What My Kids Are Watching: Shark Week

Image via Wikipedia

by Sandie Angulo Chen, posted Aug 2nd 2010 1:00PM

It's a sacred week in my house -- otherwise known as Shark Week on Discovery.

In the hierarchy of annual milestones, Shark Week -- which is celebrating its 23rd consecutive year on the air -- ranks only lower than Christmas and birthday but definitely higher than any of the non-gift-giving holidays.

It's even more anticipated than ABC Family's annual Harry Potter Marathon Weekend, because at the end of the day I can recreate that marathon with our personal stash of DVDs, but no one can recreate the excitement, the awe, the occasional terror that comes along with Discovery's annual shark extravaganza.

And this year we were treated to 'Ultimate Air Jaws' (my son literally "ooohed" and "ahhhhed" his way through the shots of the shark) and 'Into the Shark Bite' (the latter of which only my oldest was allowed to watch). We've (OK, mostly the kids) also had hours of fun watching the Shark Cam videos, quizzing each other on shark trivia, and honing our general shark expertise, which my oldest -- who's about to enter third grade -- takes very, very seriously.

I wouldn't recommend every Shark Week offering for very young children. My two-year-old son and five-year-old daughter are clearly too young to watch 'Shark Bite Beach' (airing Tue. Aug. 3 at 9PM ET), a gripping special about the coasts of California and Mexico, where a string of horrific shark attacks frightened beach-goers in 2008. But I did let my son watch it after screening it myself. Afterward, we talked about beach safety, where sharks are more prevalent, and why we shouldn't be scared of sharks every time we go to the beach. He said he thought it was sad people had died from shark attacks and 10 minutes later asked "Can we go to the beach now?"

That's what's great about Shark Week. Along with all the amazing programming, Discovery.com makes it incredibly easy to extend the experience far beyond the TV viewing. It helps my family become active (and interactive) viewers, and ultimately that's important to me as a mother. Plus, it's nice for the kids to watch underwater adventures outside of Bikini Bottom at least once a year!