The last few days my fellow teacher friend A.and I (funny how in Chile I have 3 friends with first initial A) have been talking about our sudden inability to spell in English. We both taught Spanish before coming to Chile and have both been experiencing those moments of...Where am I? What language am I trying to speak? How do I write this word on the white board? I always considered myself to be a decent speller, as evidenced by my success in elementary school spelling bee competitions, of course.
I think these types of episodes normally occur when you are switching back and forth between two languages on a daily basis, but I just started noticing more space out moments where I literally write something on the board, stare at it for a few seconds, and know that it's wrong but don't know how to fix it. It's happening especially with words like "accustomed", where the Spanish equivalent is acostumbrado. The "o's" and "u's" get all mixed up and then my students just laugh at me and ask if I'm sure I know how to speak English. Yesterday I was teaching a lesson about clothing to 3 very successful business people and I literally couldn't spell the word "pajamas". All I got was the "p" and just couldn't put my finger on what vowel came next! Slightly embarrassing but maybe I'll just take it as a good sign that I've been reading enough Spanish lately to even have this confusion occur.
Hi Heather, I'm new to blogging but I figured it's a great way to share experiences. I know how that feels to be stuck between languages. Our brain seems to overload somehow and we have what I can "brain freezes". I teach French in BC but I'm originally from Quebec. I also took spanish courses at the same university where I'm now a sessional instructor. Don't you just love languages and teaching?! Hope you visit my blog too.
ReplyDeleteHasta luego,
Johanne
That's a great opportunity to teach the terms "pjs" and "jammies"! Haha, although maybe that wouldn't go over too well with business men, but I taught (just spelled that tought, go me) that to my teens and they just about died laughing at the word "jammies" and would just say it randomly for the rest of the semester.
ReplyDeleteI can't imagine how often it happens to you guys who teach bc it certainly happens to me a lot! What happens most is that I forget how to say a word ... literally a "como se dice" moment and it's so frustrating. It's like there's an intersection in my brain b/w the Spanish word and the English word and somehow they collide ... and the result is, nothing comes out!
ReplyDeleteThat happens to me a lot too... I used to be a great speller until I became fluent in Spanish now I forget and mix words. and I get those moments that Andrea mentions when there is just the idea of the word I am looking for but I can't remember the word in any language.
ReplyDeleteJohanne-
ReplyDeleteThanks for leaving a comment, and I will definitely check out your blog!
Abby-
Haha, I should have just said jammies, since in that same conversation we ended up talking about "man-bags" and "murses"!
Andrea and Annje-
It hasn't happened to my speech yet but I kind of wish it would so that way I would know that I'm actually speaking enough Spanish!!!
It happens to me all the time, but it happened to me more when I was speaking more Spanish. A recent example: I wrote haveing for having. GAH!
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