Puppy Socialization LIVE!
with Scotti Harvey
in collaboration with Dr. Emma Harvey, DVM
A KPA LIVE!™ Class featuring real-time training and coaching WITH Scotti
RAISING A PUPPY IS A MATTER OF HOW WELL, NOT HOW MUCH
Join Scotti and learn to make the most of the all-important first few months of a long dog life.Sold out! Sign up below to get notified when a future class will be offered.
Raising a puppy is a joy, a lot of work, and often stressful! Let Scotti Harvey teach you how to lighten the stress and increase the joy of raising a puppy. In collaboration with veterinarian Dr. Emma Harvey, Scotti will teach you a sophisticated and simplified approach to raising a well-socialized, confident, and happy puppy with skills that will serve the dog well throughout life.
Scour the internet and you will find dozens of checklists for raising and socializing a puppy. A checklist approach may lead you to believe that socialization is a matter of “how much” rather than “how well.”
Scotti’s novel approach to socialization is built around a framework of cooperation, control, and agency focused on a set of natural behaviors that not only keep a puppy safe but also foster happy curiosity, confident exploration, and a relaxed resilience to the surprises that life brings!
Join Scotti and Emma and learn how to create consistent social experiences that encourage learner-controlled exploration, build your puppy's repertoire of behavioral responses to environmental stimuli that ease the dog’s way through the world, and create exposures that are thinly sliced and smartly arranged so that your puppy experiences success and growth simultaneously. And, because it's rare for everything to go as planned, you will also be coached to handle the unexpected. Plus, if you have puppy-related medical questions along the way, Dr. Emma Harvey is on board to answer them.
Each of the four units in the class is focused on building specific skill-sets. The units progressively expand the contexts and environments where the dog’s skills, behavioral repertoire, and healthy emotional responses will deepen. For example, you will teach and practice several behaviors that improve both your puppy’s communication with you and the ways you respond to the puppy’s “requests” to prioritize safety and the dog’s eagerness to learn. Scotti imbues her teaching with a great deal of fun and joy and a thoughtful KIS (Keep It Simple) approach.
This class is for trainers, breeders, and pet guardians who have a puppy or are thinking about getting one! Puppies can be as old as one year and as young as six weeks!
Where and When!
Zoom Classes will be held on Mondays: April 8, April 15, April 22, and April 29. Classes will begin at 12:00 PM PT / 3:00 PM ET and are two hours long.
As soon as you enroll, you receive access to all of the curriculum videos. Can’t make the Live classes? No worries! The Zoom classes are recorded and made available shortly after each class concludes; you can access all of the recorded material for a full year!
Scotti will work with each Excel team via the groups.io discussion board. Teams can submit videos of training and socialization progress for individualized feedback from Scotti beginning on April 1 and leading up to the first Zoom meeting as well as between the remaining three meetings.
Engage students can follow, train, or just learn along with each of the Excel teams, sharing their progress and experiences. During the weekly live Zoom classes, Scotti will coach Excel teams one-on-one on each unit’s behaviors and socialization goals
During each of the real-time Zoom sessions, Dr. Emma Harvey, DVM, will answer veterinary questions related to the class content. Engage students can also submit questions via the Q&A during the Zoom sessions, so come prepared!
The skills and behaviors you will learn in this class will create a path that prepares a dog for work, cooperative care, sport, companionship, or simply a world that is full of curious, exciting, and sometimes scary things. Join Scotti Harvey, along with Emma Harvey, and experience puppy socialization in a new fresh light!
Scotti Harvey is a Karen Pryor Academy Certified Training Partner (KPA CTP) who specializes in canine neonatal care and behavior. Her career has been a deep exploration of those topics; she applies that knowledge and experience to her own Icelandic sheepdog breeding as well as her work with clients. Dr. Emma Harvey, also a KPA CTP, is a practicing veterinarian in the state of Washington with a veterinary sub-focus in canine reproduction. Both Scotti and Emma are eager to bring their expertise in puppies and behavior to this exciting new class!
LEARN, PRACTICE, SHARE
LEARN
Four weeks of training, a week-by-week curriculum integrated with four LIVE virtual classes with real-time coaching, interactive learning, and Q&A. Super educational, super fun.
PRACTICE
The LIVE week-by-week curriculum integrates with, and prepares you for, the weekly LIVE class. New levels of advancement each week!
SHARE
Ask questions and share insights, pics, and your training videos. Celebrate progress together!
A week-by-week curriculum guides your learning every step of the way. Each week, join your classmates for one of four LIVE classes for real-time training and personalized interactive coaching, plus Q&A with Scotti and Emma. You will see other students practice the behaviors, hear Scotti’s feedback, make adjustments, and improve their training. Each of these Zoom-based classes is two hours long. All students get access to the full week-by-week curriculum and class forum. In each Zoom class:
- Engage students watch training and Scotti’s coaching and can ask questions through Zoom chat.
- Excel students get personalized real-time coaching and feedback on their training during the Zoom class PLUS on-screen Q&A.
Miss a class? No problem. LIVE classes are also recorded.
Let's Begin This Fabulous Journey, Together
- Unit 1 Lessons
- Live Class 1: April 8
- Unit 2 Lessons
- Live Class 2: April 15
- Unit 3 Lessons
- Live Class 3: April 22
- Unit 4 Lessons
- Live Class 4: April 29
LEARN WITH Scotti Harvey and Dr. Emma harvey, DVM
Scotti Harvey, KPA CTP, is the founder of Why Runamuck Behavior and Training and co-founder of Carden Country School, where she has taught 4-6-year-olds. In addition, Scotti is a certified CSAT, FFT, and Puppy Start Right Instructor. Specializing in canine neonatal development and learning, she is a breeder of Icelandic Sheepdogs and Finnish Lapphunds since 2008, raising 15 litters. Through her studies on puppy socialization, Scotti strives to mitigate behavioral issues through the careful implementation of strategic early-life experiences. Her focus is on developing processing, coping, and communication skills to foster courageous, inquisitive, and versatile learners.
Emma Harvey, DVM, graduated from veterinary school at the University of Edinburgh, R(D)SVS, in 2012 and has been a practicing mixed animal and small animal veterinarian in the State of Washington for the last 12 years. She graduated from Karen Pryor Academy in 2013. Emma has trained in an additional sub-focus in canine reproduction under Cheryl McDermott, DVM. Emma serves as a medical consultant for this course and will be present for all live sessions to address medical-related questions.
Here's What You'll Be Learning UNIT by UNIT
1
groundwork
Skills/Behaviors Covered:
- Get On
- Get Into
- Put Head Through
Unit #1 establishes what socialization is and explains why fun, productive, and safe socialization opportunities are easy to imagine but difficult to create. As Scotti teaches you how she differentiates among various types of social experiences, you will learn both to set up learner-controlled exploration and how to exercise caution around environment-controlled stimuli.
Puppies possess a suite of natural approach/avoidance behaviors, as well as other, more subtle behaviors, such as gait or ear position, that keep them safe and communicate their needs. As dogs age, they often lose these extremely valuable behaviors because guardians and handlers miss opportunities to build on them. In this LIVE class, you will learn how to support the behaviors and use them as a foundation to foster relaxed and dynamic curiosity, exploration, and learning.
As you train, your puppy will develop the skills that are needed to engage with novel environments. Each skill that you will learn about in this unit and teach to your puppy fosters a love of learning that builds both the puppy’s communication skills and positive associations with the puppy’s guardians and environment.
After working through Unit 1, head to the discussion board as soon as possible. There, Excel students will share videos of their Unit 1 training and receive feedback and coaching from Scotti in preparation for the first Zoom class on April 8. Engage students can follow each Excel student discussion thread, share their progress in new threads, post their own videos of their puppies and training, and offer kudos to their classmates.
In the first week’s virtual LIVE class, Excel students will get to know the other Excel teams as they practice the skills and exercises developed during this Unit. This will be the Excel students’ opportunity to show off progress with the Unit material and receive coaching from Scotti on any roadblocks that have appeared. Emma will also be on hand to answer veterinary questions. Engage students will be encouraged to bring questions from Unit 1 to the Zoom class; Scotti and Emma will answer each question and guide the transition to the next Unit. At the end of Unit 1, all students will be ready for the next three weeks of thoughtful and pup-empowering exercises.
2
sensory training
Skills/Behaviors Covered:
- How to proactively build a strong, safe base for your puppy to return to when situations feel uncertain or even unsafe
- Relaxed Default Down Behavior
- Generalizing the relaxed Default Down to encourage relaxation in a variety of environments
- Safe Base
In Unit 2, you will take what you learned from Unit 1 and use that knowledge to introduce puppies to novel stimuli, safely and proactively. Scotti will coach you on assessing environmental exposures and observing how changes in environmental conditions impact how a puppy perceives an experience. Scotti will teach you how to manage sensory input to increase a puppy's comfort around novel stimuli and to prevent trigger-stacking and the risk of flooding in bigger life events.
In this Unit, students will also begin to plan for a puppy “field trip!” You will select a potential location and learn to plan out the antecedent arrangements needed for a successful field trip. Scotti will also introduce the key concept of a learned “Safe Base,” a tool that helps your puppy cope and communicate when life becomes too unpredictable. A Safe Base helps puppies return to a state of learning after a stressful or startling event.
In the groups.io forum, Excel students will exchange ideas and receive coaching from Scotti on their video submissions for the week. Engage students are always encouraged to share their progress. All students will prepare questions for the Zoom class.
In the second virtual LIVE class, Excel students will demonstrate their progress with both the Unit 2 behaviors and the Unit 1 behaviors. Scotti will coach each Excel team individually and will help troubleshoot the work they have done for the week. Excel and Engage students will bring training questions to the class for Scotti or Emma to address live during the Zoom call.
3
field trips
Behaviors:
- Relaxed Default Down with high levels of contact variability,
- Default Stand
- Chin Stationing
- Safe Base (continued)
In Unit 3, Scotti will guide you through the next level of antecedent arrangements to prepare for field trips or other planned life events. This next level focuses on understanding and considering fixed/modal action patterns (FAPs) and making more deliberate use of your puppy's Safe Base. In this Unit, you will also learn to train behaviors that support your puppy's choice, control, and agency.
The learning history you develop in this Unit is vital, as puppies and young dogs encounter unexpected and unplanned variables their whole lives. Your set-up and planning at this stage increases the probability that the unexpected will be interesting and pleasurable for your dog—and reduces the risk that new and unexpected stimuli are perceived as threats by your dog. You will be building resiliency and optimism from the start.
Unit 3 skills also help you and your puppy prepare for both public appearances and cooperative care routines. Scotti will coach you to train three behaviors that build a solid base for a lifetime of consent-based cooperative care and public access; a Relaxed Default Down, a Default Stand, and a Chin Station, each adding high levels of contact variability. When tactile training is paired with relaxation and an ever-changing assortment of physical stimulation, vet visits become routine opportunities for a puppy.
Post video links of your training progress and cheer on your classmates with comments on the class forum! Scotti will offer feedback on Excel students’ videos so that everyone can learn from them.
In the LIVE Zoom class, Excel students will demonstrate their successes and receive further coaching from Scotti on the Unit 3 exercises. Scotti will also answer any questions from Excel and Engage students.
4
Event planning (unexpected events too!)
Behaviors/Skills:
- Utilizing a Safe Base in public so that your young learner can communicate their comfort levels to you
- Utilizing the Relaxed Default Down in public at inactive times
- Adding high levels of contact variability to the Default Stand for public greetings and cooperative care
- Adding high levels of contact variability to the Chin Station for cooperative care
Unit 4 is all about approaching novel experiences, using the tools from the first three Units to shift and adapt to the unexpected. Scotti will coach you on handling the unexpected and setting up your pup for success after unexpected events. Her recommendations include learning from experiences that did not go as planned, identifying areas that require additional antecedent arrangement or sensory training, and implementing changes that encourage a return to exploration and discovery. Scotti will also teach you how reinforcement delivery can encourage natural behaviors that support learning and coach you on some of the ways that she finds success, puppy after puppy and litter after litter!
In the final Zoom class meeting, Excel students will demonstrate their progress with the behaviors that have been built throughout the course, focusing on the behaviors from Unit 4. This will also be the last opportunity for Engage and Excel students to ask questions, receive coaching, and share experiences. You won’t want to miss it!
Remember, you retain access to the course content, including the class recordings, for one year after your enrollment date so that you and your dog can keep learning together well after this final LIVE class.
