When the doors open at Community Park Elementary School, some 80 kindergartners and first-graders will begin an academic experience unlike that of their peers.

The school is introducing a teaching model used around the country but never tried in Princeton before: dual language immersion. The children, whose parents voluntarily signed them up for the program, will learn half the day in English and the other half in Spanish.

They will study math, science and some social studies in Spanish, along with Spanish language arts, while other subjects will be in English. A total of four teachers are involved — two for the Spanish part of the day and two for the English part.

The district says research has found that learning in two languages helps with children’s cognitive skills and raises their performance in the classroom, among other benefits. The minds and vocal cords of kindergartners and first-graders are more malleable at that young of an age, too.

By the time they get to the fourth and fifth grades, those children who have gone through dual language should score as well or better on math and English standardized tests than their peers who didn’t, the district said in citing research on the topic.

“The neural gymnastics of moving back and forth between languages promotes this sort of nimbleness of thought that actually transfers over into nimbleness of thought across subject areas,” Superintendent of Schools Steve Cochrane said. “Kids that age are much more able to do that, to have that flexibility of thinking.”

Dual language immersion is something Priscilla Russel, the administrator in charge of the language arts program at the district, has wanted to do for a “long time,” in her words.

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