Parelli

I did a little research on the Parelli Method that I mentioned Yesterday. Very interesting depiction about how leadership is very important in horsemanship. This method is a approach sometimes called 'natural horsemanship'. The Parelli Method also mentions that each horse has a distict personality and that the trainer or rider should take this into consideration. The horse personalities are called 'Horsenalities'. Trainers are taught to look at body cues from horses such as their facial expressions and body language to determine what kind of personality the horse has.

I think this is extremely interesting because teachers might consider this with their students. Students have different personalities and learn in different ways, just as the Parelli Method suggests that horses do. If a horse trainer can determine the personality of his horse and train him accordingly, then a teacher can definetly do the same for their students. I believe that if a person can interact with a horse and with communication determine its personality, then they could learn about their human partners as well. If you can communicate with a horse, which does not speak and determine its characteristics and personality then you should also be able to do so with a human. You can speak to another human and interact more closely than you can with a horse. If you learn the personality of another person then you can learn how to communicate with them better. My point is that if a human can characterize a horse and learn how to communicate with them better, then it should increase that person's communication skills with other people.

On another note, I rode Midnight again today. In my mind it was not as succesful as previous days but I think that is due to distraction on both of our parts. There were workers cutting down trees near us, making loud buzzing noises and such. Also I let my mother come and watch, mainly for safety reasons, because there was no one else at Zach's today. Riding alone even in a round pen could potentially be very dangerous. Midnight wanted to be in the pasture with his friends and wanted to leave the gate pretty bad. I know I anticipated his approach to the gate each time we went around the ring. I have a lot to learn and correct in my lifetime of riding. I also purposely tested whether he would actually go in the direction that you looked. It really does work. I know that my body is sending signals that I do not realize that I am sending to the horse, but Midnight is very sensitive. I am lucky that he is not extremely desensitized because he is somewhat older and has had many riders. Communication was not as I would have liked it to be, but everyday is going to be different and I can't get frustrated because things did not go like I wanted them to. I think the distraction aspect applied to humans as well. If something distracting is going on in your life, it is harder to communicate effectively with others. For instance my grandmother passed away last week and at the funeral there was a long line of people who came through. I was so distracted by the situation that I sometimes could not form words to respond to them. I was distracted by the the devistation that had just occured to my family. I believe that if a person works with horses long enough they can learn to over come distraction and still communicate with the horse. Once you are able to do this with a horse, then it seems that a person given a distraction can still communicate effectively with another person.

I also did some article searching with Mr.Brown. We found some articles that look promising but I will post the results as soon as I get to reading all the articles. Also worked on my outline for the final paper, I hope my expectations are not too high for this short amount of time to do research.

On another interesting note I read an article titiled "Equestrian Program Repair Boys' Spirit". This article talks about how boys who have been incacerated come to her farm and she shows them how to make the right choices again. She explains that an important aspect of her program is that the boys can learn, "simply how to trust others". This is exactly the kind of things that I have been looking for. This means that others have acknowledged that working with horses can build a person's trust. This person does not only build trust with the horses but they can learn how to trust people again be realizing that "this horse loves them unconditionally until they do somehting to compromise that trust". That teaches the boys that if a horse can trust them, then so can other human beings and that the boy can trust again too.