Have you ever heard a baby cry with a German accent?

You can -- if you listen hard enough, said Kathleen Wermke of the University of Würzberg in Germany to the BBC. She led a research project which concluded that infants pick up the nuances of their mothers' accents, even while in the womb.

Researchers studied the cries of 60 healthy babies born to families speaking German and French. Wermke told the BBC that they could detect the French babies crying with a rising accent while German babies cried with a falling accent.

Wermke added that the research, which was published in the journal Current Biology, is more than just a slightly interesting curiosity. It suggests that human beings are influenced by the first sounds that penetrate the womb. Scientists already knew that unborn children could memorize sounds from the outside world in the last trimester of pregnancy, especially music and voices.

Rotting ladders on Adventure Playsets have prompted a recall of more than a quarter of a million pieces in the United States and Canada.

Working with the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the Amarillo, Texas company has put out an official recall of the Adventure Playsets Wooden Play Sets, effective immediately.

A chalkboard on 10,000 Young Artist Easels sold by MacPherson's has tested above federal limits for lead allowable in children's products, prompting a recall.

According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the company has put out a voluntary recall, asking consumers to take the easels away from their kids until a replacement chalkboard can be sent to them.

The easels were sold mostly at art supply shops and online for about $75 between July 2004 and July of this year. Named Young Artist Easels, they were sold by MacPherson's doing business as Art Alternatives and manufactured in China.

The original packaging has the item number AA13301, and the UPC number is 082435133010. The recall applies only to easels with a chalkboard on one side and a whiteboard on the other.

The National Institutes of Health warn that lead poisoning is especially dangerous in kids. Even low levels of lead have been linked to lower IQ scores in kids, while higher levels are linked to anemia, muscle weakness and brain damage.

Parents can call MacPherson's at 866-319-5335 between 8 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Pacific time, Monday through Friday for a replacement, or e-mail them at recall@macphersonart.com. To fill out a form to have a replacement chalkboard sent your way, visit the MacPherson's Web site.

Related: More consumer alerts and recalls.

Kids are more stressed out than they were last year, and they take their cues from their parents. Credit: BrittneyBush, Flickr

Kids are more stressed out than ever, and their worries include family financial troubles, body image issues and getting into a good college or university.

The 2009 Stress in America survey, administered by the American Psychological Association, is the first to ask children about their stress levels, according to U.S. News & World Report. The results are startling: One third of the 1,206 children ages 8 to 17 surveyed admitted that they are more stressed out than they were just one year ago.

The term "safety first" means that being safe is the first priority when performing a task.

Freedom from danger, risk or injury is foremost in whatever activity is being executed. In order to insure "safety first," one must know basic safety rules.

Even preschoolers can understand the importance of keeping all windows and doors locked, not opening the door to strangers and how to dial 9-1-1.

"Safety first" can also be used for outdoor activities, school-aged children should always wear a helmet when riding a bicycle or tricycle.

While remembering this philosophy is a very important thing to do as a parent, some safety gadgets can go overboard. Attachable GPS trackers can tell you every move your child makes. In most cases, your common sense will help your safety skills more than an expensive gadget will.

Turn to ParentDish for further Health and Safety questions and answers.

A normal pregnancy lasts for 40 weeks. If a baby is born three or more weeks early, she is considered premature. Babies born close to 37 weeks usually do not have many problems, but babies born between 32 and 37 weeks may need to stay in the hospital's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) to receive help eating, breathing, staying warm, and continuing to develop before going home. Babies born before 32 weeks are the most likely to have serious problems and may have to stay in the NICU for an extended period of time.

Preterm babies must often be tube-fed or even fed intravenously (through a vein) because they cannot eat on their own. Others need ventilators to help them breathe. Premature babies also can have difficulties staying warm, so they are kept in heated beds called isolettes.

A neonatologist is a doctor who specializes caring for preterm babies. If the hospital you choose to deliver your baby at has a NICU on-site, you will be introduced to the staff neonatologist. If your baby needs to be moved to another hospital, you can ask your ob/gyn for a reference or you can find a doctor on the Revolution Health web site.

Check out ParentDish to learn about amazing premature babies and Pregnancy & Birth.

VERDICT:

Brendan Adams' mother didn't want him to play middle school football. She was afraid he might get hurt.

Wait a minute. Brendan is almost 7-feet-5-inches tall -- the tallest teenager on the planet, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. And she's worried about him getting hurt?

The sad irony is it took a lot of work to get Brendan on the gridiron. His mother's concerns are more than justified. The 14-year-old eighth-grader from Ellensburg, Wash., about 100 miles east of Seattle, has health problems as formidable as his height. His body is full of tumors. His joints are enlarged. And doctors recently discovered an arrhythmia in his heart.

Parent Portal is a site created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to provide information on keeping children healthy and safe. If your kid has the sniffles and you are wondering if it's swine flu or a just a common cold, the Parent Portal is a good place to find reliable information from a credible source.

Additionally, there is health and safety information for pregnant women and children from infancy to the teen years. A "Quick Links" section includes information on H1N1 (swine flu), vaccines, growth charts, home safety, violence prevention and more. An easy-to-use "A to Z" index lets users quickly find information on thousands of health and safety topics.

Parent Portal also includes informative videos on a wide range of topics and links to other resources provided by government agencies. Additionally, users can sign up to receive automatic email updates on subjects of interest to them.

Read more about Health and Safety on ParentDish.

In a heart-stopping split second, an Australian mother watches as her 6-month-old son rolls onto a train track and under an oncoming train -- and escapes with just a scratch.

It could happen to any parent -- you release the brake on the stroller to prepare to board the train, and it rolls away from you. For Shweta Verma, a 29-year-old mother and dentist who lives in Melbourne, it is a nightmare that keeps replaying in her head and on TV, thanks to a surveillance camera that captured the entire terrifying episode on film.

Verma told Today's Matt Lauer about the terrifying moment when her son, Saurish, rolled onto the tracks as a train sped through the station. The video shows her horror as she helplessly watches her baby disappears under it.

A study presented last week at the American College of Rheumatology's annual meeting showed kids who play video games for more than an hour a day increase their chances of having wrist and finger pain. Among kids ages 7-12 who play up to three hours per day, each hour of play time increased pain by 50 percent.

If a pregnant woman drinks during her pregnancy, she runs the risk of giving her unborn child fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS). Consumption of alcohol during pregnancy does not always lead to FAS. Doctors are unsure exactly how much alcohol can cause problems, but they agree that consuming any alcohol is unsafe. They advise pregnant women and those attempting to become pregnant to avoid alcohol.

When alcohol is consumed, it crosses the placental barrier and can stunt the growth of the fetus. It can also cause atypical facial features (a flat face with narrow eye openings) and damage brain structures and neurons. Permanent brain damage is often common because developing brain cells and neurons become malformed from the alcohol exposure.

As the child ages, he or she can show other emotional, physical, mental and/or behavioral problems. This can cause attention-deficit disorder, poor memory, poor cause-effect reasoning and impulsive behavior.

Unlike at other times in life, the fetal brain is constantly developing, meaning there is no "safe" time to drink alcohol while pregnant.

Head to AOL Health to learn more about fetal alcohol syndrome.

Elimination communication (EC) is a type of potty training that goes back to time immemorial because one of its goals is to forgo diapers altogether. Here's how it works: When a parent or caregiver knows or feels that the baby needs to go, he or she removes the diaper or clothing and holds the infant over a toilet or other appropriate receptacle. Because the baby is pre-verbal --i.e., parents are starting this early after their child's birth -- way before most parents think about potty training -- caregivers need to be on the alert for body language cues, patterns (e.g., after a feeding or a waking), intuition or simply by the clock.

EC training can begin as early as birth but can also start in later infancy or during the toddler years. Although the American Academy of Pediatrics believes there is no set age at which toilet training should begin, they do say that children younger than 12 months have no control over bladder or bowel movements.

EC's rising popularity is certainly influences by the economy (diapers are expensive) and environmental concerns (diapers are not biodegradable), but it's also a natural extension of a common practice called attachment parenting.

ParentDish answers all of your potty training and diaper questions.

At 22 weeks pregnant, an expectant mother is in the middle of her second trimester and may start to feel some movement in the womb. The baby is approximately 10 inches and nearly a pound. Her organs are developing at a rapid rate and she may now be moving her limbs and exploring her face. Lips, eyelids and eyebrows are more defined and although her eyes have formed, the iris lacks pigment.

Thanks to a surge of hormones, there are lots of changes for mom too. Her hair is more lustrous and her nails are growing at a more rapid rate. Stretch marks usually appear around this time and skin may take on different textures or shades due to increased melanin. Nipples and areolas often get darker and larger. Some women's feet begin to swell at this point, often going up a half or whole shoe size.

Expectant moms should have had a triple screen test by now, which is a blood test that may detect possible fetal abnormalities like spina bifida and Down syndrome. Next up? The glucose test at 24 to 28 weeks, which checks for gestational diabetes.

Learn more about prenatal care and the second trimester at AOL Health.

Related: Second Trimester Exams and Tests

More pregnancy questions answered:
Doula: What Is It?
VBAC: What Is It?
What Happens When You're 12 Weeks Pregnant?
What Happens When You're 26 Weeks Pregnant?
What Happens When You're 27 Weeks Pregnant?
What Happens When You're 30 Weeks Pregnant?
What Happens When You're 38 Weeks Pregnant?