The Teacher and The Trainer

Instructor (n.): A person who teaches something.

Teacher (n.): A person who teaches, especially in school.

Trainer (n.): A person who trains people or animals.

Anyone who has ever tried to teach knows that it’s surprisingly hard, especially when you first start. The best instructors make it look completely effortless, but there is so much that goes into it that a student may never see. There’s a lot of research and planning, there’s a lot of practice, and there’s a lot of social skills involved. There’s a reason people have to go to college to become school teachers: it’s hard work, and I have yet to meet a teacher in any field who finds it “instinctual” or “easy.” And from what I hear, the education degree still doesn’t prepare you for a lot of things. It certainly didn’t prepare my sister-in-law for the second graders who couldn’t hold their bladders and peed on their chairs, and you know that’s just the beginning of the horror stories. Every teacher has at least a few to share.

But being an equine instructor is its own challenge. We have to at least have a basic understanding of any number of subjects, like psychology, biomechanics, biology, history, language and communication, Emergency First Aid/CPR, and so on. That challenge is doubled because we must not only know about how these things work for humans, but for horses as well. And of course, there is the safety component, since many of us are teaching small human beings how to handle animals about twenty times their size. You have to set boundaries for both the child and the horse, and you have to have constant supervision to keep them both safe. And then there’s the matter of feeling. It is good to be able to teach horsemanship with mathematical precision, but we still have to remember that horsemanship is an art. It is almost impossible to create art without engaging a different part of ourselves, and that is almost impossible to teach. So besides being able to teach an organized lesson, you also have to allow your students the time to practice and develop that portion of their brains. Oh, and if your lessons aren’t interesting enough, your students won’t bother coming back and you won’t get paid.

And somewhere in all of this mess, you really should be able to do some paperwork as well. At the very least, you have to be able to develop your own lesson plans, and it’s definitely wise to keep track of which lessons you taught to whom, what you taught, which horse you used, how much you charged, and so on.

And just so you know, there are very few schools in the US that specialize in teaching you how to do all of this, so you’ve got to cobble all of this together from whatever sources you can. Good luck.

So let’s say you accomplish all of that (and to be fair, I did make it sound a lot more daunting than it is. After a year or two of practice, it’s really not that bad). Congratulations! You’re an instructor now! Excellent work! But just what does that mean?

For the most part this is just a matter of semantics, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently. So let’s start with what it literally means to be an instructor, a teacher, and a trainer. Obviously we all think of them as meaning the same thing, but what makes them different? Here’s some of the definitions that stuck out to me.

Instruct (v):

1. To tell or order someone to do something, especially in a formal or official way.
2. To give information to (someone).

Teach (v.):

1. To impart knowledge to or instruct someone how to do something.
2. To cause (someone) to learn or understand something by example or experience.
3. To encourage someone to accept something as fact or principle.

Train (v.):

1. To teach a person or animal a particular skill or type of behavior through sustained practice and instruction.
2. To prepare a person or animal for a particular sport or event with a course of diet and exercise.
3. Train something on/at (v.): Point or aim something, typically a gun or camera, at

Let’s start with “Instruct.”

If you look at the etymology of “instruct,” you’ll discover that when it first made its appearance in Middle English, it meant to “impart knowledge or information.” However, before that, it originally came from the latin verb “instruere,” which meant “to pile on/up,” or possibly “to spread.” So if we want to be fairly literal, you might say that our job as equine instructors is to compile information and then give it to our students. But I think that’s a pretty limited job description. After all, the reason we go to instructors instead of to the internet or encyclopedias for information is because we are looking for something more than a pile of facts.

So if being a mere “instructor” isn’t enough, what if we extend our job description a little from being mere “instructors” to “teachers” and “trainers?” What’s the difference between the two, and why does it matter?

From what I understand, the word “teach” comes from the Old English word tæcan, which apparently meant “to show, declare, warn, or persuade.” It seems that “train” came from the Latin word traginare, which meant “to draw” or “to pull.” When we first started using it in English it originally referred to manipulating things like plants and trees into a particular shape. About three or four hundred years after that it started to refer to pointing or aiming a weapon or shaping oneself for a performance by using a regimen of exercise or diet.

“Teaching” is about growth.

“Training” is about honing.

It may seem like a negligible difference, but I think it’s actually very important to know and understand. I think the two defining factors that distinguish the two are Time and Attitude.

Teaching is like feeding and watering a plant: It doesn’t have a time limit, because learning is an eternal process. Teachers understand that they cannot make a student grow: they can only enable and encourage growth. Some students learn faster than others, and all students learn different things in different ways and at different rates. For example, I can intellectually understand the history and theory of horsemanship, and I thrive off of building and feeling an emotional connection with the horse. But I struggle to develop correct muscle memory. What some people can learn in six months I have to take three years to practice if I want to turn it into habit. The best teachers I have had so far clearly understood that every student and every horse has his/her own particular set of skills and needs, and they could alter their methods to suit each individual pair. There is no “one size fits all” in teaching, but an instructor whose methods are flexible enough to suit each and every student is surprisingly hard to come by.

Training is like pruning a plant back, because it usually involves a hard goal: “You must reach this skill level by this date if you wish to compete at this show.” Trainers are all about pushing their students to the next level and stretching them to their limits. This is why many trainers will not only make a student pay for lessons, they will require that they leave their horses with the trainer as well, simply because it will be too much strain on the student to push themselves to the limit and then ask their horses to do the same thing. Sometimes they hammer a lesson or principle into a student’s mind and body with constant repetition. Trainers have a deadline, so they must pick and choose what information is relevant to you, and then they will do whatever it takes to make sure that you can achieve your goal.

There are drawbacks to both styles of instruction though, so it is important to remember that good instructors have to draw on both sides in order to maintain a balance.

Sometimes a teacher makes the mistake of allowing too much growth, because unfortunately, not all growth is helpful or healthy. Amanda and I had a student in who apparently had come from just that kind of a background. She had been at a barn where they taught them a lot of things, but they had not taught them some of the core principles of horsemanship. She wanted to ride horses, but she didn’t want to clean stalls or wipe down saddles. She wanted to jump, but she didn’t want to develop a solid rising trot. She wanted to be a good rider, but she hated riding the challenging horses. Whenever she “failed” she would blame the horse for not listening, but couldn’t recognize that the faults were in her aids, not in the horse’s comprehension. No one had ever taught her before that horsemanship isn’t just fun: it’s hard work, and it’s often pretty thankless. She did not appreciate our efforts to teach her self-discipline, and she very nearly quit because she was not hearing what she wanted.

I think one of the most important things we can teach our students is that when we say “no,” it’s really not because we don’t want to have fun. We say “no” because if we say “yes,” we are allowing you to put yourself in danger. One of my teachers was acquainted with some of the people who taught Christopher Reeve (and for those of us who were born after 1978, he played Superman) to ride. I have no doubt that Christopher Reeve was very in shape and very strong: after all, he was Superman. But he lacked the fundamental flexibility and balance to do Eventing, which is what he wanted to do. He went through several instructors who all told him “No, you’re not ready,” and every time he heard that, he got angry and went to a new instructor until someone finally said “Yes.” His horse stumbled, and since he was balancing on the horse’s mouth, he got thrown off. He didn’t have the flexibility to tuck and roll, and so he flew headlong into the fence. It paralyzed him from the neck down. I believe this was in 1995 when I was four years old, which probably explains why my parents were a bit perturbed when I kept pointing out all of the horses on the side of the road and saying that I wanted to ride them. Horses are very beautiful, sensitive, incredible creatures. But they are big, and they do have hooves and teeth, and they’re not infallible, so an equine instructor’s job is always, always, to put safety first, even if it means telling your students “no.”

Conversely, instructors should be very careful about how much they say “no.” I tried going to a trainer who I thought would be a logical choice as I continued my education. The first lesson or two was good: I was hearing a lot of the same things that Amanda had told me but never really pressed me on, and so hearing them from a different source was making more of an impression on me. And she clearly had a good knowledge base and she had been teaching for a while, so that wasn’t an issue. I was sore after every lesson, but I didn’t mind that, because I was learning, and I like learning. So I went home and practiced everything that this lady said and returned two weeks later for the next lesson. She continued to push me, and I continued trying to rise to her expectations.

Obviously this model worked for other people, because she HAD other students, and they all loved her. But something just didn’t fit for me. Maybe it was because I told her I would only be in the area for the next six months, but I guess I was not learning at the pace she wanted. By the end of the fifth lesson she lost patience with me and told me that I clearly wasn’t working hard enough, that I was wrong, and that I had trained my horse wrong.

I left in tears.

Sure, I wasn’t a perfect student: I was late a lot of the time, but I was making a two hour drive each way to come take lessons from this woman! I was busting my butt practicing at home, and if I wasn’t practicing it was either because it was raining or because I was out of town for family events. She had never even seen my horse, let alone ridden him, but that didn’t stop her from telling me that I had messed him up.

Now, maybe she thought I was just being a wimp when I didn’t come back for more lessons because “she hurt my poor widdle feewings.” But here’s the thing: I was already working on what she was telling me, but never once did she ask me what I was doing at home or what I was working on or what my goals were. As a matter of fact, when I point blank asked her to tell me three things that I was already doing well or that I had already improved on, she just sort of bit her lip and looked uneasy. And even though I hadn’t been with this woman for very long, I was heartbroken.

Fortunately this story has a happy ending. I ended up going to a different instructor and telling him point blank what my issues were and that I would really appreciate it if he didn’t tell me that I’m absolute crap, and he made it very clear that that’s not how he operates. And he was everything you could ever hope for in a teacher. He had an incredible knowledge base, he possessed a remarkably trained eye for both the horse and rider, he was happy to spend as much time on something as we needed, and he knew how to gently correct faults so that I wouldn’t shut down. On top of all that, he was freaking hilarious, and that can make even the most painful lesson better. That combination was exactly what I needed. Within four lessons he had me correcting my faults by myself and he actually had Champagne and I beginning to experiment with and feel the beginnings of proper impulsion: something we had never accomplished. I learned more about having a soft, light, feeling seat in one month than I had ever learned before, and he made it exciting to learn.  Those four lessons were exactly what I needed to heal and start over again.

So here’s what you instructors need to remember:

1. Safety always comes first. Like, seriously, always.
2. Do not compromise your standards of teaching. Many instructors have benchmarks that students must reach before they are allowed to advance to the next lesson or level of difficulty. Don’t let those be negotiable. Yes, your students might be frustrated that you’re not letting them move to the next level, but it’s a safety thing: a student who is not balanced at the trot cannot be balanced over a jump. But on top of that, your students may not be with you forever, and whatever they take with them to their next barn will reflect on you. Keep your standards high and they’ll be ready to face the horse industry when they leave.
3. Know your own faults. You have to understand and accept your weaknesses as a horseman and as an instructor if you want to have any chance of success. It’s okay not to be perfect: after all, no one is. But that doesn’t mean we don’t keep striving to get better.
4. Keep learning. You cannot teach what you do not know, and what you know you must know very well in order to teach. If you try to teach something that you don’t understand yourself, you are in danger of teaching it incorrectly, and it is much harder to fix something than just do it right in the first place. But anything you learn will add a new layer and a new aspect to the things you already know, and it’ll help you stay excited about horsemanship too.

Teachers:

1. Come with a plan. Even though you are teaching the student at their pace, that doesn’t mean that you should only be working on what he/she likes. Notice their faults and plan lessons that will help correct them. Your goal should be to expand his/her knowledge in every direction, and that means confronting weaknesses as well as encouraging strengths.
2. Don’t be afraid to push your students past their comfort zone. Sometimes your student will reach a plateau, and it’s your job to help them past it. That means that there are going to be days where you purposely put a student on a more difficult horse in order to teach them a lesson that they are ready to learn. Your students may freak out a little, and (dare I say it) that’s okay. Stay calm, and once they have taken even a single step in the right direction, you can let them return to their comfort zone.
3. Get creative. Teachers often end up teaching the younger children, and teaching fundamentals can become very boring very fast. Get creative about how to teach them. Turn exercises into games or make obstacles into challenges. Find new exercises to teach old lessons. The internet is an incredible place to find new ideas: use it. If you don’t keep coming up with new things, you’re going to get very bored very fast.
4. Ask for hard things. You’re not a babysitter; you’re a teacher. Even though play is the work of children and it’s how they explore the world, children are also young adults in training. Your students will need to learn to work: Teach them how. Show them how to groom their own horses and then let them do it. Teach them to clean stalls and bathe horses and do all of the things that you could just pay someone else to do. Let them shoulder some of the responsibility as well so that when they become adults, they never take any of that work for granted.
5. Have discipline. There are a lot of behaviors and practices that you can alter with lessons and exercises, but there are some that are dangerous to the student, the horse, and everyone around him/her. These can include hitting, punching, spitting, grabbing hair, kicking, whipping, screaming profanities… need I continue? If someone could get hurt in any way, shut those behaviors down immediately. Yes, your student may have his/her feelings hurt, but if you do not, you may very well be compromising the safety of your other students, horses, facility, business, and self. Trust me, it’s not worth it.

Trainers:

1. Don’t just focus on one thing. Because you are a trainer and you are working toward a hard goal with a time limit in mind, it is usually prudent to only work toward that goal. But don’t forget to cross-train. Adding another discipline every once in a while can help to refresh your students and their horses, and sometimes it can give them an appreciation for the things that you’ve taught them.
2. Be able to teach one concept many ways. Repetition can only get you so far. Sometimes when a student just can’t seem to get something, the fault lies with the trainer for not being able to teach it in a way that he/she can understand. I suggest having three different ways of explaining something, but my goal is usually to have six or more. It may seem ridiculous, but if you can make something easier for your students to understand, you can speed up the training process tenfold.
3. Take your time. Only prodigies ever learn something on the first try, and even then it’s rare. Training your body and your mind takes time, so be patient. Even when you come with the most perfect of lesson plans, they are frequently bound to fail. Roll with the punches and be okay with focusing on what your student and his/her horse need in this moment.
4. Be invested in your students. By the time students come to a trainer in order to prepare for an event, usually they’re not young enough to need a babysitter, so your job isn’t to make everything better. But you have to want them to succeed. Students always know when you’re not invested in them, and it can make any lesson go downhill fast. Remember, they might be paying you for your time and knowledge, but trainers cannot be instructors without students to teach.
5. Use positive reinforcement. You’ve seen it with horses, when they have been beaten down so much that they either run around like psychos or they completely stop and refuse to work. People are the exact same way. Even gentle corrections can be detrimental if that’s all you do. Give students something to look forward to, and find something positive about every training session. If you make a big deal about the things that your student is doing right, they’ll keep doing it, and you’ll probably have to correct even less in the future. Go out of your way to make this a good experience, and you just might enjoy it too.