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| Retrieved from http://www.saskatoonsportscouncil.ca/nccp-part-b.html |
So a couple weekends ago I took my first course in becoming a certified riding instructor. The NCCP course (national coaching certification program) was a 2 day, 16 hour course that I took at Whitemud Equestrian Centre. This was a horse-back riding specific course and we covered making ethical decisions, teaching and learning, preparing a lesson plan and analysing performance. Again all of this was thankfully horse specific so we covered making decisions about students and horses, teaching and learning styles to benefit both student and horse, emergency action plans involving human and horse injuries and analysing riders. This course is required in order to to be a certified instructor of beginners in Canada. This course is offered by the Alberta Equestrian Federation.
I thoroughly enjoyed this course. It was long days but I learned a lot! I currently teach 1 lesson a week and fill in when necessary. I have always gotten good feedback and see good results in my students but i definitely had room for improvement. Even going back and teaching my first lesson I felt I was much more organized and had a stronger structure to my lesson. The biggest thing I realized was I was trying to do too much in each lesson, so by picking one topic and designing my exercises around that I was able to have a better flow to my lesson and able to reinforce what I was trying to teach. This course also boosted my confidence in preparing for my coaching exam. For me the most intimidating factor was presenting a professional lesson plan and emergency action plan. Both I am aware of but its more something I keep in my head rather than formally write down. Now I feel like I understand and can formulate both plans sufficiently.
The requirements for this coaching exam involve the NCCP course, having at least your level 6 riding, completing 10 hours under a mentor, and various paper work. I actually challenged and completed my level 8 over a year ago so that is settled, done the course, and now just need to be mentored. Through the course I met an instructor at Whitemud Equine Centre so I think I will do my mentoring there as I live only 2 minutes away. Then I will go for my exam which is an un-mounted lesson, mounted lesson, lesson on a lunge line, and a stable management portion. It will be over 2 days in front of 2 examiners. Still a little apprehensive. My ultimate goal is to complete my Equine Canada Competition Coach certification but I felt that doing the instructor of beginners was a good prep for that!
Bye for now,
Kira
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