The study found that the further advantage for Gaelic-speaking children may have been due to the formal teaching of the language and its extensive literature.

BBC: Bilingual children 'better at problem-solving skills'

Illiterate Idea One of the goofiest, most destructive educational fads of recent times has been the so-called Whole Language method of teaching kids to read.

FORBES: Fact and Comment

His reforms over the past year included scrapping state security courts, cementing civilian control of the army, allowing Kurdish-language teaching and broadcasting, and shaking up the police and judiciary.

ECONOMIST: Turkey and the European Union

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Chakravorti, 52, spoke about the type of student the program attracts, teaching global business and why speaking the local language matters.

WSJ: Teaching Global Business

It has a dedicated foreign-language school with international teachers and touts its English-language teaching skills, the foreign studies of many of its faculty members and its alliances with foreign schools.

WSJ: Parents of China Victim Get U.S. Visas

The working language of the course was English, while some selected teaching materials and guidelines used in the course were translated into Urdu or Pushto for the participants of the Project for better understanding and implementation.

UNESCO: CULTURE

That is why it took Switzerland more than 20 years to introduce teaching in a second national language (German or French) at the age of 11-plus instead of 14.

ECONOMIST: Do you speak English? Jaa, es bitzli

But the government's ambitions to extend language teaching to younger pupils will depend on tackling a shortage of modern languages teachers.

BBC: Straw regrets lack of languages