Improvement!
Maxwell was noticeably more relaxed as we went through the first set of exercises again. He started in a sit, not popping up even once. About a third of the way through the sequence he slid into a half-floppy down. While his face was still very alert, he let his rear legs slide out to one side with loose muscles.
He was no longer hyper-alert and scanning the room, either, though he was still more in tune with his surroundings than I'd prefer. For example, Sadie shifting in her crate made him whip his head around to look. Overall, his handler focus was more consistent, with long periods of eye contact.
He clearly still thinks that, when I count aloud, there must be something he's supposed to be doing. His weight shifts forward (without breaking the down), his mouth closes part way, his ears come forward, and the quality of the eye contact changes. It's hard to explain that last bit... His relaxed eye contact is nose pointed at my face, eyes soft and meeting mine. When I count aloud, his nose drops slightly, his eyes widen a tiny bit, and he ends up almost looking up at me... Like a schoolmarm looking over her glasses.
For now I'm letting him maintain position between exercises. I start each with "wait" and end with "yes!" and kibble. I am not using a no-reward-marker.
I did try to work with Sadie again. She is just far too excited by food, though. Every muscle in her body becomes ready to LEAP forward at the first hint of offered kibble. She even tried to snatch it from me! So instead of the protocol, we did some remedial control work. We played It's Yer Choice, and my hand got thoroughly slobbered while she tried to get at the kibble. She quickly progressed to food in my open palm right next to her head, with barely a twitch towards it. Not sure what I can use to get her to relax around food, since there isn't much that's lower value than kibble while still being edible!
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