04/03/2026
Delighted to support Spence Horse Sense sharing her horse knowledge for another year at Dukes Equestrian
I first properly started exploring reward based training with horses back in 1999 after a visit to the lovely Linda Hams . Linda got me thinking about why we trained horses the way we traditionally do and helped me see that I could apply so much of the theory I learned on my Psychology degree in a really practical way.
I'll be honest, I made a bit of a mess of it at the start- I didn't have anyone to teach me, so I just had a go. Over the following few years I refined things, but really, my main teachers were the horses, along with my solid Psychology grounding in learning theory.
Along the way I discovered a few other trainers that were doing similar things, Shawna Corrin Karrasch , Heather Simpson, Ben Hart, Donna Skinsley, Jenni Nellist. They served as inspiration and encouragement to keep going.
I kept practicing, observing, learning. I taught my first 'clicker training' workshop in Northern Ireland in 2003, and over the years went on to teach workshops across the UK and Ireland, and even in Finland and Norway!
But I realised I didn't want to be known as 'the clicker training lady', because for me, training with a tool like the clicker is not a method.
I want people to understand horse behaviour, motivation and emotion, as well as learning theory. The clicker is just one tool in the training tool kit.
But tools are only as good as the hands that hold them. My goal is happy, relaxed, safe horses. I want people to have good relationships with their horses. I want them to feel like they have partnership, not forced or pressured, but a horse that chooses to engage and enjoys the activities that they do together.
This doesn't come from a training method, this comes from a true, deep understanding of horses and what makes them tick. So I focus on that. Training with a clicker can be a part of that, but the whole is just so much more.
If you attend a class or workshop with me, I really hope that you will see that. Having said all that, the use of positive reinforcement in horse training can be pretty cool, and I would really like to see it better understood and better utilised!
So if you'd like to learn more about training with the clicker, among other things, give me a shout, or better still, come along to my Northern Ireland based workshop in a few weeks time!!
I'm running a series of practical workshops in 2026 sponsored by the brilliant Equine-X, at Dukes Equestrian near Portadown, Northern Ireland:
22nd March 2026 Getting Started with the Clicker
12th April 2026 Target Training
21st June Liberty Training
27th July Training In-Hand
TBC Confidence Building
More detail and booking forms on my website,
https://spencehorsesense.com/spence-horse-sense-events-2026/ thank you 😊 🙏 xo
