BLACKSBURG (WSLS 10) - You'll hear the difference when you walk into the Indigo Room at Rainbow Riders.
Teachers at the Blacksburg child care center are introducing students to Mandarin Chinese.
"They're still learning and they're like sponges," explained teacher Letitia Wang-Moore. "So they basically pick up everything."
Wang-Moore works with the 3 to 5-year-olds, immersing them in Chinese culture and language at a time researchers say learning another language is easier than at any other time in their lives.
"When they're doing English talking to each other, I throw out Chinese and I interact in Chinese and engage in their play," she explained.
Rainbow Riders follows the Reggio Emilia philosophy. It's based on principles of respect, responsibility and community through exploration and discovery in a supportive and enriching environment based on the interest of the children through a self-guided curriculum. Learning Mandarin is an extension of that philosophy.
"The children are still playing and learning at the same time," said Marjorie Vest who is in her eighth year teaching at Rainbow Riders. "We just have an added extra benefit of the Chinese language in the classroom."
As the children play and explore, they hear the words and the phrases. Unlike adults who may be apprehensive at attempting another language, the children embrace it.
"They don't even think it's another language. They're like, 'this is fun, this is new, this is different, we want to give this a try.' So they don't have those restrictions like we are adults have."
Within a month, Vest said most kids are counting not just in English, but Mandarin as well and looking to learn more. The benefits, teachers say, reach beyond being bilingual.
"This is really good for them, for their development and their brains. A lot of research has shown that being bilingual or having the opportunity to be able to learn a different language is good for them."
Teachers noticed that adding a second language helped student's vocabulary, in both English and Chinese, explode.
They also see other benefits like accelerated brain development and cognition and increased attention and focus.