BiDirectionality

You could get really creative and target away from you using a helper or a stationary target, but, realistically you need to teach yielding like yielding gets taught... pressure to move away, even if its just a wagging finger, then release, or release plus reward.

I teach my horses to yield with positive reinforcement more than negative reinforcement (release). Here is how....

Decide what the cue is that makes intuitive sense to you. For me, it is a combination verbal and hand signal. For example, I want the hip to move away. I use the term "around" to mean turn by moving your back legs, or I could use "hips away", then my hand signal is a waving hand pushing toward the hip. The first time the animal even leans away, bridge and reward. It won't be long before the animal will swing it's hips around. To get the animal to move toward me, my cues are the v-sign target and the verbal cue "target hips".

I have found that moving the hips away on command is one of the best things I can do to maintain control of my animal when things get dicey, so we spend a lot of time on this issue. If I can get them to face me, I can control panic. I want that to be second nature to them. The targeting of the hips to move toward me is not something I want them to feel so good about since it is the prelude to a kick. Not that my animals kick at me, but hips swinging around makes me a tish nervous, especially if I am not directing it.



The reason I am duplicating the commands "around" and "hips away" is that I am teaching the command "away". She originally learned it as "around", but teaching her "nose away", "shoulder away", and "away" in general is going to help her tendency to be pushy with me.