First in the series is: Lesson 1: Getting Started with the Clicker. Before I tell you what is in this lesson let me tell you about the original lesson and this new updated version.



I began producing these videos in 1999. At the time video cameras were huge.  There was no high definition video. Video was produced on VHS tapes.  There was no youtube, or facebook.  The entire clicker training community gathered together in a single group forum.  Over the past twenty-five plus years the world has changed and changed and then changed some more.  



I produced the first four lessons in the series as VHS tapes. It took me a while to admit that the world had shifted to DVDs.  I finally switched to DVDs for Lesson 5, and there I have remained – until now.

Mostly, I also stayed with DVDs because I just didn’t have time to make the switch.  There were always more pressing projects that needed to get done.

 But now, finally, I have turned my attention to getting the DVDs up on the internet.



Lesson 1: Getting Started with the Clicker was originally produced in 1999.  That was the first of what would become an eighteen part lesson series. It took me over ten years to finish the series. Always I felt as though I was in a foot race.  No matter how fast I got the videos out, there was always such a need for more.

 The whole “soup to nuts” training program was in my head. I knew the progression of lessons that would take someone from the first introductory steps to a solid understanding of clicker training; through basic husbandry behaviors to problem solving scenarios; from simple basics to performance superstar.  

I wanted the lessons to be as close to my actually being in your barn with you as I could manage via video.  So throughout the series I was often using video that was filmed at clinics.  I wanted you to see people and horses learning together – solving the puzzles that horses present. This sometimes created a compromise with sound quality.  You can see real time training, but you have to listen to the background noise of birds in the rafters or the wind taking our voices away.



I could remake these videos.  Modern cameras are so much better, and we have learned so much over the twenty-five plus years since that first video was produced.  But always when I go back to them, I see things that I don’t want to throw away.  These videos show you the birth of equine clicker training.  Yes, we have become much more sophisticated in the way we talk about the training.  We have a much deeper understanding of behavior analysis.  The horses have helped us to add so many more details to the handling.  But everything on these lessons is still valid.  They are a good beginning.  They will show you how to introduce your horse to clicker training.  And they will show you why I kept adding more details to these basic lessons.



When I switched from VHS tape to DVD, I added an extra hour to the original Lesson One.  I felt an update was needed. That was in 2006.  Now all these many years later not only do I have more to say, I have a better way to deliver the material.  

I’ve taken all the material that was in the DVD and added new video, updates, and more background information so the original DVD has essentially been transformed into a mini course.

The course breaks the material up into bite-sized pieces.  Watch a little, try it out with your horse, then come back for more. 

Lesson One focuses on clicker training basics: Introducing your horse to the clicker and the key foundation lessons that create safe, polite horses. 

If you are a beginner, you’ll find that this is an easy format to use. And if you’ve been clicker training for a while, I think you’ll enjoy this look back at the early development of clicker training for horses.

Visit theclickercenter.com to learn more.

Enjoy