I just found out my kid's kindergarten class is teaching Russian 40 mins per day.

[DFW]

214. 1st grade vs pre is a tough call

The earlier the better is the rule for absorbing languages, but circumstances play a role, too. After 1991, Western Europe was flooded with Russian speakers, from economic refugees to sharp businessmen looking for an early foot in. Knowing Russian was an unimaginable advantage for everyone from real estate brokers to social workers.

My wife, who IS a social worker, had one difficult Russian immigrant who heard that everything was free in Germany ( and he didn’t even read DU ha ha!), and was disappointed to find that he was expected to work. He continually skipped out on appointments my wife made for him with prospective employers, claiming afterwards he hadn’t understood enough German to know when or where his appointments were. He wasn’t stupid, just lazy. Before recommending that his welfare be terminated and having him expelled back to Russia, my wife decided to give him one last chance. She called him up one Friday evening, and told him to hold the line a second. Then she put me on, and I told him in Russian that he was to be in her office without fail at 8:00 AM the following Monday morning. I told him that if there was any part of what I said that he didn’t understand, that now was an excellent time to say so. He acknowledged, я понял, я понял (I understood, I understood) and he was indeed there at 8 the next Monday morning. He finally got it that she was not playing around, and got a job interview that he took seriously. His German has improved greatly (it was probably already better than had been admitting), and he has now held that job for over ten years.

The world is just going to keep getting smaller and smaller. We are going to be running into Russians, Chinese and Arabs more and more, not less and less. The best thing we can do for our children is to prepare them for this. I promise you that the Russians, Chinese and the Arabs are foing the same with their children with English, but with those same other languages as well.