As I spend more time at my CFE and get more accustomed to the routine and the general tranquility of my environment I feel more and more at home here. It is hard for me to write a blog post that sums up my experience as I feel like the lessons I am taking from Empowered by Horses is on a more intuitive, emotional level than those that are directly taught. So far from my experience I know that without a doubt I support equine facilitated wellness and that I would not hesitate to recommend this as an option for any student I have, or person I know, going through various struggles in life.

This week I had the opportunity to hear Carla speak about PTSD and equine facilitated wellness which was another very formative experience for me. I won’t go into too much detail here but essentially it was about how horses can help us and why. So that includes things such as the fact that being with horses is proven to help with mindfulness and lower cortisol levels. As I helped Carla prepare for the talk I also went into the research and although there is not much I was inspired by the research I found and I will continue to follow the topic into the future.

As far as my own pedagogy is concerned I feel like this experience ties in very well to social emotional learning. I am constantly thinking how I can take this peaceful, mindful experience I am having into the classroom to benefit my future students. Therefore I have been thinking more about the benefits of having a class pet, or having a peaceful corner. It also bring to light the importance of getting to know your students to know what situations they have lived through so that you can work out how to make them feel the most safe and secure in your classroom.

I look forward to the following week and to see what new experiences it will bring!