“of course, it’s all about the relationship. This is exactly what I do.”

What is CHAT®?
CHAT® is Allynwood Academy’s unique program for adolescent and young adult dog enthusiasts. CHAT® stands for Canine Human Attunement Training/Therapy. CHAT® emerged out of more than 16 years combined experience and thousands of hours of practice with adults, adolescents and dogs of all breeds. It builds upon the best of current canine learning theory, human and canine brain science, and the groundbreaking work of Dr. Beebe et. al on mother-infant attachment and attunement. CHAT® coursework and experiential learning address a number of issues, particularly those related to trauma and addiction.

What you can expect
By the end of the seminar you will understand how and why developing properly attuned relationships with dogs can help address a variety of issues including many stemming from early relational trauma. AND, while it’s only one day, we think the seminar will help you improve your relationships with the dogs that share your life.

Schedule

    • 8-9 Registration and Breakfast (anyone who brought a dog and didn’t fill out the pre-seminar questioner does so now)
    • 9AM-9:15 AM Introduction and Overview
    • 9:15-10:15 Introduction to Attunement and CHAT® theory
    • 10:15 Break
    • 10:30-Noon Crash Course in Canine Human Attunement
      • Dog-Human Meeting and Greeting (Interactive) We meet any dogs that you have brought with you one at a time and observe their behavior. The students and instructors discuss what they see.
      • Doggy Dialectics (Classroom) Dog body language: Is it a signal or an expression of feeling or both? Interweaving Turid Rugass, author of Calming Signals in Dogs, and Dr. Beatrice Beebe’s work in a way that helps participants really understand the interaction diagram.
      • Eyes (Interactive) The “gaze” is one of the most important parts of the experience of attunement. Participants do the “eyes” exercise with one or more dogs and then reports on what it felt like. Hopefully most participants will experience mid-range attunement. We will also discuss the “look-away” and the problem of the gaze for dogs and some humans.

    • 12 -1 Lunch
    • 12:30 -1 Lunch Speaker Rita Argiros on “Dogs R Us” What the research says about canine evolution, emotions and cognition and why it matters.
    • 1:15-2:00 Crash Course in Canine Attunement continued
      • Dog-Dog Meeting and Greeting. Participants and our students “read” dog-dog attunement. We put together (safe) dogs and watch them interact.

    • 2:00 Break
    • 2:15-2:45 Collar & Lead (Classroom) A presentation of something so mundane and every day. Walking a dog on lead and what it says about attunement style.
    • 2:45-3:30 Attention Regulation (Interactive) Everyone takes a dog on a walk. (outside or in the gym depending on the weather). Can people use what they have learned to have a sustained interaction with the dog?
    • 3:30 Break
    • 3:45-4:30 “Trust the Dog” (Demonstration) How often do you hear students say they don’t trust anyone. When you are doing scent work, you have to trust. Scent work as the ultimate communion between dog and human. You can’t smell what the dog is smelling. You have to rely totally upon their abilities.
  • 4:30 Closing remarks