I'm still learning and Hon thinks I need some pointers!!

[janehon]

I was thinking about that Ash, She has been told off in the past for walking over me as when scared it was her favourite trck. She has been allowed to walk ahead of me though so not banned from walking past me.

I have been very traditional in my training of her so far, and think it is just taking her wimpy character time to realise she can experiment.

[ash]

I was thinking about that Ash, She has been told off in the past for walking over me as when scared it was her favourite trck. She has been allowed to walk ahead of me though so not banned from walking past me.

Tommy, my Haffy, used to be an expert at walking into/over/jumping on people.  Once I taught him to do AK's  'Why Would You Leave Me?' exercise (although I didn't know that was what it was at the time), where they are walking beside you with their head and neck flexed around/towards you, it solved the problem.  Firstly because with his head flexed towards me he couldn't walk into me with his big ol' shoulders.  Secondly, because he was concentrating so hard on earning his treat, he pretty much became oblivious to everything else, so forgot to be spooky! Everyone's a winner! 

He was a horse that had clearly been trained with heavy negative reinforcement (the scars on his body are testament to that), but instead of shutting down, and becoming meek, he got angry.  Half a ton of angry Haffy is not a pretty sight.   Since I discovered CT was the way to go with him, he has gone from being an 'angry young man' to a delightfully polite and playful one. 

[janehon]

OK our next instalment has been working on finding ways to CT her for moving as she had kinda learnt to glue her feet to the floor with the target work, don't know how I managed to teach her that but obviously I did

So we have been working on backing up, turning and walking on. I start a session with some basic target stuff, do some moving stuff then go back to harder target stuff eg chasing it round the field. Today I added in some stand and wait training as she was getting a bit pre-emptive at one point.

Next question, Do you think this is a good idea or would you concentrate on one thing per session?

I find that no matter how easy I make it and how high the reward rate is if I keep asking for the same thing she starts getting distracted, If I mix and match a bit she is better. Today I only lost her attention once and that was when we were working on targetting from a distance and a pesky jet came over so understandable. I made it easier again then progressively harder and shortly after she did the bigger distance very convincingly. Is ths cheating though, should I be trying to keep her focused on one thing? What do folks think?

[ash]

I don't call it cheating, I call it 'setting her up for success'.  Do what feels right for you and your horse, there is plenty of time to make your criterion stricter as you both progress.  All horses are individuals, and you know your horse better than anyone.