Can experienced riders give me some advice on riding lesson situation

[Ginandcolic]

Hello all,

I would appreciate some advice from experienced riders on some situations I've encountered at a riding school. Quick background: I used to ride a lot in my teens / early twenties then stopped so I am very rusty (at best). My daughter (10 yo) started riding last summer and has regular one to one lessons - I will join in occasionally but very much just fit in with what she's doing.

About six months ago, DD was in a lesson riding a pony she knows well - he's a really good pony and tries hard to do what he's asked. The only time she had ever had trouble before was when she was learning the right way of asking for things eg he didn't realise she wanted him to canter because she hadn't got the signals quite right.

In the lesson in question, the instructor had five trotting poles on the ground very close together - if I was walking over them, I would only need one step between them. I've always seen them much more spread out (eg 3 pony paces between them). The pony is about 14hh.

The pony tried to walk over them but ended up knocking into them and getting flustered. He was raising his hooves so not dragging them but just seemed to get confused by how to walk over them all.

He then refused to go over them again (which I kind of understood given he'd had a difficult time with them before) and DD was uncomfortable trying to make him as he'd never refused to do anything before so she didn't want to push him.

DD got quite upset at the instructor trying to make her make the pony go over the poles again and I was worried that the stress wasn't doing anyone any good. I have never commented / intervened in one of DD's lessons before but I suggested to the instructor that things were getting a bit stressful so maybe they could end the lesson there or move on to something else.

I've also experienced something similar where I've been told to whip the horse I was riding to get him to do something he obviously was uncomfortable doing - I was being asked to go over a combination of jumps where I felt one of the angles was too sharp for him as he is quite big (tall and heavy set). Again, he had never refused to do anything before so he's not a stubborn horse who needs a strong hand.

I wasn't happy doing it so I said I'd rather just end the lesson or just go straight to a cool down (we were almost at the end anyway).

At no point did I suggest not paying the full price for the lessons and I was very happy to do so.

Can I ask for thoughts? Am I being a bit too precious and DD and I should just have made our pony / horse do what we were asking? I don't know if I am being a bit of a wuss and should have pushed through.

Thanks all!

To be honest having trotting poles that close together is the normal way of using them so I'd be surprised about a riding school pony finding that problematic to be honest but without being there it's hard to say why that might have been.

Nothing wrong with suggesting they come back to it another time in my view, when I helped at a riding school as a kid one of us would have had that pony out schooling over poles next time they were due to be ridden, though, just to see.

Thanks Heyha I've only seen trotting poles much more spaced out so that's v helpful to know that my experience is not typical!

That narrow striding is normal for balanced, schooled horses. The thing is if a horse is never made to do anything it doesn’t like, you will end up with a stubborn, lazy horse. It’s a bit like a child- sometimes they have to work through things they find hard or they have no resilience.

it depends on how the instructor asked you/the horse to work through the problem.

How close were they? If you put one foot in front of the other (toe touching heel) then they should be 4-5 of your feet depending on stride length and the size of your feet obviously!
If they were at that distance then the pony should be fine trotting/walking over them. If the pony was being a bit stubborn then it is better to push them to do it or they will start taking the piss in other areas.
Though this is only if the conditions were correct -no back pain,poles too close together etc…

The instructor could have thought of another way to use the poles to get the result they wanted from dd and pony depending on what the point of it was. If they get frustrated then she's less likely to give the pony clear aids. If she wasnt able to ride him over the poles with a good consistent trot, or she didn't understand the point of what she was doing then the exercise may have been too advanced for her so a good instructor would have moved on anyway.

The argument about not letting a pony take the piss is a common one but that depends on you having a child on board that's confident to push the pony on. If she's not confident to do that then it's better to take a step back and build her confidence in ways that don't rely on her having to have a confrontation with the pony. The traditional way to get the pony through that exercise with a beginner on board would involve a whip, in my experience of riding schools. Which teaches the child nothing except that it's ok to hit a horse that won't do what you want, and does nothing to address why the pony didn't understand what was being asked of him.

I would normally have them double spaced in case they canter but going over poles shouldn't be an issue. I would usually start with one and work up to three if pony or rider were unsure. It would be unusual for a pony to refuse in walk. I hope you get things back on track. I try to tell riders they are training their pony all the time so if they cut the corner every time,vthat is what you are training them to do, or if you let them jog before walking, you are training them that is ok. So you need to be consistent and if they learn you stop doing something if they get it wrong, you have also taught them that is ok.

I feel It's always better to go back a stage than force a confrontation imo, either when you're schooling a horse or teaching a rider. So you're still moving and doing something (so the horse doesn't learn that refusal means everything stops and then refuse to do anything) but you're also not creating a bad experience by pushing the issue.

In the situations you've described I would expect poles removed, even going back to starting with one and then adding them back in gradually as confidence grows, or dropping the refused fence and then building back up. And then out of lesson time an experienced and strong rider trying the exercises to work out what the problem is. When time is limited though because your lesson is coming to an end that can be an issue.

The pole spacing doesn't sound like an issue as in they were wrongly spaced, rather the horse lacking confidence to do it and not getting that confidence from the rider (not a criticism of your DD) and some horses need a lot of persuasion to attempt something they've got 'wrong' again, my horse was like this, he'd jump 1m40 for fun, but if he got it wrong and had an issue, he'd sometimes refuse to go anywhere near the fence itself or even the wings of the jump, rather than fight it out I'd work around the jump, aiming to get him through the wings and over a small fence then rebuild from that - he'd happily go over a larger fence that he hadn't had an issue with though in the same session, just not anywhere near that one.

The poles were definitely not 4 to 5 lengths of my feet apart (I'm a shoe size 5.5 so not huge!) I wonder if maybe they'd drifted too close together and that's why the pony got a bit confused

I was taught to ride without using a whip so I'm a bit uncomfortable with how readily they seem to be used ... but I'm conscious that could just be my very outdated experience! I really got the sense that the pony just didn't get it / was very nervous rather than being stubborn

Thanks, that's an interesting point about DD's pony and my horse being put off by having gotten something "wrong" ... I do think DD and I both feel uncomfortable with confrontation and whipping doesn't sit well with us so we probably weren't helping as we were maybe being too soft. I genuinely think the issue was not stubbornness though as the pony and horse had been doing some great work with us beforehand. They had also both responded well to us getting them not to cut corners, to turn more crisply into changing the rein etc so it's not like they just did whatever we asked IYSWIM!

If you're paying for a lesson but overiding what your instructor is telling you then I'd see it as a waste of money. To progress there will be times when your daughter and yourself feel uncomfortable but that is what learning is about and I would hope your instructor knows the ponies and their capabilities if they are school ponies.

If this comment comes across as bitch I honestly don't mean it too, sometimes it's hard to read a persons tone in text rather than conversation. I just mean if you are not comfortable then the pony won't perform at it's best, the instructor will become wary of asking you to do things and you're money will be wasted along with any enjoyment for yourself and your daughter which is what it's all about.

Like others say it doesn't sound like a particularly unusual exercise and horses will knock poles or stand on them all the time so I don't see that as a reason to stop the whole lesson (mine despite being an excellent jumper has no respect at all for poles on the ground and will trip and nearly faceplant if not made to pay attention, if I stopped every time he does this I'd never ride at all!). It does sound like they were intended as trot poles though, not set up to go through at walk so that's maybe why the confusion, because of the way the horse places his legs diagonally at the trot he's more easily able to 'collect' and take shorter, higher trot steps than at any of the other paces which is what those short poles are helping them to do.

Obviously without being there on either occasion it's hard to tell how upset both the horse and rider really were, but in general I do think riding like all sports requires a certain level of being prepared to push through difficulties and being OK with repeatedly failing and trying again, the difference being that obviously in riding you're making that decision for both yourself and your horse and as well as motivating yourself to keep going, you have to persuade the horse as well which IMO is why riding is one of the best sports for leadership skills and resilience (what in the good old days we used to call 'character building'), I suppose though it does require you to be more robust and confident either in your own decision making or in trusting what your teacher says (as if you really aren't sure about something that will tend to transmit to the horse who will be even less inclined to do the thing than before).

For what it's worth I don't think either of the exercises you describe (trot poles spaced with one step between each and presumably relatively small jump on a tight angle) should have been particularly difficult for an average riding school horse, harder work than just walking/trotting/jumping in a straight line for sure, but certainly not to the level of causing distress unless they were in some way lame or sore already in which case certainly you shouldn't have been riding them at all. So I can certainly sympathise with the instructors feeling that you/DD should have not allowed the horse to make the decision to simply say no - that's a dangerous path to take with horses, I know you describe both as kind, obliging types but they will only stay that way with consistent training, the cornerstone of which is that humans are the leaders and the horses do as they are told - this isn't just so we cruel horrible humans can do whatever we want, it's to keep what at the end of the day is a large, heavy, easily scared flight animal safe and under control. Of course as a sympathetic rider you have to ensure the horse understands what you are asking of them (like with your DD learning to canter) and that the question you are asking isn't one they're incapable of answering, but once you start simply allowing them to overrule you they can pretty quickly decide that every instruction from 'go in that direction' to 'stop when I use the reins' to 'follow me when I lead you to your stable' is also over-rideable and this has obvious problems!

I do admire that you were able to assert yourself in both situations and obviously you are the paying customer and only riding for fun so if you honestly aren't happy or feel safe then of course stop, but I am getting a sense of distrust of your instructor and as though she doesn't have your/your horse's best interests at heart (e.g. you say you were told to 'whip' a horse, learning to use a crop correctly and so it doesn't hurt the horse is very important as a beginner, if you feel you are being told to be unduly rough or cruel then how can you trust that teacher at all?), I think if that's the case I wouldn't want to be taking lessons from this person, like I say trust in your teacher in absolutely fundamental to learning well and there are excellent teachers out there, absolutely dire ones and lots in between. Perhaps it's time to explore a different instructor, perhaps with better communication/strategies about what to do when it's all going a bit wrong? Horse people perhaps often aren't the best at communicating with humans, and certainly some have a more 'just get on with it' attitude whereas others are more about explaining and talking things through, different styles suit different people, maybe you and DD are more the latter?

Her money will be wasted faster if dd is forced to do things or ride in a way that she's not comfortable with. If she's being forced to bully a pony to make him go over the poles then she's not learning how to work with the horse. I think some horse people get so focused on this idea that the horse must do what he's told, whether there's a reason why he's saying no or not, and that's where this idea of a pony is pissing about comes from. Why is it so vital that this little girl who is a beginner, and pony go over these poles that someone has arbitrarily decided they must, even though the pony and girl are both getting upset?

I don't ride any more but have ridden for years and so many times as a child and teenager, the answer to not being able to get the pony to do something was "make him do it". Whatever it takes, make him. Which usually involved kicking and hitting. Not until i was 30 odd did i start to discover that there's a gentler way to ride. Not til i was working with the horse and trying to work out why he or i were uncomfortable and fixing that first did i really feel like i could call myself a horsewoman. And the results were so much better. I could cry for the amount of times i was bullied into bullying a horse to make him do something that really didn't need to be done. If id been taught proper aids, and how to ask the horse nicely instead of telling him id have got much better, much faster. Quite often i did end up in tears at the end of lessons, stressed and frustrated. Ending up fighting a horse does not advance someones riding skills and if the pony has an issue where he's reluctant to go over poles, then a more advanced rider can work on that after the lesson. Your dd isn't at the stage after less than a year to try and fix or train a pony. She's still learning. The lessons are for her benefit.

If the ethos at her school is whips and kicking (and don't get me wrong whips have their place as an aid but not for hitting) then id suggest finding somewhere that practices gentle horsemanship.

Thanks everyone for taking the time to respond and giving me the benefit of your experience.

I think you've helped me crystallise some thoughts. I absolutely felt like DD and I were being told do things which felt like bullying and I think this has undermined my trust in the instructor - rightly or wrongly.

We are both riding for fun - neither of us wants to make a career out of this nor do we want to compete (I used to compete a lot so I'm capable of it but it's just not where we are right now). I know that gaining experience and confidence in working with a horse to do what we want is important - and we have been doing that - but I felt the two instances I described were no longer about partnership or leadership and more about a power struggle.

I also think, given the point above about the spacing of the poles, they were too close together. The angle of the jump is a bit harder to describe as I don't have a photo and it could be that the horse was tired, lazy or just not feeling it that day but he had cleared some relatively robust jumps before and he was just unhappy with the angle of the turn. He may have had legitimate reasons, or my just have been ready to stop but I did not think he was being deliberately difficult - although I'm not a horse psychic so hard to say!

I do think, given everyone's comments, that this may not be the instructor for us though regardless of the rights and wrongs.

Soultrader what you are describing very much captures how I was taught to ride so I'm finding the reliance on whips and massive kicks a bit distressing. I don't want to hold DD back though if that's just how things are now.

Thanks again to everyone for your thoughts.

Id look for another place to ride.

Id say whips and kicks are very much old school and if you were taught to ride gently years ago that was probably the exception. The concept of gentle horsemanship is quite new and not well understood at traditional riding schools where you must make the horse do as he's told at all costs.

Jumping fences with tricky approaches for a child who had only been riding a few months at the time doesn't sound ideal to me in any case. Especially as you mention she isn't secure in her canter aids - groundwork needs to be there before she can jump other how can she possibly help the pony do his work over the jumps. No criticism of your dd intended. There will be another school out there who will be more aligned to the way you want your dd taught.

Thanks Soultrader I learnt in a different country so I'd assumed that what I've seen recently is a UK thing! Where I learnt, they were much more about being in tune with your horse - not that you couldn't ride strongly when needed but that you should use your voice, weight and leg position / squeezing (in that order to see what worked) with kicking and whipping not really featuring

If you're paying for a lesson but overiding what your instructor is telling you then I'd see it as a waste of money. To progress there will be times when your daughter and yourself feel uncomfortable but that is what learning is about and I would hope your instructor knows the ponies and their capabilities if they are school ponies.

The problem with saying you will inevitably feel uncomfortable with learning is that that is how we end up with Olympic medallists whipping horses with a tree branch and nobody questioning it until years later. You can find learning challenging and exhilarating but I think if you find it uncomfortable and sense it might be wrong, you should listen to that. For a long time now we've told horses they must and they should. We've put stronger riders on and said 'see they can do it' rather than acknowledge that the horse is still in pain but just more scared of the stronger rider.

I'd go elsewhere OP. Look for somewhere more horse-centred. Horses need clarity and firm boundaries, yes. But they also need someone to understand why it is they sometimes say 'no.' And it's not often that they're taking the piss. They're incredibly genuine animals.

My horsey experience is mainly in Austria/Germany/the Netherlands so I don't know where you're from originally but I would say certainly learning to ride in the UK is a different experience to continental Europe, I wouldn't say one is about 'dominance' of the horse and the other is 'gentle' per se, but certainly IMO in (most of) Europe there is a much greater emphasis on the rider's positioning, balance and correct use of aids than in the average UK riding school. In general in Europe they will keep beginners on the lunge and in the slow gaits for a lot longer, until the seat is truly developed and the aids very effective, whereas in the UK we don't use the lunge much (preferring to lead from the head) and we want kids riding independently and moving up to the faster gaits and trot poles and jumping ASAP. I don't think in the UK we particularly want people to be kicking and using the whip more than in Europe as such (riders absolutely do carry and use whips/crops in Europe as well and you'll see some kicking even from high level competition riders when needed!) but it's more a corollary that in the UK we don't wait until the leg aids are perfect before we let people move on to more 'exciting' stuff, because of this the riding school horses get desensitised to more subtle instructions and you absolutely need an escalation route to get them to respond - the principles 100% should be the same, you should always, always be aiming for the horse to respond to the subtlest pressure possible rather than going straight in at 100% every time, so if you/DD are being taught to go straight for a kick/tap with the whip without doing a squeeze first then that's incorrect teaching as it's a correction method rather than an aid in itself.

Basically I can see the merits of both systems but personally I probably do prefer the UK way, it doesn't look as pretty and perhaps it's more open to poor practice creeping in but I don't think it really does the horses any harm and learning through the medium of hacking, games, jumping etc is certainly more engaging for both horse and rider than lots and lots of slow walking in circles... if you do want to be taught more 'continental' style you will probably need to look for a bigger and likely more expensive riding school, European style tends to require intensive private lessons at least initially (can't use a lunge in a group session) and it also requires more carefully schooled horses to be both highly responsive and also safe, which means they need more input/training from the instructor/owner and probably to do fewer lessons per day than a more 'average' UK riding school pony. If you can you may be interested in learning from a classical dressage instructor, again I wouldn't say it's 'gentle' as such but certainly more interested and careful about correct aids and subtlety rather than can you jump X high or go Y fast as a measure of success....

Unfortunately I was taught to ride using the harder methods, and as a child although it sat badly, I didn't have a frame of reference.

I learned different approaches and say I'm somewhere in the middle, horses are big, heavy animals and it's essential to have their cooperation to make sure everyone is safe, and sometimes that means gaining attention or deterring unsafe behaviour, I've used methods from wiggling or nudging with my legs, a sharp voice, driving forward strongly with my seat, to a tap on the shoulder or behind the leg with a stick.

Today it might be refusing to go over a set of trotting poles, but tomorrow it might be refusing to move away from the middle of the road putting everyone in danger, so it's important to learn to establish how to gain attention and cooperation in difficult and different circumstances so you can deal with these situations as they arise.
My preferred method is to go back to the comfort zone and move forward again slowly, so that confidence is built and the 'right' thing becomes easier than the 'wrong' thing. It takes time and for someone who's not patient or wants instant results, it's not the ideal solution. I'd rather it took me 6 sessions to achieve something and the horse and rider are comfortable and happy than 1, and the horse and rider be upset - you don't really have cooperation there.

My horse needs firm boundaries, he will take advantage of any slip in those boundaries, whether that be when he was under saddle or in hand/being around him, he knows where he stands.
It's harder with riding school horses, they're ridden by people with different styles and ability and you don't know what's happened between your last ride and this one, so those boundaries are harder to establish and keep and in order to progress, you do need to be outside your comfort zone at some point.

Ultimately though if you're not happy with the methods used in your lessons, you should look for somewhere else or another instructor that teaches in line with the way you want to learn, but as already mentioned, gaining rather than forcing cooperation takes longer and progress is slower.

Thanks WisherWood yes I think I will look elsewhere. I really didn't feel that the pony or horse in question were being tricky for the sake of it and my DD was genuinely distressed at being told to whip the pony who had been very responsive and tried his best up until that point.

That's a really interesting point about escalating the scale of "strong" riders until the horse does what it's told.

I think it's just not the right place for us to ride

I don't want an animal to be scared, uncomfortable or distressed so I can have a fun afternoon. There's no pleasure in it for me, or my DD, to have that dynamic with well mannered horses. I'm sure there were no genuine welfare concerns but it felt wrong and for both DD and I to have that feeling, I don't think we can trust the instructor / stable again ... plus we'll be total PITAs for the instructor if we're second guessing her all the time

Maverickess yes that's a good point about going back to the comfort zone. I'm not that bothered about how quickly we progress tbh as we're not aiming to be professionals and I think I would have been happier with dropping back down to something everyone (including the horses) were happier with and then building up to the jump / poles again rather than just trying to push through with brute force

Maxelly thank you, that's really interesting. Yes I learnt on the continent and I was taught by dressage instructors on horses who were trained in dressage as well as XC and puissance.

I was told off by the instructor in the UK for squeezing before kicking so it's interesting that you say it's not a standard UK approach to go straight for the kick.

Interestingly, DD and I rode recently on holiday with an instructor who was much more aligned to the way I learnt and it was way more enjoyable and relaxed. DD's confidence grew so much.

This thread has really clarified for me that we need to ride elsewhere ... regardless of rights, wrongs or culture clashes, this is not the stables for us!

I think this is a bit of a case of 6 and 2 3s,
I don’t carry a stick when riding but RS ponies quickly learn every trick in the book and regardless of whether you want to compete or not, the horse learning it can evade everything you ask of it is not great and if you had your own, could swiftly become nappy or worse…

i don’t agree with leathering them for not helping out a riders mistake but equally neither task sounds hard and while I hate a rough rider I also hate watching ineffectual riders who are a bit wet letting their horses get away with murder as I’ve ended up reschooling so many horses who’ve learnt horrid habits or are really nervous and unsure of the world from it as their rider NEVER pushes them though anything