# What do you like about your instructor?



## Luvs2jump (Oct 11, 2010)

I've had a few good instructors and a few bad ones, a total of 5, 3 bad, 2 good (that includes my current one). I love how she teaches and how she has the patients of a saint among other qualities.


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## mustbemonroe (Mar 3, 2011)

I love my instructor because she is very genuine. I have been her student (and working student) for so long she is pretty much family now. She is also the only eventing instructor around but has access to upper level trainers and brings them to our facility.


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## starlinestables (Nov 24, 2008)

bump bump bump!


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## Lonannuniel (Jun 13, 2008)

the biggest difference i found between my trainer and my previous trainer was her manner of teaching. both charged the same, yet with my current trainer she was standing, watching me from all angles, providing visuals, and giving examples the best she can from the ground. she has a calm tone, that carries well, and she is very accepting of mistakes. I've never gotten the ' WHAT ARE YOU DOING CHILD!? ' tone when i did something wrong, which often rattled me with previous trainers.


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## Rhivia (Mar 6, 2010)

I love my trainer! I think the best thing about her is that she knows my limits and she'll always push me right up to them them but never past them. Like when I was was learning to ride english and she first told me to trot without stirrups. I thought I was going to die, but she knew just how far to push me. She is really dedicated to her students, too. She has more faith in me than I do in myself sometimes, and that means a lot!

I've also worked with the BO where I ride, and although she's really knowledgeable, she is very negative and yells a lot. I'm not a huge fan. lol


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## NicoleS11 (Nov 21, 2008)

What I didnt like about my old trainer is that he always told me what I was doing wrong but never told me how to fix it...but at the same time..I liked it because he would call me out the second that I made the mistake.

I like my new trainer because he doesnt make me cry haha. My new trainer has a total different way of doing things and its interesting to learn those ways.


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## SamAndThomas (Mar 22, 2011)

i love my instructors becuase they are kind and helpful but pushy in a good way, they have brought on my riding so much


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## Livy (Mar 12, 2011)

I love my instructor because she knows me & my horse very well. She's taught me & my horse A LOT since day 1 of lessons. She always makes a joke while training & makes lessons not a pain, but a pleasure. She helps me with saddle fitting to clipping as well. She's always their when I need her. She turned my used-to-be cow horse to an amazing show stopper


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## ptvintage (Feb 12, 2010)

Many, many reasons.

1. I hadn't ridden regularly in like 5 years, and she tolerated my lack of riding fitness, and my stupid stories of when I rode as a teenager.

2. I felt like I was actually learning something from her, instead of just having a babysitter for an hour.

3. She did private lessons as the standard, and I love private lessons.

4. When I ask her about riding concepts and training concepts, she will discuss it with me. She knows her stuff and when she teaches me things it's like a lightbulb goes off. 

5. She's a really nice person, fun and easy to talk to. I can call her up on the phone and talk to her for 20 minutes about my horse without feeling like I'm annoying her.

6. My husband likes talking to her too, and he isn't a horse person


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## Jessskater (Mar 16, 2011)

My old trainer helped me soo much. She was my first trainer ever and took me on trail rides and taught me how to ride bareback,western and english. I currently don't have a trainer right now.


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## justjump (Jan 18, 2011)

My instructor is like my second dad. I have been training under him for about 10 years and thefamily is basically my second family. He doesn't really force me to do things that i don't want to do or know that I won't do well in (like undersaddle... I despise that class...). Yet, he always helps me when I need it and isnt high stress or gets super frazzled about things. He leaves me alone when I'm upset (since I work better that way.. Allows me to get myself together before my next class) and makes jokes about everything. He's made me the rider I am, and has always been there with me through my entire career!
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Arksly (Mar 13, 2010)

I absolutely love my current trainer! She's patient and has a manner of explaining things that is just wonderful. She goes through all of the extra steps when we are working with Kitty (like if she was a horse that was just being started). She encourages me to call her if I have any questions and once she called my mom, who at the time was in Arizona, to get my number just to say she was running four minutes late on a day where the roads were terrible.


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## Zeke (Jun 27, 2010)

Just bumping this, as an instructor I like reading this kind of stuff. 

I loved my trainer who was on her horse throughout my lesson. She would teach me reining maneuvers by showing me step by step what to do on her own horse and I would recreate it. It taught me alot about what to look for and feel in a maneuver, not just how to do it. I'm also a visual learner so the live visual was nice.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## mls (Nov 28, 2006)

When I take a lesson, I want to learn something. I am not taking the time or paying money to have someone tell me how pretty my horse is.

I ask questions. If I don't get an answer or feel as though I am confusing the instructor, I don't go back.

I had a working cow horse lesson with a nationally ranked clinician last fall. It was A W E S O M E. He critqued but did so in a manner I learned from - not felt bad about myself or my horse. I wish he would come to MN more often!


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## kcscott85 (Jul 28, 2010)

I absolutely love the one I'm with now. Before I had a freak cross country accident, I rode for 16 years, competing in H/J and Eventing. 6 years later, I bought a horse and began taking lessons at a nearby H/J barn. I was stuck pretty much in limbo, definitely not a beginner, but also not ready to jump again, and wasn't getting the instruction I needed. A new instructor got to the barn where I board my horse and she is fantastic. I'm somewhat of a timid rider now, and she pushes me, which I definitely need. She makes "executive decisions" if she thinks I'm capable of something that I wouldn't do on my own, like canter.


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## Delfina (Feb 12, 2010)

mls said:


> When I take a lesson, I want to learn something. I am not taking the time or paying money to have someone tell me how pretty my horse is.
> 
> I ask questions. If I don't get an answer or feel as though I am confusing the instructor, I don't go back.


Yes! 

I love that my instructor *always* has something to teach me and if something arises with one of her horses that I haven't dealt with before, after my lesson she makes sure to show me and educate me on how to treat it. So I have learned all about treating minor injuries, dealing with Thrush, de-worming an difficult horse and so on which I otherwise wouldn't have because none of it was with my own horses. 

I also like that if for some reason she doesn't know the answer to a question, she has no qualms about telling me so and then will then go consult with other trainers and do research until she has an answer for me. 

She has no issues kicking my butt or screaming at me when needed but also dishes out encouragement at the same time. 

Goes from kicking my butt all over tarnation to the sweetest, most encouraging, calm person when it's time for my kiddo's lesson. Completely different personality who would fall to pieces if you yelled at her, so she works with her completely differently. 

She's beyond flexible, wind was howling at 50mph yesterday so we're doing my lesson today instead. I can call and tell her I don't "feel" like riding because it's yicky outside and she has no problem, would rather I cancel than show up and have a horrible ride.


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## EmilyandNikki (Sep 7, 2010)

Well I'm a nervous person, so when I have an instructor who gets mad, or yells, then I get upset and loose confidence. Even though I progressed quickly with my last instructor, my confidence fell.

With my current instructor, the only time she gets mad at me is if I don't discipline the horse when it does something bratty. My confidence is higher now. She also uses a few forms of teaching and changes them up if I'm not fully understanding, which I like. She also uses one form of teaching that I do find helpful sometimes. She will through out comments and suggestions here and there depending on what needs to be done, but she lets you discover the feeling yourself. Like, when I was off-balanced going into the canter, I needed to find my seat by myself, so she just gave me suggestions till I could find my seat and stay balanced.


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## Luvs2jump (Oct 11, 2010)

SamAndThomas said:


> i love my instructors becuase they are kind and helpful but pushy in a good way, they have brought on my riding so much


Same here with my current instructor. I was just glad she was able to break some weird and funky habits I picked up from previous trainers.


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## DieselPony (Jul 26, 2010)

I learned pretty much everything I know from books and trial and error. I must say my first mare was a saint when I look back on everything now. And that I had some darn good luck spending hours on green horses that had no business being ridden out yet. But I did teach myself a lot that way.

I never had an instructor until this past December. She has been great at filling in the holes and explaining things. I knew a lot of "rules" but never the why to any of those rules. The biggest help is she is an actual trainer and trains in pretty much the same way as the trainer who was working with my horse. She has also worked with several of the same personality types of my mare. She makes a great spotter for me during lessons or will ride one of the horses in training that is slightly more advanced than my mare so she can show me how to ask the horse something it doesn't know.

She is a really encouraging instructor, but will raise her voice when you are doing something wrong. She has even threatened to have me get off the horse during one of my first rides in over a year and ground drive her to help me get a better feeling of a horse's mouth instead of me trying to figure it out on a horse with a sensitive mouth. That really put into perspective how much feel and timing you lose when you don't ride for a long time.

I did take quite a few English lessons with a friend once. I was taught a couple bad habits, but man did I have one heck a seat after riding with that instructor. I never jumped over 2 feet, but she had me going over the jumps stirrup-less, arms out, and eyes shut, approaching at trot and canter.


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## Opus (Jan 3, 2011)

Reasons I chose (and kept) my current instructor:

-- She's nice without be a doormat. She's also laid back but not careless.
-- She's younger (25) but very experienced
-- She showed IHSA in the same region/zone as I did. So, I was familiar with her instructor and team, and she was familiar with my old coach and team. 
-- She pushes me when I need it, but knows when to leave well enough alone when I'm just having an off day.
-- She runs her barn the same way I would run my own. She's practical, emphasizes safe riding, and refuses to progress students until they have the basics down.
-- We also share similar philosophies about riding, horses, training, etc.

My old instructor wasn't really a choice, as he was the head trainer at my college, when I started taking a college riding class. But he is now the gold standard for me as far as trainers are concerned. He was also a somewhat BNT -- something I didn't know until I left college. 

He was gentle, but pushed us when necessary. He was fantastic about coming up with ways to tell us what was wrong and how to fix it. Phrasing it in ways that made it click in our head. He was also incredibly warm, had all sorts of funny stories/anecdotes for us while we were riding and never, ever made us feel stupid or inadequate. 

And even though I only did walk-trot classes in IHSA, he was ALWAYS there before we rode into the ring. He would talk to us, adjust our stirrups, take out our legs and roll them back, wipe off our boots and give us words of encouragement. Even though he had 25 riders to look after, from sun up until just about sun down.

He wasn't in it for the ribbons or recognition -- he was in it for us. And I miss him dearly.


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## kalliy10 (Mar 25, 2011)

My 1st instructor: 

I wanted to start to learn English and my F I R S T lesson she came told me I'm NEVER riding english cause i didn't pick it up on my frist lesson. Plus she used to switch horses on me so i didn't have the SAME horse every lesson and it was hard for me.... She also didn't care much for me to learn, all i did was ride around a arena for a hour and that was it... NO REAL lesson, and we couldn't 'hang out' after the ride. ALSO she was really really expensive! i rode twice a month ever other week.... THAT expensive and she wasn't really worth it.... 

My NOW instructor:

I L O V E HER! She explains the difference of riding, also she really breaks down the science of horse back riding and horses. We TALK all the time during my lesson cause I want to LEARN more about horses... Audra is also really friendly and super nice! She lets anyone just 'hang' after a lesson, on the weekends we have horse soccer (i haven't gone to one YET) or During the summer we have Horse Camping and LOTS of Hack rides!!!! Also I have 30 mins of tacking up and grooming then a hour of riding then 30mins of cooling off plus, taking pictures feeding the horses treats... Yup I pretty much L O V E it there


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## coffeemama (Jul 10, 2009)

My trainer is patient with me being an adult beginner. I rode very briefly with another instructor who put me on a bolting horse and told me he would take care of me. I had only been riding for two months and just learning to post my trot. This horse took off in an out of control bolt around the arena and only increasing in speed. I jumped off into mud to avoid worse. Nothing would stop this horse. I haven't gotten over this still to this day I have trust issues even with my own horse and am scared to canter more than half arena just started learning to canter. My trainer understands what I have been through and is very patient but also pushes me beyond my comfort zone when she sees I can really do it. I am always thankful when she does and I do something new and show progress. She knows my strengths an weaknesses and teaches accordingly. I think because she teaches so many kids she has patience for me..haha.


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