AN INTRODUCTION TO NATURAL HORSEMANSHIP FOR CHILDREN The purpose of our Kids Introduction Day is to introduce children to some of the basic Natural Horsemanship principles, to allow the children to learn from experiencing what it feels like to be a pony and to have plenty of fun. 10.00 Saying Hello Pip will introduce herself to the children. The children will be asked to tell us a bit about their own ponies or riding experiences, what they like, what they don’t like and what they would like to do when working with their ponies. We will introduce some ideas about saying hello to your pony, we will talk about what we think ponies want from us and what we want from them. 11.00 Demonstration Pip doing a ground work display to show kids how they can play with their pony and improve their relationship with their pony. 12.00 Having a Ball - Communication The children will work in pairs, one will play the horse and will decide what s/he wants to do as the horse – to jump or not to jump, to listen or not to listen, to walk quietly or not to…Meanwhile the other child will play at being the handler and, without speaking, will persuade the ‘horse’ to work properly. The pairs change roles so each child gets an opportunity to be both ‘pony’ and handler. We use a large silver ball to work the ‘ponies’ and the kids get to run around and burn off some energy whilst learning what it might be like to be a pony and how hard it might be to understand what the humans want. 13.00 Lunch and play. 13.30 Trust This part of the day introduces the principle of trust to the children. We talk about trust and do some exercises in trusting each other, work out what it means to us all. We will encourage the children to ask questions and to speak about their own feelings about their relationships with horses and ponies. 14.00 Working with ponies – Responsibility Training If we have ponies to work with, if any of the children have brought their own, then we will work with them and their ponies. We will allow the children to participate with the ponies as far as possible. However we are very mindful of the wellbeing of the ponies and will not overwork them. We are also extremely safety conscious and firmly believe that ponies treated with respect will behave properly but if they are not suitable for working with children we will not allow it to happen. Listening to our horses is a core concept in promoting safety and if this causes some disappointment amongst the children then we recognise that this is a vital part of the learning process and will use it as an element of the teaching. The pony is not a machine and recognising his needs are crucial to safety. We call this Responsibility Training – putting the needs of the pony above our own. Many children in our society today are used to having what they want and having it now; our Responsibility Training encourages the children to take a wider perspective. 15.00 Horse Play – Synchronised Horsekidship Here the kids will work in pairs. Two pairs will be asked to work together, with one child in each pair being the pony and the other the handler. The handlers will be given a Secret Task to perform with their ‘ponies’. Again without speaking to each other the handlers will show the ponies what they are expected to do and the two pairs must perform the task simultaneously. This exercise teaches the children self awareness and asks them to focus on both their own actions and that of their own ‘pony’ whilst having to be aware of moving in time with the other combination. 16.30 Saying Goodbye The children will be encouraged to ask any questions they have, to describe how it felt to be a ‘pony’ and to work out what that might mean to how they work with ponies in the future.