Avoiding Unlit Touchpads follows Engaging Consistently, and is designed to teach your dog that activating different touchpads can have different results. That is, triggering a lit touchpad will result in a food reward, while triggering an unlit touchpad will not. In this challenge, the Hub presents two lit touchpads that your dog can choose from to get food, and one unlit touchpad that they must learn to avoid.

Devo the mixed breed is already learning which touchpads to focus on in order to get a reward! He almost goes for the middle touchpad — maybe he got in the habit of pressing this one in the previous challenges. But, after taking a moment to weigh his options, Devo goes for the left touchpad. Success! 

Gaia the Bernese Mountain Dog is good at pressing the buttons, and boy does she like the middle one. Up until now, any touchpad worked, and so it was never a problem to stick with the one in the middle. However, now she'll start to get some trials “wrong”.  Many dogs will persist on the thing that previously worked.  In this challenge they'll have to learn that it’s worth trying something new.

Wait and watch. Halfway through the challenge, the rules become more strict.  If Gaia makes a mistake — say, by repeatedly hitting the middle, unlit touchpad — she will be locked out of puzzles that have the middle touchpad lit.  The Hub is nudging her to explore more buttons to get the reward. 

Your dog can move on to the next challenge, Learning the Lights, by selecting one of the correct touchpads almost every time, during more than one session with the Hub. On average, it takes dogs one day to two weeks to move on from this challenge.

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