Why Finnish babies sleep in cardboard boxes (BBC NEWS article)

Here's my third in a series of articles that I find interesting for my students. This time, since one of them just had a baby, this might be appealing. But everyone can benefit from knowing more about babies, mothers and related stuff. Enjoy!

Thanks to the writer and the BBC for this wonderful article.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22751415

By Helena LeeBBC News

For 75 years, Finland's expectant mothers have been given a box by the state. It's like a starter kit of clothes, sheets and toys that can even be used as a bed. And some say it helped Finland achieve one of the world's lowest infant mortality rates.

1. Expectant mothers: women who are going to have a baby (so they are pregnant already!)
2. starter kit: a collection of things given to someone who is going to start something: for example this.

It's a tradition that dates back to the 1930s and it's designed to give all children in Finland, no matter what background they're from, an equal start in life.

The maternity package - a gift from the government - is available to all expectant mothers.

It contains bodysuits, a sleeping bag, outdoor gear, bathing products for the baby, as well as nappies, bedding and a small mattress.

1. To date back: to start or originate at a specific date.
2. Outdoor gear: clothes and equipment used outside buildings.
3. nappies: pieces of clothing or synthetic material used by babies to control pee and poo.
4. Mattress: the thick surface on the bed where people sleep.  

With the mattress in the bottom, the box becomes a baby's first bed. Many children, from all social backgrounds, have their first naps within the safety of the box's four cardboard walls.

Mothers have a choice between taking the box, or a cash grant, currently set at 140 euros, but 95% opt for the box as it's worth much more.

The tradition dates back to 1938. To begin with, the scheme was only available to families on low incomes, but that changed in 1949.

1. Cardboard: a material stronger than paper and weaker than wood.
2. Cash grant: an quantity of money given to a person in order to pay for something. That money must be given back but without paying an interest or at a very low.
3. Opt for: choose something.

"Not only was it offered to all mothers-to-be but the new legislation meant that in order to get the grant, or maternity box, they had to visit a doctor or municipal pre-natal clinic before their fourth month of pregnancy," says Heidi Liesivesi, who works at Kela - the Social Insurance Institution of Finland.

So the box provided mothers with what they needed to look after their baby, but it also helped steer pregnant women into the arms of the doctors and nurses of Finland's nascent welfare state.

In the 1930s Finland was a poor country and infant mortality was high - 65 out of 1,000 babies died. But the figures improved rapidly in the decades that followed.

1. Mothers-to-be: pregnant women.
2. to steer: to make something go in a specific direction: a car, a ship, a group of animals. (Steering wheel: what a driver uses to move the car right or left.
3. nascent: something that started recently.

Mika Gissler, a professor at the National Institute for Health and Welfare in Helsinki, gives several reasons for this - the maternity box and pre-natal care for all women in the 1940s, followed in the 60s by a national health insurance system and the central hospital network.

At 75 years old, the box is now an established part of the Finnish rite of passage towards motherhood, uniting generations of women.

Reija Klemetti, a 49-year-old from Helsinki, remembers going to the post office to collect a box for one of her six children.

1. Welfare: socially accepted conditions that are needed by everyone. Usually found in the expression "welfare state".
2. Rite of passage: an event or activity that is considered necessary to start a new period in life, typically adulthood. (note: "-hood is a very frequent ending that signals an abstract noun, such as: neighbourhood, childhood, parenthood...")

"It was lovely and exciting to get it and somehow the first promise to the baby," she says. "My mum, friends and relatives were all eager to see what kind of things were inside and what colours they'd chosen for that year."

Her mother-in-law, aged 78, relied heavily on the box when she had the first of her four children in the 60s. At that point she had little idea what she would need, but it was all provided.

More recently, Klemetti's daughter Solja, aged 23, shared the sense of excitement that her mother had once experienced, when she took possession of the "first substantial thing" prior to the baby itself. She now has two young children.

"It's easy to know what year babies were born in, because the clothing in the box changes a little every year. It's nice to compare and think, 'Ah that kid was born in the same year as mine'," says Titta Vayrynen, a 35-year-old mother with two young boys.

1. Eager: excited about a future event; looking forward to something.
2. to rely (heavily) on something: to use something as help. If you rely heavily on something it means that you are using it a lot as help. For other meanings of rely on, please look here.

For some families, the contents of the box would be unaffordable if they were not free of charge, though for Vayrynen, it was more a question of saving time than money.

She was working long hours when pregnant with her first child, and was glad to be spared the effort of comparing prices and going out shopping.

"There was a recent report saying that Finnish mums are the happiest in the world, and the box was one thing that came to my mind. We are very well taken care of, even now when some public services have been cut down a little," she says.

When she had her second boy, Ilmari, Vayrynen opted for the cash grant instead of the box and just re-used the clothes worn by her first, Aarni.

1. unaffordable: so expensive that you can't pay for it. (to afford: to be able to pay for something)
2. free of charge: you don't have to pay anything.
3. to be spared the effort: if you are spared the effort, you don't have to do something that would have been an effort for you. See spare.
4. to take care of: to make sure that something or someone is in good condition, safe, healthy.

A boy can pass on clothes to a girl too, and vice versa, because the colours are deliberately gender-neutral.

The contents of the box have changed a good deal over the years, reflecting changing times.

During the 30s and 40s, it contained fabric because mothers were accustomed to making the baby's clothes.

But during World War II, flannel and plain-weave cotton were needed by the Defence Ministry, so some of the material was replaced by paper bed sheets and swaddling cloth.

1. deliberately: something has been done with a specific intention.
2. fabric: a clothing material elaborated in a specific manner: cotton, wool, polyester, spandex, flannel...
3. flannel: a fabric used very commonly for things such as winter pyjamas or shirts. Very warm.

The 50s saw an increase in the number of ready-made clothes, and in the 60s and 70s these began to be made from new stretchy fabrics.

In 1968 a sleeping bag appeared, and the following year disposable nappies featured for the first time.

Not for long. At the turn of the century, the cloth nappies were back in and the disposable variety were out, having fallen out of favour on environmental grounds.

Encouraging good parenting has been part of the maternity box policy all along.

"Babies used to sleep in the same bed as their parents and it was recommended that they stop," says Panu Pulma, professor in Finnish and Nordic History at the University of Helsinki. "Including the box as a bed meant people started to let their babies sleep separately from them."

1. ready-made clothes: clothes which you buy in the shop, instead of buying the fabric and making them at home. 
2. stretchy fabrics: fabrics such as spandex (lycra) which are very useful for some baby clothes.
3. sleeping bag: you sleep in one of these when you go camping.
4. disposable nappies: one-use nappies which you buy at the supermarket.
5. Cloth nappies: nappies made of cloth (usually cotton or linen) which are washed and re-used.
6. fall-out of favour: something which people used to like, but not anymore.
7. on environmental grounds: for reasons connected with the protection of the environment.
8. to encourage: to motivate someone to do something, helping them, creating favourable conditions...
9. Parenting: the activity of being a parent (being a father or a mother).
10. all along: from the beginning to the end without relevant interruptions. See along.

At a certain point, baby bottles and dummies were removed to promote breastfeeding.

"One of the main goals of the whole system was to get women to breastfeed more," Pulma says. And, he adds, "It's happened."

He also thinks including a picture book has had a positive effect, encouraging children to handle books, and, one day, to read.

And in addition to all this, Pulma says, the box is a symbol. A symbol of the idea of equality, and of the importance of children.

1. to remove: to take away from a place or situation.
2. breastfeeding: giving a baby its mother's milk.
3. picture book: usually a children's book, with very little or no text.
4. to handle: to use and manipulate. Typical in boxes "handle with care".

Additional reporting by Mark Bosworth.

The problem with Spanish learners is...

Spanish learners have a list of problems but they can be widely categorized in two groups: language based and psychological. Speakers with other mother tongues have some of these problems but this is what happens to Spanish native speakers.

When you learn anything you ask yourself questions about what you are doing, unless it is something simple. I will point out today some of the stuff with which I coach my clients to help them along the learning process.

Both aspects are combined and cannot be separated. People get blocked in their learning process because of psychological hurdles triggered by specific linguistic aspects. This applies to pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary and everything else.

The first thing that a learner needs to internalize is that they are going to learn to use a different way of doing the same things. Since many people in Spain live in flats I use my flat metaphor: imagine that you live in a flat (the Spanish language) and your neighbour lives in his flat (The English language). One day he invites you over and surprise: most of the walls are in different places. You wonder: how can they live with this floor plan?

People don't speak English, they live using it. That means that you are learning not to say things but to say things differently. Their way. And for them it works the same as your system (insert language of choice) works for you.

So that was the first hurdle: things are different and that is OK. Other alternative worlds are possible. A second hurdle, not specific for spanish learners is stage fright. Years of experience, on both sides of the trench, have told me that the biggest problem is not fear of poor performance, but peer review. I don't know about children today in schools, but in the traditional education system in Spain, listening and not speaking - keeping a low profile - was more often than not a formula for success. Or at least for survival. Volunteering to do things in class was suspicious and doing things well all the time was high treason. And producing strange sounds in a foreign language could bring you to the category of laughing stock.

Not very long ago(five years or so) I had a student come to me in an intensive course. He was getting ready for NATO STANAG English levels (so a military course) and at the end of the course he had a test. That would qualify him in the vicinity of B1 of the European common framework.

But he had a problem. He confided to me that he had never spoken a word of English. And in less than four weeks he had to pass a test that included writing, reading, listening and speaking skills.

Lack of practice has never made masters. Many spaniards do not practice their English. Not because they do not have the chance. They do not dare. And he did not dare. He had been learning English - rather studying it. he was not bad at any other skills. But speaking... he had never even tried. The worst part is he had been able to get that far without it.

Language issues depend mainly on the differences in "floor plan" that I mentioned in passing before. There are substantial differences (obvious!) but learners are not aware of where the differences lay (not so obvious). You don't need to be a linguist to know some of these things:

The sound system of both languages is very different. Yes, but how is it different. Most learners have no clue what is really happening when they try to pronounce English and fail to sound native-like.  There are several factors: vowels, intonation and priority/emphasis settings among others. English has twelve vowel sounds, whereas Spanish has five. In addition to this, vowel sounds in Spanish are linked to how they are written. As if this were not enough, English has short and long vowels and they establish lexical differences. Finally, not only are similar vowels in both languages pronounced slightly differently, but there is a central, vital vowel sound in English, called "schwa" in phonetics, which according to studies, amounts to roughly 45% of vowel sounds pronounced in any variety of English. This sound does not exist in Spanish and it overlaps with the areas of the mouth for all five vowels in Spanish.

Consonants are an additional problem. Whereas all vowel sounds involve vibration, consonants can be pronounced with or without it. For example the difference between /p/ and /b/ which exists in both languages. However, many of the existing "vibrating" consonants in English (technical term "voiced") just don't exist in Spanish. Other than plosive sounds like /p/ and /b/ and the affricates, there aren't any consonant couples, which means that Spanish speakers don't have any contrast elements to be aware of such differences. That's why it is so difficult for them to achieve those important nuances.

Intonation is also different: at word level the intonation in each word is fixed by different systems, but at sentence level English uses intonation much more - and uses it much more efficiently - to achieve emphasis and to process old and new information. Vowel length and specially systematic vowel reduction (using schwa or even syllabic consonants) is alien to Spanish. Not knowing this impairs listening skills and speaking quality. Intonation contrasts add relief and heavily contribute to emphasis.

Emphasis in English is achieved mostly by two means: intonation (see above) and sentence structure. Most Spanish learners are unaware of two facts: sentence order is quite fixed in English (not as much as in other languages like German). In comparison Spanish is anarchic. Every system has its advantages, but getting used to a rigid order and the reasons for it is a cultural shock: from "almost everything goes" to "everything has a place and a reason to be there". Inversion for questions, re-inversion for questions in reported speech, adjective placement or the existence of a default order for some verb complements are puzzles that may well make the learner give up if left unsolved.

Spanish learners are ironically famous for being strong on grammar, but they have been, so far, in an almost medieval way. Many of those who have succeeded have done so by trial and error and without knowing very well why. Grammar is a backbone that has to be there, but should not be seen. And learners need to understand what they are doing. Not until they stop feeling confused, helpless and puzzled, will they really make progress. But so far, for many, it is a matter of arcane and mysterious things.