At the school where I work, the preschoolers are taught English, Korean and Chinese. A prospective student visited the school this week and while he toddler waddled his way around the entrance hall, wide-eyed with mischief, his Mom chatted with the Head Teacher about the teaching curriculum. She was very inquisitive about the teaching methods, in particular for English, as Koreans believe English is the most important foreign language to force feed down their 4 year olds throats. However, upon perusing the syllabus she was a little upset to notice that Chinese was part of the curriculm. She demanded to know why it was a featured subject, whereupon the Head Teacher informed her that the school believed Chinese ( not sure what regional group is taught) to be just as important for children to learn as English. She pooh poohed the idea saying, "Nonsense, Chinese is only a trend at the moment". That's right. And I am quite sure the 1.3 billion Chinese speakers in the world whole heartedly agree with you.