The Second Language

In my own country we learn from infant school the Irish language, a quaint, cute-sounding tongue with little practical benefit, and I and many retain only embers of it today.  In a discussion here on the actual, practical benefits of bi-lingualism, the 'cognitive' benefits of another language are explained, something to do with assessing things from a different viewpoint.

Most interesting to me was the idea of jettisoning in the the initial and most plastic years of school subjects like history or geography in favour of pure languages.  I think this is a good idea, to ingrain this stuff when the brain is spongelike, but what do I know.