Your Name Megan Marland
Language of Investigation Spanish
1. What places of origin (countries, regions, cities) is this language primarily spoken? in Spain and
22 other countries including: Andorra, Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Cayman Islands, Chile, Colombia,
Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Guatemala,
Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, the USA and Venezuela
2. This closest/ most similar language to this language is Italian and Portuguese
3. How many speakers are there globally of this language? A little more than 400 million native
speakers
Alphabet
1. This language has a Latin alphabet.
2. This language reads left to right, up to down.
3. The letters/ characters of this alphabet are of Indo-European language family
4. Does this language depend primarily on tone or pitch? Yes
5. Is this language syllable or stress timed? Syllable
6. Does this language have strong sound/symbol correspondence? (English does not) Yes
Complete this section ONLY if your language is Latin based (most languages you will encounter are).
Phonetics and phonology
1. There are 5 vowels in this language. They are (cut and paste the vowels in the actual script) a e
i o u.
2. Which vowels sound the same as English vowel sounds? (list L1 vowel and English vowel
correspondence). /a/ = "ah", /e/ = "eh", /i/ = "ee", /o/ = "oh", /u/ = "oo"
3. Which vowel sounds do not exist in English? N/A
4. There are 27 consonants in this language. They are (cut and paste the consonants of the
actual script) a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, ñ, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z.. Which consonant
sounds do NOT exist in English? eñe (ñ).
5. What sounds do speakers of this language have difficulty pronouncing? Some may fail to
distinguish the sounds in words such as ship/sheep, taught/tot, fool/full or cart/cat/cut.
Pronouncing certain consonant sounds and the different vowel sounds.
6. Are there any sound placements that are different between English and this language? What
are they? There are 15 phonemes that occur in both languages, 5 that occur in Spanish only, and 9
that occur in English only. “Ch” and “sh” are two different phonemes in English, however, in
Spanish; students may pronounce these interchangeably without changing word meaning. “V” and
“b” are two different phonemes in English, but in Spanish, both letters appear in written words but
the typical pronounced “b”. “S” and “z” in English are two different phonemes but in Spanish, both
letters are pronounced as “s”.
7. Do any double letter combinations exist in this language? Yes
8. What are they and what do they correspond to in English? /ll/ = /y/, /rr/=rolling of the tongue,
Syntax and Grammar
9. How many tenses exist in this language? 14 Spanish verb tenses; 7 simple tenses and
7 compound tenses
10. What are they? Present, Imperfect, Preterite, Future, Conditional, Present Perfect, Pluperfect,
Preterit Perfect, Future Perfect, Conditional Perfect, Present Subjunctive, Imperfect Subjunctive,
Present Perfect Subjunctive, Pluperfect Subjunctive
11. The word order of this language is Subject, verb, object
12. What are the punctuation forms used in this language? Most punctuation is the same as far as
periods, commas, and semi-colons. However when question marks and exclamation marks are
used they are represented at the beginning and the end of the statement and quotation marks are
not used in the Spanish language.
13. How does this language mark gender? Gender determination is done by using different endings
to the word. So feminine words include: most words ending with "-a" and all words ending with "ción, -sión, -tad, -dad, -tud, -umbre, -cia". Masculine words include: most words ending with " -o",
all words ending with " -aje, -or, -ambre, -án, a stressed (accented) vowel such as í or ú", and most
words ending with "r, l, s, n". If the word does not have one of these endings the word is identified
by gender using a learned article such as: -un,-una,-el, and –la.
Morphology
14. What are some shared cognates between English and this language? English and Spanish have
many similar words. Some of them include: authorize ‐ autorizar, border ‐ borde, cable ‐ cable,
decline ‐ decliner, error ‐ error, family ‐ familia, gasoline ‐ gasoline, history ‐ historia, ideal ‐ ideal,
ustice ‐ justicia, kilogram ‐ kilogramo, laboratory ‐ laboratorio, manual ‐ manual, native ‐ native,
objective ‐ objetivo, pause ‐ pausa, quiet ‐ quieto, reference ‐ referencia, Salad ‐ ensalada,
temporary ‐ temporal, united ‐ unido, vacation ‐ vacaciones, and many more.
15. What are some FALSE cognates between English and this language? Words that are false
cognates are typically called “False Friends” or “False Amigos” because they look the same but are
not. Some of these words include: actual, asistir, basamento, boda, campo, and carpeta to name a
few.
16. Through your research what have you found are the biggest difficulties of speakers of this
language learning English? Please provide specific examples. Spanish has 5 pure vowels and 5
dipthongs and the length of the vowel is not significant in distinguishing between words. This
contrasts with English, which has 12 pure vowel sounds and 8 dipthong and the length of the
vowel sound plays an important role. So this leaves learners unable to distuguish the difference in
certain words like taught and tot. Spanish speakers have trouble going from Spanish which is
syllable-timed language to English which is stressed-time. There are also some pronunciation of
consonant letters to take into consideration such as: failure to pronounce the end consonant
accurately or strongly enough (cart for the English word card), problems with the /v/ in words
such as vowel or revive, difficulties in sufficiently distinguishing words such as see/she, and the
tendency to prefix words beginning with a consonant cluster on s- with an /ε/ sound; so, for
example, school becomes eschool and strip becomes estrip.
17. If you have an early production ELL who this language is their L1, what would be the most
important thing you will teach them in regards to the difference between their language and
English? Since Spanish and English are very similar, I would have my students learn the basic
cognates first as a way for them to hear similar English words. Then I would begin working on
grammar and letter sounds. All the different vowel sounds can become tricky and if the student
could learn different cognates using the different sounds beforehand it may become easier. Once
the student could understand vocabulary, the alphabet, and letter sounds, I would then teach the
student punctuation. To me understanding the language and vocabulary is the most important
part.