As a parent, you play a crucial role in supporting your child’s horse riding journey. You have the ability to be their biggest supporter or their biggest critic, to strengthen their confidence or unintentionally build their fear.
We're here to help you evaluate whether you may be helping or hindering their progress.
How can we positively impact our child's riding journey?
1. Trust the Trainer’s Expertise
Allow the trainer to teach. Ask questions respectfully if you need clarity but avoid contradicting their instructions.
2. Encourage a Growth Mindset
Riding involves challenges, setbacks, and learning from mistakes.
Celebrate resilience, praise effort and improvement and encourage them to try again.
3. Be a Positive Role Model
Children look to parents for cues on how to approach challenges.
Stay calm and optimistic,. Show respect for trainers, horses, and other riders.
4. Foster a Love for the Journey
Riding is about more than competitions or big goals—it’s about personal growth and connection with horses.
Focus on the joy of horses, the friendships they make, and the life lessons learned along the way.
5. Listen to Their Feelings
Children may experience fear, frustration, or excitement in their journey.
Be a safe space for them to share their feelings. Validate their experiences and encourage open communication.
Parents can unintentionally hinder their children’s learning and enjoyment of horse riding in several ways:
1. Pushing Too Hard
Setting high expectations or pressuring children to advance quickly can create unnecessary stress. This may lead to burnout, loss of interest, or fear of failure.
Celebrate achievements like mastering a new skill, overcoming a fear, or showing good sportsmanship.
2. Micromanaging Horse Care
Doing everything for your child rather than teaching them responsibility for grooming, tacking, and horse care. Your child then misses out on valuable life skills like patience, independence, responsibility, and empathy. Avoid doing tasks for them, for hard tasks encourage team work so they are still part of the process.
3. Comparing progress
Comparing your child’s progress to others and expecting progress to match their peers.
Every child develops skills at their own pace so we want to avoid comparing to others. Instead encourage them to focus on their own improvement.
4. Reacting Dramatically to Falls or Mistakes
Overreacting when your child falls (e.g., gasping, rushing in) can make the event seem more serious than it is.
Stay calm and focus on helping them learn from the experience without amplifying their fear.
5. Projecting Their Own Fears
Parents who are nervous about horses or riding may unknowingly transfer their anxieties to their child. The child may start to mirror the parent’s worry, even if they were initially confident.
Work on managing personal fears privately and encourage your child to trust their trainer and abilities.
By being your child's number one supporter and focusing on the positive, parents can help their child develop confidence, resilience, and a lifelong love for horse riding.
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