Is knowing another language a help or a hinderance?
I waas wondering whether other people found that having learnt another language before Spanish was helpful or not?
I can't make up my mind. I used to be reasonably fluent in French, although I haven't used it for some time, and thought I had forgotten most of it, while my German was always more of the "point, gesture and smile" variety, but I am finding that now I am trying to learn Spanish, both of those languages are re-surfacing from the dark and forgotten recesses of my mind.
It's a great help at times, especially the French (and the little Latin I managed to assimilate) as the vocabulary is often very similar to Spanish.
It's also a darn nuisance at times, because I find myself confusing the pronouns and prepositions in particular, while trying to keep the grammar and syntax straight between French, German, English and Spanish seems to be quite beyond me.
So I'd love to know how those of you who have managed to become "trilingual" manage to keep the different languages apart in your heads!
5 Answers
I studied 3 years of French and was by no means fluent. I've found it to be both a help and a hindrance. 
The concept of learning a new language is made easier and the pronouns and conjugation is familiar, but I do find myself confusing the two.
One of my girlfriends is in the same boat. She too studied French for several years. So when we mix up the pronouns or common phrases we just laugh it off and go on.
A good topic, Sheila
I have to admit that as far as vocabulary is concerned, knowing two very different languages: Polish and English has been a great help. I was suprised many times when I found lots of similarities betweend Spanish and English, as well as between Spanish and Polish. I used to learn French and German, but most of it evaporated from my memory a looong time ago!
As for the syntax, the similarities can help and interfere at the same time. But so far, so good. I manage, as you said, to keep the different languages apart in my head, but I sometimes have to be very careful at work... Last week, instead of saying "hello" to my students, I shouted vigorously: ¡hola a todos!
I would say its a help in the long run... in the short run, like you say, very frustrating. For a while back in highschool, I was reasonably fluent in both German and Russian, but I had to get myself "going" in one or the other in any given conversation.
I found the hint from Breaking Out of Beginner Spanish really helpful -- memorize a couple of set phrases that you can use to get your brain into the correct language. My favorite (because its long) is "lo que pasa es que..."
From about the 16th-17th century, most educators have insisted that students ought to learn a foreign language(s). During much of that period the recommended languages were Greek and Latin. The reason was not because one was likely to encounter a Greek/Latin speaker (these were, after all., "dead" languages) but, rather, because, by studying "foreign" languages, one might come to realize that the world-view presented by ones own/native language was not the only possibility.
The primary lesson to be gained from learning a 2nd language is that my is way is not the only way".
I teach French to many Anglophone children and many aspects of the language are transferable from one language to the other. On the other hand, there are interferences. The interferences, of course, are a nuisance in the short term, as someone else put it. But, in the long run, you will benefit from learning another language and the interferences will, not disappear, but you will have mastered them. I was fluent in both French and English before I started learning Spanish and I find that the similarities with Spanish that I already know are helping me learn faster.
