Splitting is hard, lumping is easy.
You know splitting is good, and you know you want it. And you know lumping is bad, and you never to want to do it in front of people.
We can often tell when we’ve lumped something after the fact. Usually, because something is going wrong… often very wrong. But that doesn’t always tell us where we should have split a behavior, or especially where we can split in the future to prevent future train wrecks.
What is splitting?
It really means breaking your training down, working on ONE criterion at a time.
When we talk about lumping, what we are really talking about is combining criteria. Trying to click for changes in more than one variable.
So when we are thinking as a splitter, we are looking to identify all the different variables in play that result in the outcome we desire. And how we can adjust the difficulty of those variables in the smallest increments possible.
Why is splitting awesome?
- Intense focus on One Thing At A Time
- Minimizes Errors and Frustration
- Easier on dog
- Easier on Trainer
In this episode, we talk about where to look for “splits” when training a behavior.
