The Best Birth Gift

If you are thinking of hiring a nanny, no doubt you plan to choose her very carefully. We have all watched some of these scaring videos showing nannies bullying the children they were expected to take care of. Of course, to choose a woman who will not ill-treat your kid is the first point to consider. Fortunately, most nannies meet this requirement. So, which other points to come to?

I am not going to give you advice about things I know nothing about, or no more than any other mother. For medical advice, ask your doctor; for religious advice, ask your preacher; but for educational advice, ask a teacher. Do the math:

  • One needs about a thousand hours to learn something.
  • The nanny is going to spend hundreds of hours with your beloved baby.
  • So: your baby is going to learn a lot from the nanny.
It is difficult to calculate how much time young children need to learn whatever. What we know for sure is that they learn almost continuously, from any source of knowledge that they are exposed to. Give your kid a source of knowledge that will provide him with a lifelong benefit. Hire a Polish nanny!

Polish language has a particularity: it contains most of the phonemes of the European languages; in fact all of them except the English/American sound "TH" (but you are here), the Spanish "J" and the French "R", called "Parisian R". By leaving your baby with a Polish au-pair girl regularly, you give him a gift he cannot lose or break: the ability to pronounce any phoneme without accent. There are many birth gifts but very few last lifelong.

So, even if you work at home, consider paying a Polish native speaker two hours twice a week. Your baby's future is worth it.

Gabrielle Guichard

A French teacher who proposes a high-level free French course on FrenchCourseByFrenchTeacher.com.

In The News:

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In this April 22, 2008 file photo, former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, left, followed by current Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Ky., right,  smiles on Capitol Hill in Washington.  Democratic officials say Daschle has accepted President-elect Barack Obama's offer to be Secretary of Health and Human Services.  (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File )AP - President-elect Barack Obama promised the voters change but has started his Cabinet selection process by naming several Washington insiders to top posts.



Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008 in Washington, before the House Financial Services Committee.  (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)AP - Pounded by a fierce financial crisis, the country is sinking deeper into economic despair and is likely to be in the hole well into next year, forcing more Americans into the ranks of the unemployed.



Rev. Amos Brown,  a national board member of the NAACP, raises his hands as he speaks to a large crowd of supporters of same-sex marriage, as they cheer in front of San Francisco City Hall on Saturday, Nov. 15, 2008.  Thousands of demonstrators gathered to listen to speakers and protest the passage of Proposition 8, a ballot measure amending California's constitution to ban same-sex marriage. The event is part of a simultaneous protest planned in in hundreds of communities.  (AP Photo/Darryl Bush)AP - California's highest court agreed Wednesday to hear several legal challenges to the state's new ban on same-sex marriage but refused to allow gay couples to resume marrying before it rules.



A gopher frog sits in the hand of Audubon Zoo curator Nick hanna  in New Orleans, Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2008.  For the first time in 10 years, a pond in south Mississippi got enough rain this year to let gopher frogs, one of the nation's most endangered animals, turn from tadpole to frog without human help.  (AP Photo/Bill Haber)AP - Animals and plants in danger of becoming extinct could lose the protection of government experts who make sure that dams, highways and other projects don't pose a threat, under regulations the Bush administration is set to put in place before President-elect Obama can reverse them.



U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, left, and Vice President Dick Cheney are shown in this 2006 file photo at the White House. Cheney and Gonzales have been indicted on state charges involving federal prisons in a South Texas county that has been a source of bizarre legal and political battles under the outgoing prosecutor. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, file)AP - A Texas judge has set a Friday arraignment for Vice President Dick Cheney, former U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and others named in indictments accusing them of responsibility for prisoner abuse in a federal detention center.



In this image from NASA TV, a tool  kit bag, center, as seen through the helmet camera of astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper, floats away from the International Space Station after she lost hold of it during a procedure during a 6 1/2-hour scheduled space walk outside the space station, Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008. (AP Photo/NASA TV)AP - Astronauts vowed to double-check, even triple-check, to make sure a bag of tools is properly tied down during a spacewalk Thursday so it doesn't float away like one did earlier this week.



Israeli archaeologist Prof. Ehud Netzer walks in the mausoleum at the fortress of Herodium, in the West Bank, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2008, the place where Israeli archaeologists are excavating what they believe is the tomb of biblical King Herod.  Israeli archaeologist Prof. Ehud Netzer announced at a press conference on Wednesday,  that analysis of newly revealed items found at the site of what they believe is King Herod's mausoleum at Herodium, have provided researchers with further proof of the site being the actual grave site of the Jewish King. (AP photos/Bernat Armangue)AP - King Herod may have been buried in a crypt with lavish Roman-style wall paintings of a kind previously unseen in the Middle East, Israeli archaeologists said Wednesday. The scientists found such paintings and signs of a regal two-story mausoleum, bolstering their conviction that the ancient Jewish monarch was buried there.



This Sunday, June 1, 2008 file photo shows Benji Madden, of Good Charlotte, and Paris Hilton at the MTV Movie Awards in Los Angeles. Paris Hilton and her boyfriend of nine months, Benji Madden, have broken up. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles, file)AP - Paris Hilton and her boyfriend of nine months, Benji Madden, have broken up.



Dallas Mavericks' Jason Terry (31) drives around Houston Rockets' Luis Scola (4), of Argentina, during the fourth quarter of a NBA basketball game Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2008 in Houston. The Mavericks beat the Rockets 96-86. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)AP - The Dallas Mavericks didn't need Josh Howard as much as the Houston Rockets missed Yao Ming on Wednesday night.



Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., holds up a print-out of a New York Times article as he testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2008, before a Financial Services Committee hearing on the automotive industry bailout.  (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)AP - A Democratic Congress, unwilling or unable to approve a $25 billion bailout for Detroit's Big Three, appears ready to punt the automakers' fate to a lame-duck Republican president.



An employee works behind a monitor displaying stock information at a securities company in Taipei November 20, 2008. (Nicky Loh/Reuters)Reuters - Global economic misery spread on Thursday with the Federal Reserve predicting U.S. recession well into 2009, Japan's exports to Asia falling for the first time in six years and another sharp sell-off on global equity markets.



A pedestrian walks along a side street in Seoul November 20, 2008. (Jo Yong-Hak/Reuters)Reuters - A 6 percent fall in Asia pushed world stocks to their lowest in 5- years on Thursday, while oil fell below $53 and safe havens such as the yen gained on fears the global recession and a financial crisis will get uglier.



Leaders of the U.S. automotive industry testify at a hearing held by the House Financial Services Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, November 19, 2008. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)Reuters - Chances dimmed that a last-minute plan being crafted by Republican senators, with White House support, to provide $25 billion to bail out U.S. automakers would receive enough backing from Democrats to pass before the end of this week.



Pedestrians are reflected in the window of a Citibank branch in Hong Kong's financial Central District November 18, 2008. (Bobby Yip/Reuters)Reuters - The U.S. financial system still needs at least $1 trillion to $1.2 trillion of tangible common equity to restore confidence and improve liquidity in the credit markets, Friedman Billings Ramsey analyst Paul Miller said.



Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano speaks during closing ceremonies of the 26th Border Governors Conference at Universal Studios in Los Angeles August 15, 2008. (Fred Prouser/Reuters)Reuters - U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's top choice to lead the U.S. Department of Homeland Security is Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, CNN reported on Wednesday, citing multiple sources.



A man waits to be served at a petrol station in Dhaka October 27, 2008. (Andrew Biraj/Reuters)Reuters - Oil fell for a fifth straight session to approach $50 a barrel on Thursday as the fallout from the credit crisis hits the global economy, hitting demand for fuel.



Musician Felice Pomeranz plays her harp at her studio in Sudbury, Massachusetts, November 17, 2008. (Brian Snyder/Reuters)Reuters - Wall Street's pain is rippling through U.S. small businesses, as bankers who once pulled in million-dollar bonuses lose their jobs and cut back spending on everything from parties to home improvements.



Newlyweds Sharon Papo (R) and Amber Weiss (2nd R) pick up their marriage certificate after exchanging wedding vows at City Hall on the first full day of legal same-sex marriages in San Francisco, California June 17, 2008. (Erin Siegal/Reuters)Reuters - California's Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to hear a legal challenge against the state's voter-approved ban on gay marriage and let the ban stand in the meantime.



US auto giant executives wait to testify before the House Finincial Services Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. Fears of an implosion of the US car industry have continued to weigh heavily on investors' minds as the AFP - Global markets suffered fresh turmoil Thursday, with Asian stocks plunging as a sharp drop in Japanese exports added to gloom about the outlook for the faltering global economy.



A picture taken in 2007 shows the Delight cargo ship anchored in the port of Hamburg, Germany. Somali pirate attacks have spun AFP - Russia announced Thursday it would send more warships to combat piracy in the waters around Somalia, as the Saudi owners of the Sirius Star negotiated with the pirates holding their oil tanker.




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