What is Horse Boy Method?

Over approximately seven years of working with autistic children and horses Rupert Isaacson, father of Rowan Isaacson (the Horse Boy) stumbled upon a number of techniques that seemed to bring about better verbal communication with his son.

For some years Rupert and Rowan literally lived in the saddle together on board a Texas Quarter Horse called Betsy. The story of how Rowan opened up to the outside world through Betsy is told in the bestselling book and award winning film, both entitled "The Horse Boy".

Soon after Rowan's success Rupert began working with other local children on the spectrum to see if what had worked with Rowan and Betsy would also work for them.

While no method can ever be right for 100% of people Rupert did find that a sufficiently high percentage of children did seem to benefit in sometimes quite astonishing ways.

After a couple more years Rupert realized that he had a system of techniques in place, that targeted different types of autism spectrum challenges. Since 2009 he has been working internationally with the Horse Boy Method™ at camps and centers in North America and Europe.

Horse Boy Method is specific to Autism and neuro-psychiatric conditions.

6-stage process

It's a simple 6 stage process. We create the right environment, address sensory issues and these then allow perspective taking and academics to be taught from the saddle: riding with the child and finally self-advocacy.

The 6 steps of Horse Boy Method are as follows:

1. Environment: we create and environment with no bad sensory triggers in which the child has perfect freedom to explore and where families can exchange information, find community and where natural surroundings, which calm the over active nervous system are the norm.
2. Sensory work: By removing bad sensory triggers, we address the child's sensory integration challenges and then work directly to this further by laying the child body to body bareback on the horse's back. "Stimming" and other stress behaviors fall away and the child's intellect engages.
3. Back-riding: We ride with the child in the saddle in front of us which has several benefits. The rhythmic rocking motion created by the rider rocks the child's hips which scientist believe floods the child's body with the feel good hormone oxytocin; sitting behind the child the rider/therapist is a voice in the child's ear, not a challenging frontal gaze that might upset the child, and can insinuate him- or herself into the child's though process; the riders arm provides deep pressure which many children on the spectrum appreciate; studies have shown that any activity that causes you to find and re-find your balance from moment to moment opens up the learning receptors of the brain, The child is thus in the ideal position to receive and retain information.
4. Perspective taking: By playing rule-based games and engaging in specially designed perspective taking exercises, we begin to re-pattern. As time goes on the child's cognitive process begins to normalize and develop in a more neurotypical fashion. It's also lots of fun.
5. Academics: Once the child has reached the perspective taking stage we can start to introduce math, reading, history, geography, the natural sciences and even languages while in the saddle. The key here is to use specialized kinetic learning techniques with both the horse and adapted play equipment. We find that most children display a level of intellect far in advance of their special ed achievements to date.
6. Self-Advocacy: By now the child is usually to big to share the saddle with us so we create the same good effects of back-riding by driving the horse in front of us in long lines. Now the objective is to encourage the child to begin teaching us about what interests them. This self-advocacy process – the ability to make a case for oneself – is the single most important survival tool that a human being can have. By now the child is usually ready to become a volunteer in the program.

Get Communication

Though some children emerge as riders, we are not here to teach children to ride. We are here to get communication. The horse is our colleague in this process.

Difficulty relating to the exterior world

If there is one thing that defines Autism it is the difficulty of relating to the exterior world. The horse can carry a person into the exterior world without resistance and provide a living, breathing environment where information can be easily received and retained.

Let the child lead

The methods we use are not based on theory. They are child led: based on years of working with Rowan and other people on the spectrum and developing what worked consistently for them.

Child's intellect can come to fore

Get the environment and sensory work right and the child's intellect has a chance to come to the fore. Often astonishingly so.

Lasting change

By following the child's lead, honing our riding skills so that we can create soft rhythms at walk, trot and canter, involving the family and addressing their needs too, using circus tricks, and even dressage we get to see rapid and lasting changes.

Learn the Method in detail.

Trainings, Certifications and Master Classes

Early in 2010 Rupert realized that he could help many more families by teaching the Horse Boy Method™ to others.

Accordingly it is now possible to train and learn the method through a two day training program.

We offer different certifications.

• Method 1: Horse Boy Method Introduction for parents, therapists, therapeutic riding instructors, riders etc. 
• Method 2: Back-riding for experienced riders.
• Method 3: Applied back-riding (rule based games, and other exercises) for very experienced riders
• Master classes for experienced riders

Completion of the training gives the participant a certificate that allows them to advertise that they are using Horse Boy Method™ in their program.The hands on training is very important.

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