Each of us memorizes material in a different way. Knowing your learning style is helpful. Try a number of memorization styles in each of these categories and see what works.

Although living away from the hub of equine activity can be a challenge, it is possible to map out a plan to suit your needs. The inconvenience and cost of travel to shows and training help is, no doubt, discouraging. Here are some suggestions that have worked for long distance clients of mine and ideas from amateur competitors.

It is a real asset for a young person to have a parent who is so supportive of their riding. Conflicts can be kept to a minimum if you’re careful to keep your role separate from the coach. (Failing to do so is sure to result in: “Well I’d like to see you do it, if you think it’s so easy!”).

Seated at the head of the quiet classroom, I watched the students in the classes I teach write their Equine Behaviour and Equine Business final exams, noting the happy faces of smug recognition (“Yes, I studied that!”) and the winces (“Rats, I’d hoped that material wouldn’t be on the test”). I empathize with them. I know what it’s like to sit in the “test seat” – as a student in university and, more recently, writing judging exams. And as a competitive rider, every horse show is a test.

A rider can communicate confidence with her eyes and, of course, can pilot her horse much more effectively when she uses her eyes correctly. The eyes plan the destination and often the next stride of the horse.

Q: My daughter has been taking riding lessons for some time now and at each lesson I hear the trainer remind her about her position – heels down, thumbs up, shoulders back, etc. When I asked my daughter the reasons for such attention to a rider’s position, she really couldn’t tell me more than “that’s just the way you do it.” Can you help this horsey mom understand?

By Lindsay Grice - Falling off hurts! It can shake a rider’s confidence so much that many choose to abandon riding altogether, and it can scare their horse, too.

By Lindsay Grice - Riding should not be an aerobic workout like riding an exercise bike. Self-carriage is when a horse maintains his pace, straightness, and frame or outline when you lighten up on your aids. You’re not really riding until you take the training wheels off!

By Lindsay Grice - Cribbing is a stereotypy, similar to obsessive compulsive behaviour in humans. A stereotypy is a repetitive behaviour that serves no practical purpose but makes your horse feel better by releasing brain chemicals. Research shows that, while initially begun in response to stress (physiological or environmental), cribbing often continues as an everyday habit, even without the stressful trigger.