Paired lessons? Dressage camps.

[oldie48]

I've done several different dressage camps over the years and all have used the paired lesson structure except AM dressage. I think it's really difficult for trainers to work with two complete strangers with different needs at the same time, some manage really well, some less so but I wondered if there was a better way of doing it. Has anyone come across a better way? I wondered about doing a 15 minute warm up then 30 minutes with trainer then out, next rider comes in half way through 30 minutes, does their 15 minute warm up then goes onto 30 minutes with trainer. So trainer sees horse after a 15 minute warm up and has a concentrated 30 minutes with each rider. At these camps there are usually 2 lessons a day and horses do get quite tired and I noticed that at the one I've just returned from, on the second day riders were finishing early. Really interested to hear your thoughts as we might think about doing our own camp for our riding club.

 

[PaddyMonty]

Your suggestions make a lot of sense as the trainer will still get a view of the next rider during their 15 minute warmup so should have a good idea what needs to be done when they start their 30 minute session. If the 15 min warmup was in a different arena I dont think it would be so productive.

 

[oldie48]

I was thinking warm up in same arena. when 2 riders come in together the trainer can only speak to one at a time so the second rider ends up effectively warming up anyway until the trainer has given the first one some training. In a 09.00 - 12.00 period, with the paired system the trainer would see 8 riders but with the other they would only see 6, so there would be a costing issue! However each rider would get 30 minutes of the trainers time instead of 22 1/2 minutes if the time is divided equally, which it rarely is. You can tell I'm not a fan of paired lessons!

Your suggestions make a lot of sense as the trainer will still get a view of the next rider during their 15 minute warmup so should have a good idea what needs to be done when they start their 30 minute session. If the 15 min warmup was in a different arena I dont think it would be so productive.

 

[milliepops]

Your suggestions make a lot of sense as the trainer will still get a view of the next rider during their 15 minute warmup so should have a good idea what needs to be done when they start their 30 minute session. If the 15 min warmup was in a different arena I dont think it would be so productive.

agree ^^

At AM Dressage they do the initial assessment on a camp as a 45 min session with 3 or 4 riders in it. But they are not for training, more for spookbusting and familiarisation of the arena, so you don't waste your first lesson getting the horse into the corners, or spooking at the mirrors. Then you all have a short session with the trainers, before starting proper lessons later in the day.
I think that's valuable time as they can get a glimpse of everyone before starting a lesson.
Your system would have similar benefits, agree that it would need to be in the same arena. Good idea, I think group lessons are the pits and it's the thing that puts me off some of the regional dressage camps.

 

[Leaping]

BD Southern camp at Merrist Wood did 40min individual lessons with the trainers which worked well. Agree that individual is better than paired. They had 3 trainers, two shared the large outdoor and one indoors - but the venue needs to have enough space to do this.
The afternoons both days were test riding. The tests were indoors, the only issue was that some started to warm up for their tests (as they would) and the lessons were still going on in the outdoor which made life a little more interesting.