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The appropriateness of early childhood foreign language education is occasionally a debatable subject among parents, educators, public education administrators and policymakers. A large body of research has been done on this subject and conclusions sometimes appear contradictory. This article first reviews briefly the importance of learning a foreign language, and the advantages of bilingualism. Second, it compiles empirical evidence that concerns early foreign language education of children living in a native language speaking environment and suggests answers to questions regarding the developmentally appropriate timing to start providing foreign language education services.

The article describes essential and distinctive features of an exemplary basic educational program of preschool education “From birth to school”, which is connected with the innovative systems the Standard of the preschool education - positive socialization, individualization of the development, support of children’s initiative. The program “From birth to school” has a systemic, comprehensive, science-based understanding of the objectives and requirements that are applied to the preschool educational institutions. The program is based on the scientific psychological-pedagogical school of L.Vygotsky and his followers (A. Zaporozhets, A. Leontyev et al.). The program is developed in accordance with the psychological and physiological characteristics of the children, supports the diversity of childhood, makes preschool education “entertaining” and is aimed at the formation of motives and needs of a child.

In the article the problem of the organization of communicative activity of the senior preschool children in the process of early foreign language education is presented. Various forms of communicative activity of children can be organically included in the educational activities in the classroom during foreign language acquisition, enriching the learning process with communicative and ethno-linguistic content. In preschool education modernization the process of foreign language learning, built on the basis of communication, is of great importance and contributes to a child’s ability to intercultural and international communication, as well as for his/her personal development as moral and responsible citizen. The author describes the basic forms and principles of the English language teaching in preschool and gives examples of the types of work with preschool children in the classroom in English, which can be implemented by teachers and parent.