English at school, should we start at the early stages?

Recently has come to my mind the idea of when should our students start doing English classes at school. Nowadays all the teachers of the Catalonian educational system agree that English is essential for the social and academic development of our students, despite of that, teachers have different opinions about when should we start working the English subject at school, some of them argument that it’s difficult for children to understand a teacher talking in English during the whole hour because they have no previous knowledge about it, others say that it’s difficult for the young pupils to learn a third language at the same time they’re trying to learn Catalan and Spanish and finally others affirm that it’s vital to let our students learn English at pre-school because the younger they are the easier it is for the human brain to learn a language. So, with these different points of views brought to light I will write in the following lines, which is my opinion about this topic.

In my opinion promoting the use of the English language at school is essential, not only because students can learn about different cultures and habits while they’re learning English but also because the learning of a foreign language it’s a bullet proof investment for a greater future. With that being said I agree that introducing English at the early stages of pre-school is essential to help our students make their best of their brain potential, but also because they’re learning passively and with little effort what years later could become a living nightmare. We all know many people that nowadays regret not having the opportunity of learning English at school and I think that learning it when students are young can help them to avoid problems and be more prepared when they’re older. Nonetheless I am not saying it’s an easy process because I think that the coordination between teachers and parents is essential: they must offer students the possibility of talking regularly in English, watching TV series/films with English audio, listening to English music, etc.; but also they must be aware of the student’s progress, try to motivate students and helping them with the difficulties they can have along this long path that is learning a new language. If we do all this we are treating English just as Catalan or Spanish because we are approaching this language to their daily life situations and they will see the utility it can have in their daily life situations.