Code switching--switching from English to Spanish

[eventer289]

Does anyone else that calls themselves fairly proficient in both languages have trouble switching between the two languages at times? I feel like if I have been speaking English the whole day and then I switch to speaking Spanish, it takes me a little bit of time to proficiently speak again in Spanish, like my brain and mouth have to warm up.

¿Hay alguien que se le pasa así?

[richardksa]

The students here call it, "Changing the chip". And yes, it does take a while to make the switch. A Spaniard I met last week, who had spent some time living Canada told me that after returning to Spain and not speaking English for six months when he did need to speak English he had "aching mouth muscles"!! Which was his reason for joining our English Speaking group in Madrid so that he could "work out" those muscles for at least a few hours each week.

[Juanjo]

Does anyone else that calls themselves fairly proficient in both languages have trouble switching between the two languages at times? I feel like if I have been speaking English the whole day and then I switch to speaking Spanish, it takes me a little bit of time to proficiently speak again in Spanish, like my brain and mouth have to warm up.

¿Hay alguien que se le pasa así?

The bad news is that it gets worse as you get older!:(

With the usual word-blindness that increasing age brings, often the word that is eventually extracted from the hazy memory can be from either of the languages, which confuses everybody including the speaker.

The even worse news when you have first learned a foreign word for something new that word usually comes out first! Thus when we lived in Germany and had a young family the device for drying nappies (yeah!, yeah! the old Terry towelling ones! :blush:) we knew only as a "Windeltrockner", and that is the word that still comes out first for that product!

[Sagitario]

The bad news is that it gets worse as you get older!:(
You better believe it! My brain is like an old fashioned television without a remote control – no way of effortlessly switching channels – whatever program I’m watching I have to stay with all the way through.

[Diana]

Does anyone else that calls themselves fairly proficient in both languages have trouble switching between the two languages at times? I feel like if I have been speaking English the whole day and then I switch to speaking Spanish, it takes me a little bit of time to proficiently speak again in Spanish, like my brain and mouth have to warm up.

¿Hay alguien que se le pasa así?

I remember wondering (many, many years ago) if or when I would be able to switch back and forth from German to English (and vice versa) with ease and it actually did take me a few years. After that it was seldom a problem. I do know several people who have spoken two or more languages from childhood and they have never had a problem.

[g-cogle]

hi,
yes this happens to me as well. Also when I´m speaking one language I use the odd word that sounds like a word from the other. For example, my favourite one I always get mixed up is "mark". I might say "What mark are those jeans?" (brand) as I´m thinking of the Spanish word marca!! poor brain!

[gtappend]

I did an interpreting course at University and had the skill of changing fast between languages drummed into me - a long with a lot of memory mastering skills to be able to remember everything (eg. when you have to remember an entire German sentence because you're still waiting for the verb at the end and can't start the English until you have it).

It still works and I tend to think in the language that I am using rather than translate things in my head.

[casatadley]

Sooo good to hear I'm not the only one. I teach Maths (in English) all day at work, but once a week at school join a Spanish GCSE class for fun and to help me with my Spanish and its terrible. Takes me half the lesson to switch and then I go into my next Maths lesson greeting the students with 'Hola chicos' They think I'm bonkers, but no just old!

[gary]

My Spanish is pretty meagre but on several occasions I have found myself speaking to my pal ion the pub and unable to think of the English for words something i could say and understand in Spanish - recent examples include 'enchufe' and oddly 'claveles'

... its official I am old and confused!!