235 The Time Crunch Children Face
235 孩子们面临的时间危机
On average, American kids ages 3 to 12 spent 29 hours a week in school, eight hours more that they did in 1981. They also did more household work and participated in more of such organized activities as soccer and ballet. Involvement in sports, in particular, rose almost 50% from 1981 to 1997: boys now spend an average of four hours a week playing sports; girls log hall that time. All in all, however, children’s leisure time dropped from 40% of the day in 1981 to 25%
美国3到12岁的孩子平均每周在学校呆29个小时,比1981年多了8个小时。而且他们所做的家务也比过去多了，同时他们还参加了更多的诸如足球和芭蕾舞之类的组织活动。尤其是在体育活动方面，参加体育活动的时间在1981到1997年之间增加了将近50%：男孩们平均每周用4个小时，女孩们用2个小时。然而总的来说，孩子们的闲暇时间从1981年的40%降到了25%。
“Children are affected by the same time crunch that affects their parents,” says Sandra Hofferth, who headed the recent study of children’s timetable. A chief reason, she says, is that more mothers are working outside the home. (Nevertheless, children in both double-income and “male breadwinner” households spent comparable amounts of time interacting with their parents 19 hours and 22 hours respectively. In contrast, children spent only 9 hours with their single mothers.)
桑德拉·霍夫斯是研究孩子时间安排的领头人。她说“孩子们跟他们父母一样，也在受时间危机的影响。”她认为最主要的原因是更多的母亲走出家庭去工作。（尽管如此．双职工家庭和只有父亲工作的家庭的孩子与父母的交流活动时间差不多：分别是19个小时和22个小时。相反的是，单亲母亲与孩子在一起的时间却只有9个小时。）
All work and no play could make for some very messed-up kids. “Play is the most powerful way a child explores the world and learns about himself,” says T. Berry Brazelton, professor at Harvard Medical School Unstructured play encourages independent thinking and allows the young to negotiate their relationships with their peers, but kids ages 3 to 12 spent only 12 hours a week engaged in it.
只学习，不玩耍会造成孩子的迷惘。“玩耍是孩子认识世界和了解自身的最好途径。“哈佛大学医学院的教授T·贝瑞·布列兹顿说。自由活动能培养孩子独立思考的能力，还能让孩子们学会如何与同伴协商处理他们之间的关系，但现在3到12岁的孩子每周只有12个小时的时间可以自由玩耍。
The children sampled spent a quarter of their rapidly decreasing “free time” watching television. But that, believe it or not, was one of the findings parents might regard as good news. If they’re spending less time in front of the TV set, however, kids aren’t replacing it with reading. Despite efforts to get kids more interested in books, the children spent just over an hour a week reading. Let’s face it, who’s got the time?
接受调查的孩子还把自己正在迅速减少的自由活动时间的四分之一都花在了观看电视节目上。但是，信不信由你，父母却把这视之为好消息。然而即使减少孩子们看电视的时间，孩子们也不会这些时间用来读书。尽管人们想方设法让孩子们对读书产生兴趣，但他们一周花在读书上的时间只有一个多小时。还是让我们面对现实吧，是谁抢走了时间呢？