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In Touch: A new method of training guide dogs

30/04/2019

A new method of training guide dogs

BBC Radio 4 - In Touch, A new method of training guide dogs

Training of Guide Dogs and memories of playing the Notre Dame organ.

Changes to the way in which guide dogs are trained and a blind organist shares his recollections of playing the Grand Orgue at Notre Dame.

Two guide dog trainers from the Liverpool Guide Dogs Centre, Nina Swindells and Jan Johnston, tell presenter Lee Kumutat about Positive Reinforcement Training, which the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association is in the process of introducing across its twenty training schools.

Lee also speaks to David Grice, GDBA’s Head of Canine Behaviour and Training, about the rationale for the new methodology. 

Finally, we hear from visually impaired organist, David Aprahamian Liddle. In 2002, David got the opportunity to play the organ at Notre Dame Cathedral. David tells us about how he made a braille chart to remember the organ’s layout, the rehearsal and how he felt when he had finished his recital.

Presenter: Lee Kumutat 
Producer: Tom Walker

Photo description: Presenter Lee Kumutat stands in between Guide Dogs trainers Nina Swindells and Jan Johnston, and guide dogs Farley and Pepper. They are in front of the parcours outside the Guide Dogs training centre in Liverpool on a sunny day.

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