Well, English youth across the world don't have as much opportunities to build an understanding of a foreign language as others do. You could even say that English is the equivalent of Latin for non-English speaker. There is every day a new word to learn for them, via the media, the reading etc...
Early language learning is fundamental for how children will feel confident in abording new domains during their education, particularly Mathematics. It's helpful when their mental reconstruction of language codes is devoid of simple inheritance (this why girls are often more at ease with early mathematics as, most languages being inherently misogynistic, girls have to reconstruct their real selves through their available vocabulary).
To make it short, understanding how a language is structured and different from others develops the cognitive potential at an early stage. Those little bits of exercises like reading and understanding a few words on a coin and being taught what it is and comes from have a role in this.
Obviously, today you have internet, gaming etc... But do we really want that to be it all?
www.telegraph.co.uk
www.bbc.com
www.telegraph.co.uk
www.thetimes.co.uk
www.grunge.com
