Editor's note: Few parents can claim to be child-rearing professionals. In this occasional series, we show what people learned about parenting from their day jobs. If you have other suggestions, let us know.
One way to keep your children from acting like animals, it seems, is to treat them like animals.
Carole Garrett, a zookeeper at the Folsom Zoo, worked with animals (including orcas) for more than a decade before she had any children of her own.
At the zoo, she taught mountain lions to stand still for inoculations and monkeys to hand over potentially hazardous objects.
"Being monkeys, they get hold of things they shouldn't have," she said.
Once, the primates ended up with a lighter that a zoo visitor had given them.
The training is accomplished by starting with something cheap and safe – say, a toilet paper roll.
By rewarding the animal for a series of behaviors – holding the roll near the front of the cage, touching the roll to a fence, putting it through the fence and exchanging the roll for a treat – the keeper is developing the desired behavior.
Is this the same as bribing your kids to get good grades?
"No, that isn't what we're talking about," Garrett said.
The animal does something on its own and then is rewarded.
For instance, Garrett might be talking on the phone and want her daughter to be quiet.
If she can, she makes a point of stopping during her conversation to praise the girl for being quiet and letting Mommy talk, rather than saying, "I'll give you a treat if you don't bug me."
This training idea is even a book title: "Catch Them Being Good" (Penguin, $14, 240 pages) by former U.S. National Team soccer coach Tony DiCicco.
Garrett also sets her daughter up for success. If Garrett's going to be on the phone, she may strategically leave crayons and papers where her daughter will find them.
Animals don't communicate verbally. They don't say why they act a certain way, and they don't explain what they want. That leads to another Garrett rule.
"You have to use your observation skills," she said.
You have to notice what your child is doing, and parents also have to pay attention to their own behavior.
Animals pick up on cues that we may not know we're giving. They're observant.
"Just like children are," Garrett said.
And, finally, Garrett treats kids and animals with respect.
She trains dogs for obedience competitions and recalls how surprised she was when she was first told to use a choke chain to establish dominance.
"You don't see people putting choke chains on whales."
And, one hopes, not on kids, either.
Call The Bee's Carlos Alcalá, (916) 321-1987.
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