What do you get when you put ten children who have never met each other before into an unfamiliar environment? Channel 4’s documentary, The Secret Life of 4 Year Olds, does just that, before retreating to a safe distance to watch the drama unfold.
The Secret Life of 4 Year Olds contains more arguments and fickle friendships than your average soap opera. Although this documentary was about as realistic as a soap opera at some points. In one instance, a huge chocolate cake just happened to be left out at the children’s eye level. It was only a matter of time before one of them decided to help themselves. This was one of the few points in which a teacher actually intervened. Surely the producers will have known this was going to happen, so was it really fair to taunt the children and then reprimand them for doing what they knew they would?
Two childhood development scientists observed the behaviour of the children the whole time. This places the documentary in the grey area somewhere between an experiment and a show which responds to the niche fascination to know what goes on inside the head of humans. It’s a world where ‘I’ll tell the teacher’ is the ultimate threat, and ‘just bite him’ is the best way of dealing with bullies.
The authenticity of this show was an issue from the offset. It’s certainly questionable how natural the setting was; the unfamiliar nursery was rigged with cameras, the children had microphones clipped to them and huge name badges were displayed on their clothes. They seemed fully aware of the fact that they were being observed, so it’s probably safe to say that not all of their behaviour was natural. This being said, the programme did explore each child’s personality and it certainly differentiated the rule makers from the rule breakers.
There was a complete mixture of personalities amongst the children, which was clearly exposed when they were split into two groups for a team building activity. The ‘less dominant’ children worked cooperatively on one team, whilst the ‘more dominant’ children vied for attention, shouted a lot and argued with one another. This was somewhat predictable, but interesting to watch nonetheless.
Each child had a different method for reacting to the emphasis on sharing. Some played fairly and were happy to let others join in, whilst others resorted to hitting one another. Is this merely children being children? Or is the more likely explanation that they were provoked by factors such as the show’s contentious decision to give two scooters to ten children?
One child summed up being a 4 year old with the adorable remark, ‘I don’t wanna grow up!’ So although this documentary wasn’t completely gripping and realistic, it did show that being 4 years old is a happy experience where you get to run around a lot and play on scooters (if you can prise one off someone)
Francesca Wilson
Image property of Channel 4