The influence of the spanish language in the learning of english for secondary education students

Abstract

This dissertation concentrates on the linguistic influences that exist in the teaching, learning and acquisition of second languages. It gives an account about the effect that the native tongue (L1) has on the L2. The languages we have used for this purpose are Spanish as the mother tongue and English as the L2. After an investigation about some of the linguistic phenomenon that appear in this influence, a questionnaire aimed to get an error analysis takes place. Those errors have been treated to make the reader realise and understand that a negative transfer exists and it must be solved. Only lexico-morphological and grammatical samples and errors have been dealt with as a first approximation about the matter. The obtained outcomes show that influence and transference are two aspects of high importance in the learning of second languages and, either positive or negative, the teacher must be aware of how to benefit or cope with them.