as you may of read from my previous posts. i have a 15 week old GSD dog who lacks sociliasation skills due to a slow and shaky start with his previous , neglectfull owners.

he had up to now not really seemed to settle out on walks would not go off and play or try and interact with other dogs. and was very clingy.

i have been working on this over the past couple of days and last night i took him out to the park and i met up with some people who had a loverly GSD bitch. she is very gentle with other dogs and benji started to play with her.

its the first time i have seen him want to interact with another dog. maybe it remined him of mum who knows lol.
he was also watchign her retreive balls for her owner and seemed very intrested.

then today when i took him out with my little girl i threw the ball to my little girl and benji retreived it just liek that.

not wanting to think it was a fluke i threw the ball again and sure enougth benji retreived it.

and when we met other dogs today he actually seeked them out with a wagging tail and was askign to play.

could the GSD bitch last night really helped and taught him that much? or do you think it was possible it was going to happen today regardless and it was just a couincidence.

i used to train horses and one of the most effective ways i had for teachign scared and nervy youngsters was to lety them lern off my main well trained mare. i would ask my mare to do something and the youngsters woudl then learn from her.

is it possible for this to happen with dogs as well?

Oh yes, and dogs also learn by latent learning as well - they may try something unsuccesfully time and again, then when you take a break it seems to give them a chance to think about it, and when you come back and try again, they can do it :)