The Art of Natural Dressage

I have been reading what you have on this forum and I can't wait to get started! I am very excited. I do have a question. Maybe I missed it, but what are some of the verbal cues that you use in conjuction with the ground stuff? Like the cordeo?

Thanks so much,

Ivy

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http://www.ivyshorses.com
Blog: http://www.EquestrianHarmony.wordpress.com

Hey Ivy!

Welcome! I took a quick tour around your website and it looks like you're doing lots of cool things!

As for verbal cues, there are several schools of thought.

Many of us use some version of clicker training (though not all). I use my own variation on the theme without clicker (since I can't seem to keep track of anything and am trying to shed as many tools/tack/bits and pieces as possible).

Anyway, I think your verbal cues can be anything you'd like them to be, knowing that consistency is helpful. I tend to say the movement to them ("Step over" for hind lateral work, "Cross Over" for front leg lateral work, "Come to me" for the shoulder lean towards me in the cordeo, "Away" for the shoulder lean away from me in the cordeo, and "lift" for a shoulder/neck lift into ramener in the cordeo, though I've been using "Pose" for ramener without it). I'm also experimenting with naming body parts or the thing they're focusing on, like "Leg" for leg lifts, and "Target" for them to touch the target with their noses.

I'm just learning how well these work when combined with energy/movement/body language. (In fact, as I'm starting to get better at this, I'm starting to move away from the verbal cues.)

Karen's diaries with Cisco and Tamarack are wonderful resources for things like this -- she's doing some amazing microshaping with them, and is very clear about what she's working on. (Much more subtle and sophisticated than I am!)



Hope this helps; am looking forward to hearing about your process!

Best,
Leigh

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"Ours is the portal of hope. Come as you are." -- Rumi
www.imaginalinstitute.com

Hello Ivy!

Like Leigh said, it's really up to you what cues you want to use -- the most important thing is that you're consistent, and that the cue words are somewhat different from each other (ho, whoa, no, go, all sound very similar, for example). I've also found that a two-syllable cue works great, with kind of "prep" word, and then the "cue" word; for example, "and walk," or "get up!"

Here is a list of cues that I put in my diary that I try to use.

Behaviors and Names:

Come in this direction.............Here
Touch my finger target.............Touch
Touch the regular target...........Target
Change directions towards me.......Switch
Change directions away from me.....Reverse
Go away from me....................Away
Jambette...........................Lift
Collection.........................Collect
Long and low.......................Lo-o-ong
GOTM...............................Step up
Pelvic Tuck........................Tuck
Back crunch........................Stretch
Bow................................Bow
Engage the hind legs...............Hind
Start walking......................Walk
Start trotting.....................Trot
Canter/jump/come...................a “smooch” sound
Spanish walk/trot..................Up
Go over the poles..................Poles
Go over the jump...................Jump
Move with me.......................Lead
Stop moving/Freeze.................Whoa
Lift your head.....................Head up
Pick up your foot..................Pickitup (“one” word Very Happy )
Back up............................Back
Eat grass.........................Eat
I’m coming (from a distance, like from the barn).........a whistle (mid to high to mid-high tone)
Keep going with that thought......Go-o-o-d
That's right......................Yes
Keep doing exactly that...........Hold, hold, hold (repeated until I say, "Yes!" when he can be done)

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"Do you give the horse his strength?"
~Job 39:19a

www.cambriahorsemanship.com

Titum and I hardly have any fixed verbal cues at all. Sometimes we have a word when we learn a specific new exercise (but only when it is a clear exercise and not a way of moving differently or so). As soon as the exercise becomes more normal for us, the verbal cue disappears. I don´t plan to interact without verbal speech with my horses, it just happens somehow and feels more normal to me. I would have to remind myself each time to say the word and that´s not what I want to do.

We do have a lot of talking as reward signals, but then again, no fixed word. I use "fine" a lot, but for example when Titum does something energetic that I really love (like Passage at the moment), then I shout "yippieh" or "wow". There are at least five more reward words that I use regularly. Again this is not planned, I just happen to say what I think at that moment.

Still we do get along in our training somehow. So you see - also in the middle of the chaos interactions and happy partnerships are possible. I sometimes wonder how important consistency and clarity really is... or what kind of clarity it is that really matters.

I really wonder about that too - at least when it is about the traditional being consequent in that cue A must always be followed by behavior A. I guess over here with the ponies we have a 50% chance of actually achieving that.

I do have a lot of voice cues, but while Blacky is a real sucker for them (he loves me to use words only and no bodylanguage to make the puzzle harder. Sjors however sees voice cues more as something which probably just helps me getting things straight, because he'll follow to bodylanguage blindly.

Our voice-cues also aren't that consistent. For some reason every new, energetic behavior or movement at one points gets the voice-cue 'hup!' and it's the bodylanguage that tells them which hup I actually mean. Then I do try to find better words, but it still is chaotic.

I'll also just stick to words that accidentally work by the way. Like for now when we're working on the levade (low rear) with Blacky; he accidentally did that when we were standing in front of a jump and I said 'hier' (here) in order to ask him to come closer. So now our voice-cue for levade is hier, which is pretty weird but it does work very well for us.

So I would say, experiment!

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New horse book: Mandala horses!

Never stop making mistakes! Natural Dressage

Romy wrote:




Oh, Romy, I think that's a fabulous point! And really intriguing.

I'm finding that the more my horses and I do together, the less important it is to have one, specific, consistent verbal or physical cue for something -- it was really helpful when we started, I think for both me and Circe and Stardust.

And it still is really helpful when we're just starting to learn something new.

But as they're figuring out that I'm going to be asking something, and I'm figuring out how to use body language/energy better, the clarity is starting to come in the intention, rather than the specific word or gesture. It's all getting more fluid.

In some ways, I think the language fluency metaphor is really helpful. When we start to learn a new language, we learn specific words. Then we start to slowly string them together, having to think fairly hard about grammar. As we gain fluency, we start to think in phrases, then in sentences, then in paragraphs.

(I actually used to use this metaphor a lot when teaching harp to people when they were learning to read music: first you look at the little black dots (words), then you looked at the chords (short phrases), then you looked at the arc of the musical phrase (sentence), then the whole piece (paragraph) for meaning.

I'm just starting to get glimpses with my guys about how this is like making music -- even mostly like jazz, where you start with the theme but aren't caught in the literal reproduction of specific notes (or words or gestures in this case).

And it's like improvising with a partner in dance -- there is a common language of movement, but it becomes about reading and reacting to each other, rather than doing a prescribed, fixed set of steps...

Sorry Ivy, went off on a wander!

But I think Romy is ultimately right, that it's more about clarity than literal consistency.

Best,
Leigh

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"Ours is the portal of hope. Come as you are." -- Rumi
www.imaginalinstitute.com

Thanks, everyone.

That really helped. I use lots of verbal cues as I have been teaching my horse tricks. I think that it will be very helpful, at least in the beginning for us. I do hope to be able to truly "dance" with my horse someday. I guess that you wouldn't need to keep a one way conversation to do that. I am very excited by all that I see you guys can do.

God bless,

Ivy

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http://www.ivyshorses.com
Blog: http://www.EquestrianHarmony.wordpress.com

It's rather funny, but even if you think you have taught your horse a verbal cue, so often they are really reading our body language. The only way to tell is to stand some distance away, turn your back to your horse and then give the verbal cue.

There are very few horses who have really learned verbal cues, because when we give them, we are often standing in the same place, in the same way, with the same expression on our faces. Even the most subtle body languge can be read by the horse...we may not think we are using any body language at all, and yet they can discern it.

They are amazing!

Very true!

I think that Blacky really can follow vocal cues alone. For example, he will also do exercises on voice cues when I'm sitting in a chair outside the paddock fence. But there also are exercises that I consciously support a lot with my own movements, especially when it's about collection, because the ponies really mimick that. If I just ask for a rear, Blacky will fling himself up through his neck. If however I combine the same voice cue with sagging through my knees, straightening my upper body and really collecting myself, he will do a real slow pesade, coming out of his hindlegs. So bodylanguage definately plays a big role in how exactly I ask for an exercise, but otherwise Blacky also is super on voice-cues alone.
With Sjors however, who focuses much, much, much more on what he sees, it really is a different story. He does seem to get some support out of the words, but above all listens to my bodylanguage seems to use my voice more as a sort of guide for more or less energy.

So how important voice cues are for your training also depends heavily on how your horse learns best.

_________________

New horse book: Mandala horses!

Never stop making mistakes! Natural Dressage

It really depends on the horse indeed. I used to ride Atreyu solely on voice cues. That resulted in that my instructor really had to say "go in the second gear" instead of "trot"
Evita is not listening to voice cues.. I can ask her for a potato and she will rear as high as when I would say "up".
So the most important thing is to see on which cues the horse reacts.. are they focussed on speech, body language or other signs? And make sure these cues are somewhat consistent and clear.

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I really like Leigh's language analogy, and Karen's point about the horse reading the body language instead. With the vocal cues, by far the greatest benefit I have found in them is to be for myself -- I think Caspian could care less, he doesn't really know any of them, except for a few. What I have found is that naming a behavior focuses me very well, making my intent much clearer. Therefore, I say, "trot," when riding and naturally my body goes into "trot" mode. I think about it much less, so my cues are much more subtle, which makes Caspian oh such a happy horse.

It makes sense that once the trainer/human is more advanced, more focused and together, the vocal cues can be faded out, or just done internally.

_________________
"Do you give the horse his strength?"
~Job 39:19a

www.cambriahorsemanship.com