The
Tellington TTouch Equine Awareness Method
(TTEAM)
The
Tellington TTouch Equine Awareness Method (TTEAM) is an
extraordinarily effective method of training and healing
horses which uses kindness and understanding rather than
dominance or force whilst setting firm boundaries for the
horse. TTEAM educates and rehabilitates the horse.
TTEAM was developed by Linda Tellington-Jones, an
internationally renowned and respected horsewoman, and
refined by her over the last 35 years. TTEAM improves a
horse's coordination, balance, suppleness and athletic
ability whilst increasing the level of trust and
communication between horse and handler or rider. It works
to overcome the horse’s fears and tension helping him
or her to be calmer and more contented. We work with the
understanding that horses whose behaviour might be termed
naughtly or difficult, normally have a reason for this
behaviour, which is generally pain, fear or lack of
understanding.
In
a session, I work with the horse to find out what the
problems really are. I use both the TTouch body-work and
TTEAM ground-work to find out how the horse reacts and then
give the owner or carer some exercises to do with the horse
before the next session. It usually takes three or four
sessions to cover all relevant aspects of TTEAM, so that we
build up carefully, working at the horse’s own pace,
making sure that the horse is not over-loaded with new
information and experiences too quickly. If the horse does
not cope with a particular aspect of the work, I break it
down to make it easier. We then build up again from there
as the horse learns to cope with whatever it is that caused
the problem. In this way, the horse learns how to deal with
the aspects of life that he or she finds difficult. The
horse learns to think for him/herself rather than reacting
instinctively or relying on the owner or carer for
guidance.