What has happened to childhood

Today as I was driving to our field trip I passed a billboard that said "Get out and play an hour a day". My first thought was "Why do we need to make it a point to have children play for an hour?" It seem to me the most natural thing for a child to play. No one has to teach a child to play-- it just comes naturally. Also this is how children learn best is through play. Have we so far removed children from childhood that we need to remind them to be a child? In our society we push children to grow up so fast. I remember a Facebook status on a friend whose child had been working on homework for over four hours that night. One person's response was that this was preparing the child for adulthood. Is that really preparing the child for adulthood or is it stealing his childhood? Childhood only comes once and then it is over. The child will have the rest of his life to work so why not learn values, responsibilities, a work ethic, but don't take the working part of this so far that the child loses his precious childhood. Don't we short curcuit the development of maturity by pushing it on a child too quickly. I mean there might be some maturity develop, but it is more shallow because the child did not have the opportunity to develop this at his own pace. That kind of maturity will last and be carried further into life. So let children play. Give them good quality ways to play as well instead of video games. Read them good books, provide them with good quality thoughts to build their play, encourage imagination and creativity. Let them grow into the people God has created them to be and it all begins with play. Please let them play more than an hour a day.