Wild Kratts?

My oldest loves to play the Kratts games on PBS,kids.org and he learns a ton from that too. He liked the show too, but since we moved we haven’t hooked up the antenna so he doesn’t get to watch it anymore.

Mine just got done watching it.   Over the years we’ve watched Zaboo and Kratt’s Creatures (before they had the Wild Kratts)  It’s been a favorite for a long time. 

My main concern with this show, living in AK, was played out in front of us just this afternoon. Mind, I’ve only glimpsed this show once while surfing at a hotel. My impression was that the Kratts tend to engage very closely with wild animals, right? Maybe it’s a trick of photography and they aren’t really that close. If they are giving the illusion that they are, that’s a dangerous thing for kids to see. I understand that it’s exciting and it sells advertising, but at what cost?

We went out to the glacier today. There is a visitor center and hundreds of buses a day drop off and pick up many thousands of people from the cruise ships (up to six per day) that frequent our town all summer. There was a black bear yearling CUB in the brush near the building and people were RUNNING toward it with their cameras at the ready.

Both of my girls (4 and 7) looked at me with perplexed, somewhat scared expressions as they watched about 45 people go whizzing by us directly toward the bear. My younger one then asked very loudly in her squeaky little voice, “Don’t they know that the Mommy bear will eat them?”

It’s not a zoo – it’s real wilderness and real animals that are not tame or pets. Makes me wonder where people in general have learned this kind of strange behavior. Maybe from TV? We haven’t had TV in almost 10 years, so I’m not sure, but I have even seen my own mother do this…. run toward a wild animal just to get a good picture. Do you think it could be these types of shows that encourage this?

PS: To my knowledge, no one was attacked at the glacier, but I’ll be anxious to read the paper in the morning.

We have a fun new show to add to our DVR list thanks to this thread. The first thing my ds asked me this morning was if he can watch Wild Kratts again today. (My 2 boys each get to pick one 30 min show to watch each day.) Wild Kratts is a new favorite on Mayne Street.

You can watch full episodes on YouTube and parts of episodes on PBSkids.org.  We hadn’t heard about them until this thread and now my boys are loving it!  I questioned them on the evolution and they said that one time they heard “millions of years ago the camel and llama were similar but went to different places and adapted based on where they ended up.”  That was all they could think of (and they’ve watched 10 or so episodes).  Since we’ve taught them fairly thoroughly about our views of the age of the earth and evolution vs. adaptation, I don’t worry too much about casual references.  In fact, like Robin, I hear my kids talking to the TV sometimes, “That’s not true” or “That’s only a guess” or “That’s not how evolution happens”.  They teach each other and make to tell me if there is something they don’t understand.

To answer an earlier concern, they do interact with lots of animals, some quite close, but they do tell the kids that they are trained to do so and kids shouldn’t approach animals like that in the wild.  Steve Irwin and Jeff Corwin teach the same – just because THEY, the professionals, approach or touch an animal, does not mean a child should.  If you don’t feel like the show emphasizes it enough, then reinforce it yourself.  

Heather

That’s great! thanks for the advice. I will see if the Library has it in. Maybe when we go next we can look it up on the tube! 🙂  Thanks again everyone!   🙂