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

[WhiskeyGrinder]

311. They don't know a lot of words. But they know how language *works.*

They know they have to say "I went to school and saw a dog" instead of "I to school went and a dog saw." In Russian, you *can* say "I to school went and a dog saw." Working on things like that make a brain stronger.

If you say to a child, "I flimbled the wodger on Sammerday," and once they stop laughing you ask them what you flimbled, they'll say a wodger. If you ask them when you flimbled it, they'll say Sammerday. They don't know what it means, but they know how language works. Their brains will then start working on what flimble and wodger mean, and then will quickly discard those sounds, because they have never heard those words and are unlikely to do so again. But if they hear Russian numbers and colors daily, and have a teacher who can pronounce them reasonably well, their brains will hold onto those sounds because they hear them more often. This doesn't "take up" room in the brain or confuse it. It helps it grow.

Did you watch Sesame Street at all growing up? Back in the day, about 90 percent of the skits/words were in English, and about 10 percent in Spanish. If people of a certain demographic know how to count to 10 or 20 in Spanish, it's likely because of Sesame Street. Same experience for these kindergartners. It's enrichment, which is a bizarre thing to fight against.