Month: April 2019

As this was the final session where George Spencer and I worked together, I was very happy with the progress Spencer made through the duration of the 9 weeks. As well as this, I feel as if I am now better equipt to handle physically impaired riders and aid them the best I can in progressing and developing through the RDA program. I thoroughly enjoyed working with Spencer and George and have learned a lot from them over the 9 weeks.

I believe that through the 9 weeks, my capacity for speaking and holding random conversations has increased. As it is quite hard for me to hold a conversation with someone I don’t spend much time with, as well as someone who doesn’t possess the ability to see or comprehend a lot of the things that I usually speak about, it has helped me in coming up with random, interesting topics on the spot. Spencer has also become very receptive to my voice and now smiles when my partner and I say hello or goodbye, he also now verbally thanks the horse whenever he finishes a session or she does something that he asked her to do. Although in these closing weeks of the rotation, Spencer has become increasingly stubborn in partaking in exercises or stretching and constantly asks to ‘go bye-bye’. Despite this, I believe he very much enjoys his time spent on the horse and has developed a connection both with the horse and us. For example, on the 8th week, the usual horse, Connie, was injured and we had a replacement horse. Although Spencer liked the new horse and seemed to enjoy the change of pace that it brought, he constantly asked about Connie and if she was ok. After the session, he even asked to go pat Connie and wanted to check if she was ok.

 

I believe that the connection between Spencer and our group was quite strong and after 9 weeks he had definitely made a lot of improvements, both physically and mentally.

In the final moments of the session, Spencer even hugged both my partner and me, whilst in the first session he was reluctant to even high five us. This second rotation has by far been my favourite out of the two and I hope Spencer continues to ride and live happily despite his conditions. Although it was quite challenging sometimes, dealing with someone who is blind and unable to walk very well by themselves, it was very interesting overall and I hope to see him and my partner for the rotation again at RDA.

I believe throughout these past 2 or so months I demonstrated LO5 and LO4. Although Spencer is very easy to work with, his condition does inhibit his ability to do everything the other riders do, as such it is up to my partner and me to work collaboratively in creating mildly modified versions of each activity so Spencer can still partake. On account of LO4, I believe that it was quite challenging throughout the first few sessions to establish a connection with Spencer especially accounting for his inability to see. It required a fair amount of preserving and multiple tries to get him to open up and respond to my voice, however, after he felt comfortable with me, it was very easy to get him to try different activities and hold conversations.

After six weeks of working with Spencer, and George, the three of us have become quite good friends. Spencer is still able to recognise us by our voices and can now determine who is who by the feel of our shirts and interestingly, hai. He seems to become increasingly relaxed around us as the weeks pass and now almost instantly walks in the correct direction of the stables without too much prompting from George and me, even without the use of eyesight. He has also developed a strong bond with the horse, Connie and now calls out for her while she is warming up.

Spencer has also become more physically independent on the horse. Although George and I never really had to help him whilst on the horse, he now carries out exercises such as stirrup standing and passing a small ball from one side to another with relative ease. He also now holds long conversations with us, sometimes starting them and asking us questions instead of the original ‘we ask he answers’ format. I have also realised that Spencer is a bit of a joker, making subtle jokes referring to things that George and I say. For example, around the 4th session, Spencer began saying, ‘bye-bye’, ‘me go home’ and ‘bed-time’ at random stages through the session. My partner always responded to this with ‘no no no buddy, we’ve got to take Connie for a walk first’. After this Spencer began to respond to requests with the exact same line, later shortening it to just ‘no no no’ then laughing hysterically. He also tells jokes about how bad the horses smell and about how my hair feels like a cat’s. I feel that LO5 is strongly represented here, not only for me but Spencer as well. We began to work together more fluidly after this point and achieved much more in the time frame of the session. Additionally, my partner and I worked more efficiently together, coming up with different activities and stretch for Spencer to try out. It is clear that communication and collaboration is important when working with someone who relies on you to describe the surrounding, once we established that base level of familiarity, it was much easier to work together.

Despite the relationship that has developed between us over the weeks, I believe that Spencer may be getting bored now. He often asks to go home and get off halfway through the sessions. However, once he does dismount he often wants to stay with me and George as well as pat Connie.  He doesn’t seem interested by just walking around the area now, only censing his constant asking to go home or have dinner when we either leave the arena so he can feel the breeze and listen to new sounds or give him some new exercise to do. 

His horse skills have also improved, now possessing the ability to stand in his stirrups for over 15 seconds, far surpassing his initial record of 5. He has become far more confident with his ability to ride and was even able to dismount in the area for the first time, granted with some help from my partner and me.

 

After three weeks of working with Spencer and George, I feel much more comfortable working with someone with Spencers conditions. Although the initial learning curve was quite steep, and the number of little things to remember about how to speak and help Spencer move around was a little overwhelming, we have now settled into a sort of routine. My partner and I work well together, and Spencer seems to enjoy the time spent on the horse very much, though he has started to get a little bored with the constant circling of the track and is now being a bit more stubborn in partaking in what we ask of him. Despite this, he responds well to us as he feels comfortable with the sound of our voices. Goerge and I were chosen specifically to work with Spencer as we are both quite tall and have deep voices, as Spencer is used to the sound of his dad’s voice he feels more comfortable responding to us than some of the other volunteers.

I very much enjoy working with Spencer and he likes working with us. His ailments do make it a bit challenging for him to partake in all the activities that are set out for the other kids, but when prompted, he is able to do almost all of them, with a little help of course. Working with Spencer has opened my eyes a little more to how it must be to be without one of our key senses. It has taught me how to interact with and treat someone who may be visually impaired. Although it is still quite challenging to get onto and off of the horse due to his cerebral palsy, he is now finding it easy to maintain his posture whilst riding. Even despite his condition, he is quite a good rider and never does anything to endanger himself, the horse or anyone around him, unlike my previous partner. Spencer seems very aware of what he is doing and that he is riding something that is alive and intelligent.

Spencer has also started to call George and me by our names, able to recognize us by our voices. He always gives a high five when he hears someone walk past and pats the horse after every session without prompting. Despite my initial thoughts, Spencer is very self-sufficient, intelligent and compassionate and has taught me a lot about dealing with the physically disabled.

Though this week he has become a little reluctant to do some of the stretches that we ask him to do. Although stretching will probably not do much for him, it is good to warm up before riding. I think that he just gets bored and wants to start riding right away.

As of this week, we have started a new rotation at RDA with new partners and kids. My new partner is someone from outside of school named Geroge, he is currently volunteering during time off from work and will be my partner for the next 9 weeks. The kid that we will be working with is named Spencer and has cerebral palsy, autism, speech impediment and is mostly blind.

This will be the first time that I have worked with a physically impaired kid at RDA, both in terms of visual impairment and the cerebral palsy. I believe it will be quite a difficult rotation as my partner and I will have to support Spencer physically, much more so than my previous partner, as well as describe and help navigate the area around him to ensure he feels safe at all times.

Despite this, today was actually much more relaxed than I had first anticipated. Although Spencer is quite autistic he is very aware of himself and is very nice, interesting and compliant, willing to take part in most of the activities. Additionally, though it is still a little odd trying to convey messages or speak without the reference to the surroundings and general things related to sight, conversing with Spencer was easy.

Learning to speak with Spencer in a way that doesn’t rely too much on pointing out different things in the arena or using, as mentioned previously, sight-related words like ‘white’ or ‘look over there’, is more difficult than it may seem. Speaking to someone who doesn’t understand the concept of what white or blue is something that seems very alien to me and I believe it will be a challenge to reconfigure my conversations with Spencer to accommodate for the blindness.

Although Spencer is very kind and, so far, relatively easy to work with, he does seem a little stubborn and unable to accept change. Constantly referring to me as one of his old riding instructors named Cate, and calling the horse (named Connie), Jack (name of his old horse).

I believe it will be an excellent learning experience working with Spencer and my partner, George for the next few months as I will have to change my perspective a little to accommodate for the differences that Spencer and myself have.