Learning Spanish after learning English as a second language..
I just wanted to ask you guys something, specially those who learned English first before learning Spanish.
Did your knowledge on English grammar help you learn Spanish grammar faster, or did it hinder you instead?
It's just that I keep on referring to my knowledge of English Grammar as I am going through the lessons... and so far, all it does is confuse me a bit...
5 Answers
Hi, Fernando_David, and welcome. (I really like what you wrote in the About section of your profile!) I hope my comments here will be helpful.
English is a Latin-influenced language; Spanish is a Latin-based language. This accounts for the similarities in vocabulary. For example, there are many cognates (words that look similar but have different pronunciations and similar meanings) in the two languages. However, grammatically, English and Spanish are very different. Thus, as much as is possible, please try to keep Spanish (which, I assume, is your L3, or third language) separate from English (which, as you've said, is your L2, or second language).
In FLA (first language acquisition), we humans are "wired" to "perfectly" take on a native language. Obviously, you did this with your L1, or native language. (Tagalog maybe?) After the critical period has passed (six years old? eight years old?), SLA (second language acquisition) becomes much more difficult because the "wiring" for easy acquisition has been shut off, so to speak. For this reason, we have a difficult time learning (not acquiring), an L2. (In fact, we can "tap into" acquisition only with an extended period of immersion. Maybe.) And there is more bad news: the human brain is wired in such a way that any efforts made to learn an L3 normally occur by way of interaction with your L2. That is to say, a person cannot section off L2 and "direct-connect" between L1 and L3. It doesn't work that way because we are not wired that way.
So, you're going to find that as you study, sometimes you will be thinking about English grammar as you learn Spanish grammar. It will happen, because we are wired for that. However, you should try, as much as possible, to think of your L2 (English) and your L3 (Spanish) as being somewhat similar only in lexicon, or vocabulary, and not in grammar. Yes, there are instances in which they are similar grammatically! But, in general, referring to your knowledge of English grammar as a method of learning Spanish grammar will be confusing, not helpful, because the two languages are too different grammatically. A quick look at some of the main differences shows that: English, which is analytic in structure, is a Germanic language with phrasal verbs, modal verbs, a rhythm of stress-timing, vowel reduction, a strict SVO syntax, no gender distinction for most nouns, and very little verbal inflection; whereas Spanish, which is synthetic in structure, is a Romance language with pronominal verbs (which include reflexive and reciprocal verbs), no phrasal verbs, no modal verbs, a rhythm of syllable-timing, no vowel reduction, a less strict SVO syntax (even with occasional use of OVS syntax), a gender distinction for nouns, and a lot of verbal inflection.
I agree with rac1 not to correlate English grammar with Spanish grammar too heavily. I think it is easier to take-on Spanish as a separate entity because, while there are some similarities between the languages, there are more differences that could confuse you. If you constantly compare Spanish directly to English, you might be tempted to come up with a lot of "but that doesn't sound right" and make the rules of Spanish harder to swallow because you are under the impression that it's weird. I still do that. Spanish isn't "wrong" compared to English; Spanish is just different. Spanish often has a different word order from English, so translating something from English to Spanish literally is more likely to be incorrect than correct. Spanish has different phrases, different idioms. All of these things can to hard to swallow, but they can be a fun challenge if you just take it on as something new!
By the way, what is your first language? You said English was your second language. Just curious... I know a few people whose first language was Spanish, then they started school in English, and then they went to school in Spanish after fourth grade, and as a consequence, the two languages can get a little confused and jumbled together for them!
In my experience, being exposed to the grammar of more than one language helps you be aware that languages can have different ways of solving essentially common problems. I agree with rac1 and latinabi that you can´t try to use one language´s grammar as a "crutch" for learning the next one, but you can be aware of the problem that is being solved. For example, English shows possession by changing the ending of a noun (the boy´s, the girl´s); Spanish uses a preposition (usually "de"). German uses a genitive case that changes both the noun and the associated article. English pronouns can show gender and three different roles in a sentence (he, him, his; she, her, hers); Spanish makes a distinction between the indirect object and the direct object role for pronouns, while English doesn´t. German has four such roles, Latin five, Russian has six!
If you get confused by Spanish genders (since English really only has it for pronouns), be glad you´re not working on a language that uses three genders, such as German!
You´ll probably learn more about your own native language as you experience the pleasures and pitfalls of learning others!
It's impossible not to.
Hi, welcome to the forum!
My native tongue is English so I can relate. The advice I have received is try not to do that, as hard as it may seem. I'm sure others will respond here with some very helpful information that will be of benefit to me as well. Thanks for asking the question.
