Carsen Gregg

Assignment #2

SES 335

1. List the date, time, coach, team and school you have selected to observe.

a. Thursday, February 15, 2017, at 4:00 p.m. with Jill Pelzel, who coaches the Fall

River Farm Interscholastic Equestrian Association middle school and high school

teams. The facility is located in Fort Lupton, Colorado.

2. What is your relationship with this team or coach?

a. Jill Pelzel runs a boarding facility and sale barn. I have bought several horses

from her and boarded my horses with her for some time. When I was in high

school, I competed on her team.

3. Did the high school coach utilize a written practice plan for the observed session?

a. She did not utilize a written practice plan for this session. However, she did have

exercises in mind to work on improvement in specific areas.

4. Did he/she use specific times for specific objectives?

a. There were no specific times allotted for each objective. With horses you work as

long as is necessary to achieve the objective. If they are good, you reward them

by moving on to the next phase of the planned lesson. If they do not respond well

to the exercise you repeat until they master it or determine when you have pushed

enough for the day. This decision also depends on the age and experience of both

rider and horse.

5. Obtain a copy of the written practice plan and include with your paper.

a. During the session, I did however, check the time and write it down with what

was being done as far as the instruction.

1. Did your coach use or outline any practice objectives for the observed session. If yes,

what were they? And if no, what practice objectives might he/she have used?

a. I specifically asked her what her objectives were for this session. She said that

the horse being used was well trained, but the student being taught was gaining

confidence to a larger fence or jump height. This horse also struggles with

dropping her shoulder which was a main theme through the entire lesson, having

the rider push the horse out and lift the shoulder.

1. Describe any skills that were presented or represented skill correction during the

observed practice.

a. Throughout the entire practice, the student received feedback. One major goal

was taking inside turns without letting the horse fall in. This required a lot of

focus and persistence from the rider. The rider was asked to repeat exercises until

she and the horse were able to demonstrate an appropriate level of competence.

2. Describe the demonstration. What arrangement/formation was used?

a. In the beginning, the rider was allowed to warm up at will. This involves letting

the horse stretch through the back at the walk, trot, and canter. Then working on

large circles to get the horse listening. When the practice time actually came the

coach started to instruct the rider to work more on the flat, giving the rider

feedback. They then progressed to warming up over smaller fences or jumps.

 Following successful demonstration, the rider started working on courses or a

series of jumps in a specific order with the jumps being raised to a desired height

to finish.

3. Was there an introduction, and what was it?

a. There was a little bit of an introduction, but the coach was very accommodating to

me since we are acquainted, and we discussed quite a bit, including the best and

worst parts of coaching kids in this program.

4. Was there an explanation of the skill, and what was it?

a. This practice was residual work from a meet or competition. They worked on

things that came up during the meet.

5. Did the coach relate the skill to any transfer of learning/previous learning?

a. The things they worked on in the practice were because of mistakes the rider had

made during a meet or competition. The coach made specific references to parts

of the course from the meet.

6. Did the coach identify any relevant cues?

a. She would remind the rider throughout the course to push the horse’s shoulder out

to make a smooth turn and a nice jump. If the horse dropped her shoulder the

rider would risk bringing a rail of the fence down.

7. Who demonstrated the skill?

a. The rider was proficient enough to know what the coach was explaining so no

demonstrations were done.

1. Summarize with an evaluation of the practice session.

 a. Overall, I thought the coach did a reasonably good job and was effective in her

teaching. She utilized good techniques such as asking questions for

understanding. The questions were for the coach to know that the rider

understood what was being asked and why they were doing it. She did this when

she asked the rider to trot into a turn on the haunches. This horse had a limited

attention span, so she appropriately structured the lesson to suit the horse’s needs

without compromising the content.

2. Was it organized?

a. It was organized in the sense that the coach had a couple of objectives in mind.

Instructed the student to do things to address those objectives and progressed

through a series of activities with a point of conclusion determined.

3. Did the coach use a written plan?

a. No. I have rarely seen any equestrian coach or trainer utilize a written plan. They

will, however, utilize online resources, clinics and other professional’s exercises

at home because they like the results that were achieved and to keep things

interesting.

4. Were the athletes attentive?

a. Yes, there was visible change when feedback was given.

5. How much time was spent on learning new skills?

a. This was residual issues from a meet or competition, so nothing new was

introduced. It was more about correction and improvement.

6. How much time was allotted for practice?

 a. In the equestrian world a normal practice is an hour, but can finish early or last as

long as it needs. This particular practice took about 30 minutes as the horse being

used would get upset if the exercise was drilled too much.

7. Were skills practiced under conditions similar to game or competition conditions?

a. Unless you trailer the horses somewhere else there is not a way to 100% represent

the conditions of a meet or horse show. The horses become quite familiar with

their home turf, so unless you really change things up or go off-site, it is difficult

to replicate a competition at home.

8. How and what would you change to improve on this practice session?

a. I would have my riders utilize the flatwork time to drop their stirrups and

condition their leg muscles. This improves their seats and leg positions. I would

also have a better wrap up, in which we would discuss things that should be

worked on further and goals for the next practice.

5. Practice Plan

Rewrite the practice plan for your observed practice – include and identify all of the twelve

elements of an effective practice plan as incorporated with the observed practice.

1. Date, Time, Length

a. Thursday, February 9th, 2017. 4:00 p.m.-4:30 p.m.

2. Practice Objective

a. To work on skill previously identified as needing improvement, specifically

holding the horse straight and not allowing it to drop its shoulder.

3. Equipment
 a. Rider, horse, arena, necessary tack for specific horse, and jumps.

4. Practice Schedule

a. See table below.

5. Warm up

a. The rider was mounted before the start time of the practice and had time to loosen

up the horse’s muscles in preparation for the practice.

6. Practice Previously Taught Skills

a. The rider demonstrated specific skills including turn on the haunches, counter

canter, and flying lead changes.

7. Teaching & Practice of New Skills

a. Although not a new concept, holding the horse’s shoulder and pushing the horse

out into the corner was the biggest skill worked on.

8. Practice Under Competitive Conditions

a. The closest you can get to representing competitive conditions is the completion

of a full course of jumps without interruption.

9. Cool down

a. This was done at will at the end of the practice.

10. Coaches comments to players

a. Instruction, feedback and corrections were given throughout the entire practice.

11. Evaluation of practice by coaches

a. In this case, there is typically only one coach. So if there is any evaluation it is

between the coach and the rider.

 12. Conditioning

a. With the exception of collegiate teams, conditioning is left to the rider’s

discretion. Coaches might encourage the students to work on core strength and

other areas that contribute to a better rider and reduced risk of injury.

Time (p.m.) Description of practice and instruction

4:00 The rider was given time to loose trot and canter the horse to allow the horse’s
muscles to warm up.

4:03 Flatwork began with the coach. They worked on lengthening and collecting the
walk, turning on the haunches. The horse was swinging her hind end out and
was backing around the turn on the haunches so they made the correction and
trotted into the movement. They worked on lengthening and collecting the
canter and moved into a counter canter. They made sure that if one exercise was
done in one direction, that it was also done in the other direction. During this
period, the coach made corrections and would talk through each gate. She
would also ask questions about what was going on and why they were making
the corrections they were.

4:09 They started to add a single, small vertical jump into a canter circle to start
warming the horse up to jump. The coach would remind the rider of what they
worked on during the flat work.

4:10 They added another small vertical jump to the circle, making sure the practice
the flatwork in between each obstacle. This was exercise was done 3 times.

4:11 They did the same exercise with the two vertical jumps, but in the opposite
direction. This was also done 3 times.

4:12 The rider and horse were given a break to walk and catch their breaths. During
this break period the jumps were raised.

4:17 Instructions were given to the rider about a course of jumps.

4:19 The rider began her first jumping course. Instructions were given as the rider
made her way around the course.

4:21 A modified version of the jumping course was created to isolate any problems
 that appeared while the rider rode the original course.

4:24 Problems occurred during this modified course and were dealt with when they
showed up.

4:25 The horse and rider got a walk break and the jumps were raised again. The
coach then gave the rider a short course of only 3 jumps to complete at the
maximum height set.

4:29 The rider completed the course, concentrating on what they had been working
on during the practice and had a good round.

4:30 The lesson was concluded and the horse and rider were allowed to cool down.