The Secret World of Children (Channel 5)
As a sales soundbite, it’s unbeatable. “Buy candy and go SUGAR CRAZY!” screamed nine-year-old Lily, who was running a candy store for the day. That girl has a career ahead of her in advertising, or perhaps as a political slogan writer.
With five new friends her own age, she played at being an adult in The Secret World Of Children. Out of sight, their parents gathered to watch the fun on monitors, but their reactions weren’t really the point of the show. The kids were the stars.
A similar format has been tried before with pre-schoolers and five-year-olds, in a Channel 4 programme almost a decade ago. But while most little ones are largely the same at nursery, by the time they’re nine they’ve developed sharply defined personalities – and the producers have cleverly selected six very different characters for this two-part series.
Split into two groups, one trio ran the candy store while the others were in charge of a fruit stand. Then they went shopping for clothes for dinner at a couple of fancy restaurants – one Spanish tapas, one French haute cuisine.
“It’s like a different language,” young Ben wondered, scratching his head at the menu. They ended up with escargots, or snails in garlic butter, which is certainly a change from chicken nuggets.
A series of thoughtful setups challenged the children to think quickly, teasing them without mocking them or exploiting their vulnerability.
The producers have cleverly selected six very different characters for this two-part series
A series of constructed setups challenged the children to think quickly, teasing them without mocking them or exploiting their vulnerability. When the bill at the French restaurant was more than they could afford, they had to calculate that they had paid too much.
“Why does it say ‘Pinnott Gridgo and Savage On Blank’?” Ben asked. That’s a useful life lesson: always check that you’re not paying for someone else’s wine.
At the tapas bar, they ordered “fried baby squid,” just because it sounded gross. It turned out to be delicious: “The only bad thing,” Osa decided, “is the guilt of eating someone else’s child.”
Grinning all over his face, neuroscientist Paul Howard-Jones explained what might be happening in the children’s brains as they tackled these new situations. It gave the hour a semblance of educational relevance, but that’s not the real point of the show.
What we wanted were cute, funny, and unexpectedly wise comments from the nine-year-olds, and we got them in spades.
As she was putting on her makeup for dinner, Alexis announced, “I don’t wear much eye shadow because it’s a fucking nightmare to get it off.” “Kids are better at a lot of things,” Lily concluded. “They’re nicer, smarter, funnier.”
She then explained that she had always wanted to be a police officer, “because you can taser people and pepper spray them in the eyes. But then my mom told me it’s very rare that you get tasered, so now I don’t want to be a police officer anymore.”
I was wrong about a career in advertising. This girl was born for politics.