“Stop ringing me Richard, you’re not the dad… I don’t love you anymore, I hate you now,” says four year old Jessica. No, this is not the world’s most perverse episode of The Jeremy Kyle Show, it is in fact Channel 4’s most recent foray into the world of documentaries. The Secret Lives of Four Year Olds promises to be an interesting sociological and psychological experiment, allowing experts (charmingly referred to as simply “scientists”) in the field of child development to understand just how four year olds really interact and develop. This is, of course, Channel 4, so what you in fact get is lots of choice clips of small children saying funny things, with occasional interruptions from enthusiastic adults saying science words, but luckily the programme’s entertainment value is not effected by the boring grown-ups.
The programme charts multiple visits to the nursery, and it is admittedly a very interesting watch, as you can really see how the children develop and their relationships change. It’s odd how the personalities of the children affect you. You’d expect to feel a quasi-parental warmth towards them, metaphorically embracing each of the children as they develop, forming their own likes, dislikes, and skills through play; you’d be wrong. “I’m not listening to you!” screams Skyla, as innocent Jessica stands by, desperately trying to make friends with her. Quite why Jessica developed such an attachment to Skyla is unfathomable, but she’s young, I suppose, and the heart wants what the heart wants. Even if it is the non-sharing fake crying kid for a best friend.
Skyla is nothing, however, on Chaim, the nursery’s answer to The Kingpin. “He’s so cute and so lovely and so sweet,” says Chaim’s dad. Yes, if your idea of “cute” and “lovely” and “sweet” is a cake-stealing, toy-hogging bully. Interrupting girl-time at the water tray, Chaim causes yet another kerfuffle as he tries to snatch a measuring tube from one of his peers. “You know the bully boy, if he troubles you, just bite him,” Skyla advises his target. For all her fake crying and whining, she may have had a point.
There are, of course, beams of light in amongst the tantrums. Doe-eyed Luke, Chaim’s favourite victim, could make even the cruellest of hearts melt as he asks around to see who “will be (his) best friend”. Strong-minded Christian actually went so far as to reinvigorate my faith in humanity, acting as the last bastion of justice and goodwill in the harsh world of the playgroup, stepping in when Chaim wrestled Luke off his chair. “Please don’t do that… to my friend,” he said, with spot-on delivery and a tear-jerking dramatic pause. Hero. Absolute hero.
The input of the ‘scientists’ is at times valuable, but their characterisation of the youngest of the children, Cuba, as “Machiavellian” seems a little overboard, suggesting that his actions have some sort of superior consciousness and intellect behind them to those of his peers. He breaks rules, and he enforces them. That doesn’t mean he won’t spill his dinner all down himself and draw on the walls. At the end of the day, this is a programme about children, but that’s not to say that they’re all sweetness and rainbows. What do we learn from The Secret Lives of Four Year Olds? That some people are just born bastards.
