Time, it seems, is what we’re all short of these days. One reason perhaps, why there are thousands of studies every year into how we spend our time and how we could spend it better. Some of the results are startling. Did you know for example …

Although people all over the world are working longer and longer hours, we also have more leisure time than ever before.

After sleeping and working, watching TV is by far the most popular leisure activity the world over. The British watch more TV than any other nation in Europe, but they also read more. 1_________

Although up to two thirds of modern European women work full-time, they still do the main share of the housework, too. Husbands help in the house more than they did in the past, but in the UK for example, men do an average of just six hours a week compared to their wives, who do over eighteen hours. 2_________

According to the latest research by supermarkets, the average British family spends just eleven minutes preparing the main evening meal, and prefers ‘ready meals' and takeaways to home-cooked food. 3 ___________

More than half of young people in the UK have a full-time job by the age of nineteen, but the majority of young Spanish and Italian people do not start full-time work until they are twenty-four.

 The average American fourteen-year-old spends only half an hour a day doing homework, and less than a fifth of young people participate in sports, c1ubs, music or other traditional hobbies. Instead, sixty-five percent say they spend their time chatting on their mobiles and hanging out with their friends in shopping malls.

In the UK pensioners are almost twice as active as teenagers according to recent research. 4 _________. However, surprisingly, people who use the Internet regularly do more sport than people who never use it.

The Swedes and Finns are the sportiest nationalities in Europe. Seventy-three percent do some kind of sport at least once or twice a week.

People may spend more time at work these days, but are they always working? The latest research reveals that each day the average British employee spends fifty-five minutes chatting, sixteen minutes flirting, fourteen minutes surfing the Internet and nine minutes sending e mails to friends!

2. Выберите правильный вариант в предложениях согласно содержанию текста. Предложения запишите и переведите.

1. Watching TV / Reading books / Sleeping is the most popular leisure time activity.

2. Most people read a newspaper regularly / from time to time / every month.

3. The majority of women work full-time / part-time / from time to time.

4. Women / Husbands / Children do the main share of the housework.

5. People are eating more and more / less and less / far less ready meals and takeaways.

6. The majority of young people in the UK have a full-time job by the time they are eighteen / twenty / twenty-four.

7. Pensioners in the UK are more / less / much less physically active than teenagers.

8. Regular Internet users are often / never / seldom keen on sport.

3. Определите, означают ли данные словосочетания одинаковые (the same) или разные (different) понятия. Отметьте одинаковые понятия S ( same ), разные понятия D ( different ). Составьте английские предложения с этими словосочетаниями.

1. two thirds / sixty-six percent

2. the main share of the work / most of the work

3. an average of six hours / exactly six hours

4. over eighteen hours / less than eighteen hours

5. the vast majority / ninety percent

6. almost half / fifty-two percent

7. more than half / forty-five percent

8. a fifth / twenty percent

9. at least twice a week / two times a week or more

Vocabulary

Составьте английские предложения с выделенными в тексте словами и выражениями, переведите их.

2. Дополните список выделенных слов из текста (Vocabulary list) словами и выражениями по теме “Hobbies and everyday activities”. Распределите их по группам согласно Приложению 1.