Coaching young children

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AshleyCurtis

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Hi all,

I'm a Canadian horseback riding coach in Australia coaching lessons for children and adults. I'm 27 years old and have no children (probably why I feel so ill equipped in this regard). I have recently started teaching lessons to children who are 3-5 years old and have never ridden. I'm at a total loss for what to do with them. At the moment I keep them on a lead, play hands on head/hips/knees/toes, around the world and walk and trot. I get them to hold on to the saddle mostly but I just feel like, especially the 3 year old, the attention span is short and I'm not sure what I can actually give to them.

I'm looking for any tips, tricks, games, suggestions.

Thank you so much for your help!
 
You can always play the naming game especially at the start to help them learn ie who can point to the mane/tail/ etc and make it more difficult as they progress x
 
ok for the older ones, can they ride to letter "B", letter "A" helps to start them steering independently etc a fun handy pony course which enables them to start to balance, picking up balls and putting in bucket etc. But as you say 3yr old would find this a bit much for 30 min. i use to split the "lesson" into an adventure hack and then a proper "lesson" about 15 min each. as each child is different some would move more towards a longer lesson but the younger ones are just as happy to "hack". with reminding them to put there feet in the correct position, which is education by stealth ;)
 
All children walking round together, person in middle shouts handsonyourhead, aeroplane!, handsonyourhead, aeroplane!, then some alternative command (e.g. hands on your hips), last one to do it is out - brings their pony to stand in the middle or something.
If you've only got one or two riding at a time, just get faster with calling movements out until they can't keep up - that used to make the kids at the riding school I helped at laugh.

Anything with singing/chanting nursery rhymes, each kid has to shout out a word in a saying/finish your sentence whilst riding around.
 
I'm no instructor but with my 3.5yr old up until now I've just led him about in walk and trot, little plods down the road, just started to get "up downs" in trot, he's done x-poles and tiny logs etc. too which he loves. This summer I plan to do basic PC games (bending, cups on poles, flag into cone etc.), anything to keep it fun for him - being a boy though he just wants to trot everywhere... so games should suit!
 
Thank you all so much for the help! When it comes to PC games I feel like I don't know many of them (growing up in a western family i didn't go to pony club myself until I was 14 and too old for most of the fun games) what kinds of things will i need to start doing some PC games and when it comes to grabbing a ball and putting it in a bucket what kind of thing/platform do you use to pick up the ball from? Thanks again!!
 
AshleyCurtis said:
Thank you all so much for the help! When it comes to PC games I feel like I don't know many of them (growing up in a western family i didn't go to pony club myself until I was 14 and too old for most of the fun games) what kinds of things will i need to start doing some PC games and when it comes to grabbing a ball and putting it in a bucket what kind of thing/platform do you use to pick up the ball from? Thanks again!!
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Oil drums, or similar, are your friends. Just the right height for children to reach balls etc.

As for teaching, what they all said, short, sweet and above all fun.

Simple games like move the potato/ball/bean bag from one drum to another, maybe around a couple of pylons between them, helps balance and steering and is fun.

When I taught very young children it is all about fun and gaining confidence, somehow the steering, speed control etc just comes.
 
If you have poles - you can put these down in a zig zag and get the children to steer and see if they can stay inside the poles. Put buckets down and practice steering by bending in and out.

I used to find 15-20 minutes was plenty for the younger children.
-Every time we asked the question - what keeps you in the saddle - stirrups/legs was the answer.
We'd take feet out stirrups and get them to 'cycle'. Then they'd say hands/reins so we'd have them 'swim' then for laughs tell them to swim and cycle. They realised it was their seat that kept them in.
-
 
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