Trainer forcing rein-back

From: Stephanie

Hi Jessica!

My trainer is 19 years old, and she plan to get certified soon. She boards her horse at the barn where I lease my pony. Her horse is a fancy gelding, 6 years old.

Her gelding is very nice, but he has a past with bad trainers who scared him into flying lead changes, so he must have a gentle and patient rider that smooths out the wrinkles good. She rides him very well, but occasionally on a bad day I have seen him buck or rear, and back up unwillingly. I have always been taught to send a horse forwards (but not fast) when they buck or back up angrily, but she smacks him with her crop and yanks him backwards. She will also back up horses (not just her own) if they are zooming along unbalanced. Although I agree that this should be corrected, I just don't think that backing is the right thing. I notice that it creates resistances, and the horses seem to connect the rein-back with bad things, because it is tense and it only happens when they do something wrong.

She also will sometimes asks me to back up during a lesson, if things are not going very well. I really like her as an instructor and a person, but I just think this type of training creates a hole.

And also, if it is confirmed that this type of training is incorrect, how do I tell her? I don't want to offend her, and since I am 5 years younger than her, I don't want her to think that I am being rude or something like that. I also tend to be a bit shy when it comes to things like this.

Thank you very much for your help! Stephanie

I know that it can be difficult to say "NO" to someone who is older than you, and it is difficult to say "NO" to any instructor, even one your own age or younger. But you need to begin saying "NO" now - and more than that, you need to look around for a different instructor. When you're very young, it's all too easy to admire a self-confident, aggressive rider who is somewhat older than you and knows (or thinks she knows) a great deal more than you do. But in this case, your admiration for this person is going to harm your horse. The young girl you've described may call herself an instructor, but based on your descriptions of her actions, it's clear that she has nothing useful to teach you. Find someone qualified, competent, and kind NOW, as soon as you possibly can, before your horse sustains permanent damage.

There are excellent reasons for NOT using rein-back as a punishment.

Physical: Pulling a horse back by the reins isn't acceptable at any time, in any form of riding. It's not training, and it's a particularly brutal form of punishment. A horse that is tense and fearful cannot drop its head, raise its back, and move smoothly backwards on diagonal pairs - instead, it will shuffle backwards with its jaw, neck, and back tense, putting great strain on its hocks. There are barns where such "training" is popular, and the horses invariably develop hock problems as a result - but since the horses are viewed as expendable, it's not considered to be a problem. I suspect that YOU don't view YOUR horse as expendable.

Psychological: Backing is not easy for horses and does not come naturally to horses. If they are well-taught and not overstressed physically or psychologically, they can learn to back smoothly and obediently, and can even learn to enjoy it. But a rein-back should be nothing more and nothing less than one more movement that the horse performs, easily and with full understanding, because the rider (a) asks for it correctly (clearly and gently), (b) asks at a moment when the horse is in a position to perform the rein-back, (c) rewards and reassures the horse. The reward and reassurance will, at first, need to come as the horse takes each step back. Later, the rider will be able to ask for one, two, three, or more steps without the horse becoming excited or worried.

What it says about the person who does it: The fact that your instructor is not yet certified is not so important as the fact that she is clearly unqualified to teach riding or train horses. Good instructors have knowledge, experience, teaching ability, and compassion for the horse. She may be a ribbon-winning performer in the show ring, and it's quite possible that she has had hundreds of lessons, but she should not be teaching. She obviously does not have the experience - and by that I mean CORRECT experience - even if she's been riding since she was nine years old, ten years of INCORRECT experience don't make a good teacher... and neither would fifty or a hundred years. When horses express pain or anxiety, she punishes them, which is inappropriate. When horses become unbalanced, she punishes them - again, this is inappropriate. And not only does she punish them, but she does so in the most dangerous, damaging way possible. Yanking the reins is never correct, and when a horse is rearing, yanking it in the mouth and hitting it with a whip is quite likely to cause it to rear higher and fall over backwards. You say that her horse has been hurt before, and needs a gentle and patient rider - I agree, and I hope that someday he gets one.

If backing is used as a punishment, then each time the horse is asked to step backwards, it will believe that it is being punished, and will become confused, angry, or sullen.

Protect your horse and yourself. When "training" methods like these are emplyed, horses become painful, damaged, and eventually dangerous - or too obviously lame to ride. Don't let any of these things happen to your horse. Talk to your parents, who surely don't want to see your horse - or you! - get hurt. They are also unlikely to want to continue paying good money for bad instruction, once they understand that this IS bad instruction.

Look for an instructor with knowledge, experience, and teaching skills.

Look for an instructor who emphasizes safety.

There are several programs that certify instructors in the USA. http://www.riding-instructor.com is a good place to begin your search - it's the website for the American Riding Instructor Association. Just reading what's necessary to qualify at each level will give you some idea of what you should look for in an instructor. Since not everyone on this mailing list has full web access, I'm going to include some information from the site.

Here - directly from the site - are the requirements for level I (Instructor in Training), Level II (Instructor of Beginner through Intermediate), and Level III (Instructor of Beginner through Advanced).

The ARICP offers Certification at three levels based upon the age and experience level of the instructor:

Level I - (Instructor in Training) Requirements
Minimum age: 18 years; no minimum teaching experience required.
Must pass all 4 general written tests with an averaged score of 80 or 
above. Specialty test scores must be 80 or above.
No video tape of instruction is required.
This instructor has a good foundation as a horseman, but because of age or 
limited teaching experience does not qualify for Level II. The ARICP is 
recognizing a foundation and a desire to become a certified instructor. 
Upon reaching 21 years of age, and with 3 years of teaching experience, 
this instructor may challenge the Level II certification. At that time, 
the candidate must provide a video tape and must re-take the written 
exams. The candidate with a Level I certification receives a substantial 
discount (50%) when returning to take the program for full certification.

Level II - Instructor of Beginner through Intermediate
Requirements
Minimum age: 21 years; minimum of 3 years of teaching experience.
Must pass all general exams with an averaged overall score of 85 or above, 
and all specialty exams with a score of 85 or above.
Must pass video tape evaluation for Level II.
Has his/her own personal philosophy of riding instruction.
Clearly knows personal strengths and weaknesses.
Has thorough knowledge of specialty taught.
Has understanding of safety procedures, and uses them.
Has basic knowledge of horses and their care. Has awareness of styles of 
riding other than own specialty.
Rides/has ridden at intermediate level or better.
Can teach beginner through intermediate students in a competent manner.
Has general knowledge of how horse and rider interact.
Understands psychology of the rider.
This instructor enjoys teaching beginners and has the patience for the 
repetition necessary to develop new skills. The instructor does not rush 
his students or push them ahead of their physical ability, but allows time 
to form a solid riding foundation. A certified instructor is training a 
student to be a horseman, not just a rider. He is concerned with training 
his students to use proper safety practices and to continue using them as 
they develop in riding proficiency.

Level III - Instructor of Beginner through Advanced Requirements
Minimum age: 25 years; minimum of 6 years teaching experience.
Must pass all exams with scores of 90 or above on each.
Must pass video tape evaluation for Level III.
Is an excellent communicator.
Has an outstanding personal philosophy of instruction.
Clearly knows his own personal strengths and weaknesses.
Has a thorough knowledge of specialty taught.
Has an understanding of safety procedures, and uses them.
Has a thorough knowledge of horses and their care.
Rides (or has ridden) at an advanced level.
Has advanced knowledge of training horses.
Knows the elements of styles of riding other than his own specialty.
Understands the psychology of the horse.
Has participated in competition, if competition is an integral part of the 
style taught.
Has knowledge of the practical application of stable management and horse 
care.

You'll notice that Level II and Level III aren't even options for someone who is only 19 - your current instructor would need to qualify as a Level I instructor by passing all of her written exams and meeting the standards as described above, and THEN would be permitted to return when she is 21, to take the Level II exam.

This isn't the only program that certifies instructors in the States, but it is a very good program, a bit more strict and demanding than some, but that's all for the good of the students - and the horses. As I've said before, NO certification program can guarantee that you'll have a perfect personality match with an instructor, but at least you will know that highly qualified professionals have evaluated these instructors and found them to meet the standards for their level of teaching. That means that, at the very least, you can be sure that they have been tested and have proven their knowledge, safety practices, professionalism, integrity, and teaching skills.

Your present instructor is demonstrating quite different qualities: ignorance, impatience, and violence. I know that I say this often, but I'll say it again: show ribbons are NOT an indication of knowledge or teaching skills.

Many young riders have learned enough to do well in the show ring, but don't necessarily know anything other than what they have been taught by their instructor(s). They may know how to do various things with THEIR horse - and whether or not those things are correct, kind, or even really suitable, they naturally want to apply the few things they know across the board, to every situation, every horse, and every rider. That doesn't usually help anyone, and it can be very dangerous. Without a good foundation of knowledge and experience, without some theory to go with the practice, riders tend to try to ride every horse in exactly the same way, and if they decide to go out and "teach" other riders, they "see" only what they can recognize from their own, limited experience and understanding, and their "solutions" to problems are nothing more than the bits and pieces of things they remember being told by someone else. They simply haven't had enough experience or theory or thought to develop good judgement - YET. They can certainly acquire those things, provided they make LEARNING their priority... but many do not, and some riders with limited experience, a bad attitude, and poor judgement decide that instead of developing their own skills, they can skip all of those steps (talk about "holes in someone's training!) and hang up a sign advertising their services as riding instructors.

This is not strictly an age-related problem, either. There are equally ignorant, impatient, abusive older riders and instructors, and there are also some nineteen-year-old girls who are quite capable of giving basic riding instruction under supervision. If THIS girl were being supervised by a competent, experienced instructor, she would not be punishing horses in this way. In fact, she would not be thinking in terms of PUNISHING horses at all - she would be thinking in terms of improving her communication with them. When all of the horses ridden by a specific rider display behaviour problems such as rearing, bucking, or "backing up angrily", in fact when horses under saddle do ANYTHING angrily, you must look to the rider, not the horse, as the source of the problems.

Riding should be pleasant and enjoyable for horses, even if they are asked to work quite hard. What you've described sounds much more as if the horses are experiencing the same "enjoyment" that young children experience in a physical education class when they are in the hands of an ignorant, brutal, possibly sadistic "teacher" who knows very little, cannot communicate effectively, has no notion of teaching as a way of helping children learn to enjoy movement, but knows EXACTLY how to be domineering, abusive, and punitive. If you joined an exercise class run by someone like this, your common sense would warn you to leave immediately - but you are an adult. Children don't have that option, and horses don't even have the option of complaining about it in the hope that the responsible adults in their lives will DO something. It's your job to look out for your horse and protect your horse - and you need to act, and act NOW.

"Firing" an instructor is never easy, but it may help if you remember that SHE works for YOU. You're not apprenticed to some brilliant, famous trainer who accepts only one out of two or three hundred applicants - you are taking lessons from a local girl who isn't actually qualified to teach. There's a big difference.

You seem to have a good idea of what you want to do with your horse, and of what is reasonable to ask of a horse. Find a real instructor, so that you can begin to do the kind of riding that will make your horse stronger, more supple, and happy in its work. Don't wait! If you put it off for too long, you will be bringing your new instructor an enormous challenge: a lame, tense, worried horse and a rider with bad habits. I don't know what kind of riding you are doing - sadly, I've seen this sort of "backing for punishment" idiocy in many different riding disciplines - but if this is the only instructor in your area who claims to teach the kind of riding you want to do, consider learning another type of riding, at least until you have access to a good instructor in the discipline you like most. In other words, if you want to learn dressage and your only choices are (a) the bad, abusive dressage instructor, and (b) the competent and kind hunt-seat instructor), then I strongly suggest that you change disciplines. You can't learn anything about dressage from a bad instructor, but you can learn a great deal about dressage basics (communication with the horse, balance, posture, quiet riding) from a truly good hunt-seat instructor.

Good luck with this - I know it won't be easy. But you need an instructor you can trust, and who won't harm your horse.

Jessica

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