Pre school is compulsory here in Spain at 3 and learning is structured as well as through play. Primary school begins at 6.
They do seem to get to grips with the language pretty quickly, I had a meeting the other week at Joseph's nursery and they say he pretty much gets all of what they are saying and can now ask for water and say hello in Catalan, not bad considering he's been quite slow with his speech in English.
Only thing I would add is that everything I've read about bi-lingual toddlers says that unless you can speak the second language fluently you should only speak in your mother tongue to the child as they will get more confused, they will pick up the second language better and more quickly if they are only hearing from people who speak it all the time, IYGMD.
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