Teaching the Boys Their Colors

[Naurthon]

I recently bought a small set of Lego blocks so I could start working with my boys, especially Dante, on learning colors and hopefully, eventually, counting.

Over the last two days I started out sitting on the floor where all the boys could see me with a big pile of mixed blocks in front of me. I randomly took a block from the pile, held it up and said what color it was, then put it into a separate pile with only that color of block. After two days of this, I heard Dante start saying "green," "black," "white" on his own so he was clearly learning the terms.

Today I started what was essentially a variation of target training. I put the boys, one at a time, on the floor with me, then put two blocks in front of them. One of the blocks was always yellow. I gave the cue "get the yellow one" and when they touched the yellow block, I clicked and rewarded. Sometimes the reward was a safflower seed, but often it was just letting the bird play with the block. If they picked up a block of the wrong color, I retrieved it from them and let them try again.

Maxwell, who doesn't seem to enjoy trick training much anyway, was pretty much non-plussed with the whole process and after two successes, refused to play any longer.

Dante did very well when working with just two colors of blocks. He clearly understood that the yellow one was the target, and more often that not went for that block, no matter what color the other block was. We started having trouble when I added a third block to the mix. He seemed to be "ooh! that one's new! me want!" and kept going for the new color rather than the yellow block. And he was none too pleased when Daddy tried to retrieve the new block he was so interested in playing with.

Surprisingly, Nikko did the best of the three. He had been watching me work with Dante, and immediately understood that the reward was given for targeting on the yellow block. I eventually had him choosing from six blocks of different colors, and he was choosing the right one about 3/4 of the time.

Once I get them reliably choosing the yellow block, I'll switch to a new target color. I hope to get them to target on whichever color block I tell them. I'm encouraged by the results so far. I'll keep you posted!

[cml]

This sounds really intriguing, and I think its great your smallest fella is the best at it so far ^^.
I would love to see a video of it when you've done some more practicing =).

[Naurthon]

I grabbed my phone to try to take some video when I was working with Nikko and he gave me the "what the HECK is THAT thing?" look and ran away across the room. I guess he's camera shy. LOL I have a camcorder on a tripod set up in their room, so they're used to seeing it. I'll try getting some shots with that.

[Naurthon]

I got Nikko to perform his color selection trick on camera today. I had to record several takes for several reasons - bad framing, Nikko staring at the camera saying "what the heck is that?", etc. In all, Nikko targeted 20 times while I was filming and only once picked the wrong block. Such a smart boy!

[brfussne]

Great video! Favorite part was definitely the end where Nikko kept picking up the yellow Lego as if saying "treat???" "treat now???!!" lol Even though you weren't even telling him to get the yellow one. Are you going to make a video for Dante, and Maxwell as well?

[cml]

That was awesome, I will have to try this with Stitch at some point! Great job teaching him that.

[Naurthon]

Maxwell can't be bothered to do tricks. It is all I can do to get him to turn around. He has some attitude.

I've been working with Dante on this, but for now, the novelty of playing with (chewing up) the blocks is more rewarding for him than the seed treat, so he's been more challenging to work with. I'll get there with him, eventually. He gets more excited with the Legos than with any other kind of foot toy I've given him. I think it is because there are so many edges. It gives him a lot of explore. If nothing else, I've discovered a new toy that he really likes.

I had Nikko on my hand while I was playing the video yesterday and he got very animated and started leaning toward my computer screen, so I moved him close enough that he could reach the screen, and he actually started targeting the yellow block ON THE SCREEN! It was very cute! Unfortunately, I didn't have any seeds to reward him with though. He's got this trick down!

[nagelsan]

Oh my god, thats absolutely great.
Because of a lot of things, i havent been able to practise with my birds and i started again this week.
But this is geat, i think it will be the next thing to do with my senegal parrot, because she is very clever, but a bit lazy now.
Keep up the good work!
I hope to see an other video soon, while picking all the colors!

[rosella]

WOW, im impressed at the great progress. this trick can lend itself to many future tricks like numbers and you might even be able to expand to different colored objects. this trick never even occured to me. cant wait to see a video of nikko counting every color.
keep up the amazing work!!!

[liz]

Impressive. I watch a video of a grey doing that but none other. Good work.