CHAPTER ONE<br >INTRODUCTION<br >A Better Start<br >Fred M. Hechinger<br > Most of our children deserve a better start.<br > The fairy tale vision of childhood in America sees happy<br >toddlers playing in the backyard under mother s watchful<br >eyes. While keeping the house spotless， mother also manages<br >to play with her yotmgsters， read stories to them， prepare<br >lunch and an afternoon snack with visiting neighborhood<br >children possibly on h~nd， and have dinner on the table when<br >hubby comes home from work. In an urban setting， mother<br >finds time， twice a day， to take the children to the park. In rich<br >households， mother delegates some of those functions to a<br >highly trained nanny. By the time these youngsters enter<br >kindergarten or first grade， they have already learned to read<br >and to count. They have played with educational toys. They<br >are ready for academic success.<br > Most Americans know this idyllic description for what it<br >is--a nostalgic backward glance to a world long past. Only<br >uninformed politicians still pretend this ideal vision repre-<br >sents the way American children today live during the crucial<br >first five years of their lives. Only self-deceiving moralizers<br >continue to admonish women to do their motherly task by<br >tending only to their kitchens and their children.<br > The advantage of these illusions is that they justify inaction，<br >and that saves money. Mother s work， after all， does not cost<br >anything.<br > The reality， of course， is quite different. Mother， in increas-<br >ing numbers of families， is not at home during much of the<br >day; she is out and at work. In 1984， 48 percent of women with<br >infants under one year old were in the labor force， and there<br ><br >