The new host is reaallllly hard to listen to, although I love her energy. Its actually painful on the ear drums.
Wow, I like the new host better than Natashia. I wanted to listen to Natashia but I found her hard to listen to. I did find Natashia’s warm up audio super useful - tracking it on my watch is just a pain. I don’t think it’s super deep info, no but it’s good for people who are changing disciplines or just getting started. I use a variety of different readings and watchings (I think I belong to almost everything) because sooner or later something someone says is going to stick somewhere. Some analogy. Something.
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I always wondered why she thought yelling the same thing over and over to the student was an adequate sales pitch. If I say something more than once, and it doesn’t appear to be happening, I call the student over, and we talk about whether they are understanding what I’m saying or do I need to clarify. At this point, most of my regular students know to say, “I don’t know how to do that, or what does that mean?” instead of just riding along hoping I won’t notice.
Sorry that the lady fell on hard times. I hope the new person does well.
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It was supposed to be a tongue-in-cheek demonstration of why the “traditional” pedagogical approach often fails to reach students.
As to why students don’t ask for clarification when they don’t understand what is being said? Well, I’m sure it’s different for everyone. However, as one such student, I’ll explain my own reasons for not asking. I was finally diagnosed with ADD at 35yo. Diagnosis has been helpful from the standpoint that it explains why my perspective & reactions always seemed off compared to those of my lesson mates as child & teen. I’m over-attuned to my body on a somatic level. I labor under the weight of detailed assumptions** about other people’s thoughts and preferences only to have them get annoyed with me because those assumptions don’t even cross the mind of a neurotypical person. I don’t trust my own judgment after a lifetime of authority figures telling me I exhibit poor judgment. What they don’t understand is that what looks to them as an impulse decision is actually the result of agonizing to the point of mental fatigue.
So when an instructor says something like “half halt!” and I look around & everyone but me seems to understand what they’re asking, I’m not saying anything! (Seriously. I’ve been riding for 40 years. For 35 of those I had no forking clue what a half halt actually was.) Asking questions sucks because I can’t explain what I’m asking half the time because I feel & see physical processes that you can’t.
** An incident I personally witnessed that is the perfect example of the non-neurotypical assumption phenomenon: The IEA coach at a previous barn instructed one of the participants – a girl with both Aspergers & ADD – to put the horses out. Off she went. 20 minutes later she returned to the barn & stated the horses were turned out. Tired IEA coach discovered that 4 equines were still in & proceeded to yell at participant for slacking off & not following instructions. Tears welled in participant’s eyes: “But, Miss Sarah, you said I should turn the horses out & Fluffy, Mopsie, Fireball, and Fred are ponies!!”
Let me tell you – while I’m not on the Aspergers/Autism spectrum, I felt this child’s dismay & embarrassment in my very soul – I 100% could relate. She wasn’t trying to be a smart Alec or facetious. She’d done what she thought was correct & would make the IEA coach happy. I could also sympathize with the exhausted IEA coach, who just wanted to turn out all the animals in the barn, regardless of their technical classification within the equine family so she could go home & get some sleep already. She was actually a lovely, understanding, supportive coach who worked well with this particular participant. Just too tired & frazzled after a 12 hour day to get through the whole mental process involved to catch on to the why of the participant’s actions.
Eta: I tuned into one of Natasha’s free Intro Q & A sessions for overcoming nerves back when I was playing around with building out a yoga-based offering therein. Yeah, she’s aiming at a very basic common denominator with her content. Are there more skilled riders/trainers out there? For sure. I can load up my horse & haul out to 5 such people in under 30 minutes. But I live where you stand a decent chance of running into someone who has a saddle model named after them in the grocery store. Lol. There’s a huge number of riders out there that have nothing, though. Zero opportunity to access remotely correct, competent instruction. And they’d likely be too intimidated to reach out to any instructor like that, anyway. Natasha at least filled a real need with a solid intro to the basics with a non-intimidating personal style. 
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Natasha did a video on how she has sold all but her GP friesian, and put her gear into storage. The video was very heartfelt and I could definitely relate to what she was going through. She passed YRS on to a British friend to continue.
Her podcasts are entertaining.
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So much this.
COVID has actually been a mixed blessing for me, as video lessons and online are so much better for the way I process information. Analogies are awesome, but please show me these at the halt and then let me go ride the exercise and just tell me “not yet” or “you’ve got it”. Give me constructive feedback back at the halt, and then make an analogy again. Continual shouted instructions just make me anxious and scramble my brain and yet this is something SO many instructors do. And asking questions when you’re a cerebral sort if you’re matched to a purely physical mechanical coach is just a non-starter. I ended up with lesson anxiety for awhile after being in this position.
I’ve definitely had the type of lesson depicted in the tongue in cheek commercial. It was super relatable (even if her voice is grating).
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DBYC, thank you for sharing. That is insightful and helpful to learn for an instructor. This might come as a surprise to you, but I have worked with all sorts of people over the years. Also, I have OCD (real, diagnosed, OCD, not the crap that “everyone” claims they have) and Sensory Processing Disorder - which means that normal interactions can throw me into a fit of rage with zero provocation. Yes, there is medication for that fortunately. So as an instructor, I might be more understanding of your plight than others. Nonetheless, yours is a difficult journey and I really appreciate you educating us. Great food for thought! <3
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I hope I did not come across as minimizing or negating the challenges of others. That was not my intention. Just wanted to explain my personal reasons for not speaking up & seeking clarification as a riding student in my younger years.
You bring up an excellent point regarding the impact of individual background on teaching style, too, that ties in with the experiences @Alterration described. My set of ADD characteristics is actually a major part of why I’m a kicka$$ voice teacher. Not only do I see the minute physical processes going on in the student’s body, I can also mirror them in my own. That enables me to reverse engineer the answer to why the student might be pushing a 1/4 step sharp, etc. It works well for teaching private yoga sessions, too. BUT…it is a negative for teaching regular group Vinyasa style classes. I hate the way I cue. Especially via Zoom. To the point that I don’t even bother trying to teach public group classes anymore. 
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