Learning Styles; A Break Through!

I've been plodding along with Satin, making everything I do with her a game. If I am grooming her I try to find some creative way to play the porcupine game. If we're leaving the stall I'll do the squeeze game. This has really fast-tracked my creativity and rope/stick handling skills. I do this with all the boarders, too, especially the dominant horses that are more challenging. So everyday, twice a day, at minimum, I am playing with as many as 15 horses in one fashion or another. I am beginning to see the different learning styles and just how complex the concept of learning truly is.

Let me attempt to elaborate.

A horse's root personality, or "Horsenality" as coined by Parelli, is based on several variables: Innate behavior, learned behavior, environment, and spirit. In my opinion, this is where you'll begin to discover how your horse will learn.

Take me, for example. I innately learn by doing. If I put my hand to the task just a single time, I absorb that information and retain it for a lifetime. But if I simply hear it, the odds of me regurgitating the information even a month later are slim. But I have learned strategies to help memorize information that I naturally cannot retain. And if you put me in a classroom environment I might close up emotionally. If you put me in an open, outdoor environment, I feel relaxed and learn much more readily. And my spirit level? Well, I would say I am not high spirited, nor am I dull. I am not outgoing but I am certainly not shy. Can you see how my spirit level might change the way I absorb information?

Now compare me to my other half, John. He innately absorbs information like a sponge and also has learned ways to study. He may be a genius by genetics and by practice, but he absolutely cannot concentrate when there is noise. Where I can study in a cafe no problem, John has to be in silence, like in a library, in order to concentrate. His spirit level is very high - he can get excited about the smallest opportunity to learn.

So as you can see, we are a product of several factors, as are our horses. They are born with innate characteristics and a certain spirit level that they get from their parents and relatives. This is controlled by genetics/breed (take "hot" bloods, like Arabians, versus "cold" bloods, like Clydesdale. You will never find a Clydesdale with the spirit of an Arabian!).Then you take into consideration their history. What have they learned? Have people been kind to them? Did they learn not to trust humans? Have they learned that they can bully humans? Were they taken away from other horses as a foal and lack natural socialization that they would learn in a herd?
How are they effected by environment? Claustrophobia? Agoraphobia?

All these variables come in to play when attempting to learn.
What is learning? Well...

1. To gain knowledge, comprehension, or mastery of through experience or study.

2. To fix in the mind or memory; memorize

3.a. To acquire experience of or an ability or a skill in b. To become aware

 

 If you're a horse, what can you learn while you are fleeing for your life? Nothing! The learning side of your brain has been shut down so that you can focus on survival! So how do we get our right-brained horses to learn? We need to get them in a learning frame of mind. In other words, we need to get the left side of their brain working.

Where does Satin fall? How does she learn?

Well, Satin is innately left-brained. She's naturally curious and brave. With just that information one might assume she would learn quickly. Wrong! If that was all that mattered than it would be true. She has a long history of being pushed and pushed and pushed without a single human ever really asking her opinion. So she's long since lost the idea of being allowed to do anything. Her first reaction to any learning situation is to ignore me. She thinks she knows what's going to happen since we've been doing it this way for 13 years. We have thick, tall walls to break down before I can show her that I am different. But when we do break open a little hole in that wall she absorbs information like a wiz-kid! 

Satin is hardly effected by her environment, so that rarely causes any flux in her learning frame of mind. But she is fairly dull on the spirit scale and needs encouragement to want to learn. 

It's complex, isn't it?

What spurred my interest in this subject was a new horse I've been playing with. He's young and mostly unburdened by human trauma. So his learned behavior is quite limited. This plays a huge role in how he learns as we have almost no hurdles to climb to get him to listen to me. He has a moderate spirit and is innately LB. His innate character is willing and eager, again unburdened by years of force unlike Satin. After playing with him just a handful of times I have been blown away by his desire to please. He wants to be with me as much as I want to be with him. He wants to learn. I can't emphasize this enough. It has really knocked my socks off. 

His different learning style has taken me to new levels in my own savvy. I can see my role as a teacher more now than ever before. But just as much I see my role as a student. 

Looking forward to the future.