Starting with ground poles is a good idea what I whould do is louge the horse/pony over poles and just raise it a bit at a time praise him if hes good, just don't rush him. theres nothing to it really ive train a hand full of horses to jump and i have never had major issues with it. once your horse/pony is jumping calmly and confidently (sp) ride him over the jumps once he gets a hang of jumping,

Somthing that I learned that i fined helpful is make taking the jump the horses responsibility. send the horse at the jump, then wait if he takes it great, if not just sit there and watch him. if he gives up send him around at the jump from the other side. and do it again , make a big deal if he takes if ( praise the heck out of him). Watch him if he puts his nose on it thats a big step horses are prey animals and putting his nose on somthing is like going up to a lion and sniffing it. if his head and neck goes over thats "zone 3" hes making progress, let him do if on step at a time. or one foot at a time more like. he will get to the point that he'll come up to the jump and just pop over it.

see somthing that a lot of riders do is take there horse up to a fence and force there horse to take it, its not the horses choise he just has to take it. remember that u want the horse to jump the fence not u. then these riders take there horses up to jumps and they can't just sit back and know the horse will take the fence they have to be there kicking and popping there horse with a crop to make him do it. so then the horse thinks of jumping as a boring or sacry thing cause there human makes them take the jump.

thanks for ur time I hope this helps some - ec