Our rider’s all use safe , high quality , well maintained equipment including safety stirrups and wear safety equipment including a riding helmet, jumping vests boots with a heel.
EVERY RIDER is supplied with equipment that is designed to assist with their particular needs and may include: special reins for those with only partial use of hands and arms, special saddles for those with little or no balance or who are unable to sit in a conventional saddle, and adaptive equipment to give extra body support.
Our Therapy Horses are specifically trained to support the efforts of rehabilitation to more than 30 in the Kingston Area to date.
We use mounting blocks and a wheelchair accessible mounting platform and ramps where necessary to help with getting riders onto the horse’s back.
Special teaching techniques allow for the rider’s needs, which may range from a straight therapeutic value to purely recreational.
Through participation in this program, individuals learn to believe in themselves, have positive identity, sense of purpose, optimism and psychological well-being. Programs such as ours are essential to ensuring a healthy community in the Kingston Region.
The benefits of Therapeutic Riding include improved: posture, core strength, speech, coordination, fine and gross motor skills, social skills, riding skills, self-esteem, and simple academic skills . ie. counting, number recognition, letters, sequencing.
From one of our Families " This program has been an amazing thing for my daughter She has gained core strength and balance. Since doing horseback riding is able to ride her two wheel bike with the family now without training wheels. She is steering the horse and learning and using planning skills . Cathy's horses are amazing to work with and the techniques and compassion used with the other helpers make a great team. Thank you"
Hello Everyone, My daughter has been riding at Corner Stone Farm for the last several years. The instructors have always taken an interest in her particular needs and created a custom program for her. They are constantly changing and developing the program based on her progress.
The riding has built her self confidence and allowed her to build trusting attachments with the horses, instructors and fellow riders. Her empathy and compassion for animals and peers has grown. Riding has allowed her to work through sensory experiences that would previously have been difficult for her and allowed her to set goals for the future and create plans to achieve them in reasonable steps. She has grown so much over the last several years and I look forward to continuing to watch her grow.
Thank you in advance for helping a place that has become so important to my daughter, myself and many other people in the community.
The five Principles of healthy child development are:
- A Caring Adult: The existence of a caring adult who provides supportive relationships is the one key attribute that stood out in defining quality programs for children. The establishment of caring, positive, and supportive relationships with adults can help children 6 to 12 develop positive social skills, self-esteem, and self confidence. A program’s quality is dependent upon effective interactions between staff and youth within the environment that staff creates.
- Friends: Positive peer interaction is a key component of effective programs. Friends expand the child’s world beyond one’s family; share in humour; test loyalty; form their first audience; and offer support and criticism. Positive environments foster inclusion, acceptance, the opportunity for fun in constructive play, and the opportunity to develop and practice pro-social skills.
- Participation: Children need to make choices, have a voice, and do things by and for themselves, which supports positive self-expression, physical activity, and interaction with others.
- Play: Stressing fun, creativity, and co-operation, play lets children shape their environment using their imaginations. In addition, play is integral to the acquisition and development of motor and social skills, cognitive function, and creativity.
- Mastery: Providing children with activities and tasks that enable them to feel special, important, and successful. This type of rich content-based learning, led by teachers and coaches who encourage mastery (both through structured and unstructured strategies) helps to promote learning.
