Hold Your Horses is happy to offer a new educational program, Horse Science for Home Schoolers.   It will provide students an opportunity to learn various science topics related to horses in a safe and fun environment. The program will consist of weekly 90 minute classes for 4 weeks. It is designed for children in grades 1-4, but we can make adjustments to accommodate other ages. The 4 week program is offered at a cost of $175 per child. There will be a maximum of 6 participants.

At the beginning of each session, the students will start by haltering and leading the horses to the hitching post, and will spend some time grooming the horses and getting to know them. At the end of each session they will turn the horses out in the arena to observe herd behavior and feed them carrots and apples. This will give them the opportunity to practice handling the horses and build their relationship with them. On the last day of the class, students will have an opportunity to ride the horses in the arena.

The agenda for each week is as follows:

Week 1:  Safe Handling of the Horse/Anatomy

• Approaching, Haltering and Leading

• Grooming: Safety precautions, tools used, checking horse for injuries and swelling

• Learn the correct names for the horse’s body parts and compare to human parts

• Venn diagram to demonstrate body parts humans and horses have in common

• Label names of body parts on the horses

Week 2:  Senses and Psychology of the Horse

• Sight: Binocular, Monocular and blind spots-how does horses’ sight compare to ours?

• Horses’ Hearing, Touch and Smell

• Factors that affect a horse’s character (breed, age, experience)

• Understanding Body language

• Observing Herd behavior

• Play Anatomy memory game (to review what we learned last week)

Week 3: Assessing the Health of the Horse

• Normal temperature, pulse, and respirations.

• Practice finding vital signs on a horse using stethoscope

• Signs of a normal, healthy horse (Contentment, alertness, good appetite, sleek coat, bright eyes, normal feces and urine, intestinal sounds.)

• Checking for sand (with water in glove)

• Teeth- care, floating, how to determining age using teeth

Week 4: Nutrition/Digestive System/Riding

• Digestive system

• Label Diagram

• Types of Hay and Grain-Show types of hay, density (feeding by weight vs volume)

• Body Condition Score

• Let students determine each horse’s score

• Riding: Finish day with riding in arena