Video coaching is such a useful tool when learning to train horses and change their behaviour in the least intrusive, most positive way.

Clients shoot some video, which is then reviewed and assessed by Jo Hughes. An online call or phone call is arranged to discuss the video assessment and give feedback and instruction on how to improve and move forward.

The feedback is ridiculously detailed! Students are always utterly amazed at just how much information and nuanced detail I gain from a really short clip! 

Video Coaching is an optional extra for Silver and Gold Members. Platinum Members have this service included as a very crucial and beneficial part of their comprehensive package.

Personal coaching calls are really useful for trouble-shooting as well as providing more specific help and advice on a particular issue or even for something students would like to improve on in between lessons. These online calls or phone calls are pre-booked for a specific time.

Personal Calls are an optional extra for Gold Members. Platinum Members also have this service included as an integral part of their comprehensive package.

These are individually-created behaviour modification plans written for specifically for you and your horse. Each incredibly detailed training plan will be geared to achieving a specific goal behaviour, such as standing still for a vet to inject or overcoming the separation distress in one herd member when another one leaves.

These provide a fantastic start point for training projects and give you a structured plan to follow before moving on to being supported with video coaching and coaching calls as you move through the training process.

Once the plan is written, we send it to you on email which is then followed by a coaching call to discuss.

This service is an optional extra for Gold Members. Platinum Members also have this service included as an integral part of their comprehensive package.

Our home study courses cover everything from the initial foundation steps and how to go about introducing your horse to training with food rewards safely including how to manage/eliminate any signs of over excitement and hyper-arousal or frustration, onwards through the 7 different ways to form behaviours positively including teaching targeting and how to free shape behaviour, to step by step detailed video examples of horses actually learning certain behaviours such as how to ground tie, liberty leading and groundwork.

We explain why start and end signals are so crucial. We show you how to add cues to behaviours once you have trained them and then exactly how to maintain the horse’s motivation to continue to offer those trained behaviours into the future with a variety of different reinforcement, not just food reinforcers. We give students all the essential components and complexities of behaviour science and positive reinforcement (clicker) training explained in a simple, easily understood way AND the practical know-how for them to be able to produce beautifully calm, relaxed and safe horses no matter what their goal. 

Members have access to courses focusing on overcoming fears and anxieties and learning how to de-spook and create confidence in our horses right through to delving into learning theory, learning how all about the modern behaviour modification techniques of systematic desensitisation and counter conditioning and the latest scientific understandings of animal emotions in our How Horses Learn, Feel & Communicate course.* (not all members have access to all our courses)

We also have our unrivalled Straight & Supple Training course, where students can learn about the natural, inborn imbalances in our equines and how to develop their suppleness in order to straighten them through gymnastic training. This course teaches students how to gymnastically strengthen their horses in order to help them balance correctly by developing a language of communication and behaviours formed using appetitives/positive reinforcement instead of being based on coercion or compulsion (via the use of aversives/negative reinforcement as is the case for all other mainstream classical training).

Here you can connect with, and get support from, our wonderfully diverse community. Watch member training videos, ask questions, receive training tips and discuss training topics within a completely non-judgemental and safe space.

Your own member profile area and training journal to log your progress and get feedback, comments and lots of encouragement. It’s a great way to track your progress by writing notes on those all-important elements affecting your training.