A Silly Question for the Bilingual

English most of the time

Spanish when Im with my Mexicano friends, at a Mexican restaurant or watching Tele Mundo :-)

As an engineer I work with many bilngual people from all over the globe.
Those that cannot think in English never last because they take too much time to translate between their language and the programming in English that they share with others.
Those that think in Englsh do very well.

That depends on the subject I'm thinking about. My mother tongue is Arabic, but if I'm thinking about, say, an American movie or an English book, I think of them in English. Usually. The terms are just easier in English and come more naturally.

Now if I'm thinking about something like my diet, that's a mash-up of both languages, as I track it on an English site and think in terms of calories and portions and such but think of the food in Arabic. Make sense?

As an engineer I work with many bilngual people from all over the globe.
Those that cannot think in English never last because they take too much time to translate between their language and the programming in English that they share with others.
Those that think in Englsh do very well.

I've taught English as a foreign language quite a bit (still do on a temporary basis here and there) and I'm always on at my students to think in English, not translate, for precisely this reason. I teach it by introducing the concept through a picture/object or by explaining it in English, then giving them the new word, then making them use the new words through questions and answers in context. Translation is banned; I've even confiscated dictionaries in the past. If they don't understand they have to ask me in English and I'll explain/demonstrate again in English. The result is that they quickly learn to think in English when they speak English (even the beginner classes) and their fluency improves a lot.

In addition to slowing them down, thinking in their own language then translating results in a lot of errors because expressions and grammar are not the same in each language, e.g. students saying "before two weeks" instead of "two weeks ago" or "close the lights" instead of "turn off the lights" etc.

Back on the original topic: my kids are bilingual, my older daughter (almost 6 yrs old) just switches from one language to the other just as quickly as turning her head from one person to the other. She knows who speaks what languages and will speak to them in their language, and even translates for me. I've asked her what language she thinks in and she looked at me like I was crazy.

My home language is English , so that's the language I think in.
When I went to school, Afrikaans was a compulsory language, so all South Africans were expected to speak it, and to speak it well, or we were ridiculed. Things have changed since then, but the majority of people here are either bi or multi lingual, with English being a second, or often third language.

^^^^^^ this
When I speak in Afrikaans or watch an Afrikaans tv show I tend to think in Afrikaans, otherwise I think in English. One of my best friends is Afrikaans and if I have spent the day at her place or with her family, I tend to come home still thinking in Afrikaans and even start speaking that at home. I also speak a little Zulu, but have to admit that I find it hard to think in ZUlu, dont think I know enough words, lol.

I thinking the language that I am speaking in. I don't translate it. Each sentence of questions requires a response. If I am asked a question. Tudo bem? I don't think this is a greeting "[Are] all [things] good? I respond with Tudo bem. All [things are] good. In English we would say Is everything good? and respond, "Everything's good." My point is simply that I think in the language of the situation. When I travel in Brazil, I rarely think of English unless I come a across a word that I don't know, then I go to the pocket dictionary.

Learning another language is easier if you don't translate to English and then back.

Funny, I found that i also dream in different languages.

Well my english is not as good as i want,(working on that), but good enough to have a conversation, so i think in my 1st language Spanish

I was brought up in a bilingual house, mostly English though, because I was raised in England!
I tend to switch, depending on what I'm doing. I notice if I'm by myself I think in Spanish, with others I think in English!
I don't have a lot of Spanish friends around here

taglish ----a mix of Tagalog and English

I tend to have a switch in my head as weird as that sounds. It's a slow switch. Takes a couple days to flick over. If I'm in England then everything I do is in English. Even dreaming.

If I go back to Switzerland then after a couple of days the switch moves over to the German position and everything starts running in German. I can always tell when the switch has clicked, because I start dreaming in Swiss-German again. When I get back to England, after a couple of days, everything's back to English.

The only exception appears to be phone numbers and pin numbers. The language I learnt them in is the language I have to remember them in. Very weird lol

I teach Spanish & French (middle school) I lived in Spain back in 2000 and that helped out my Spanish fluency. My first language is English, so I think in English, but if I plan to say something in Spanish, it just comes right out of my mouth LOL I can switch over to French too, but it's not as good. I wish I got to live in France or Quebec, but I just didn't have the money. I have to think a little bit more in French. When I came back from Spain, my college French prof was laughing at my French accent (all full of rolled Rs and everything--- oopsie!) It's really funny when my Spanish students leave and then my French class comes in and I'm still speaking in Spanish. hehe "Hold on kids. I gotta flip the switch! BONJOUR!" lol And sometimes I still dream in Spanish. Kinda crazy!

ahaha depends... i used to think only in english (sometimes id try to think in french but it would feel odd) now that im in france i catch myself naturally thinking in france

My mother tounge is Hungarian, live in the UK for 9 years. I guess it varies sometimes i find talking to myslef in hungarian and sometimes in english. Just depends on the situation. :huh:

Mostly in FRENCH......the only exception is when french doesn't have the equivalence in English because mot of the time it take two three more word in french to say the same thing in english

I'm multiligual and can think on any of the languages that I speak, it will depend on where I am or whom I'm speaking to. One evening when I was with lots of friends I found myself talking to each one of them in their respective native tongues and then translating to the rest of people, one of them said to me that at one point she watched in wonder how the human brain works as I had no problems switching from one to another. My husband is trilingual but seems to have some problems "switching" from his native tongue to English sometimes. Our son knows my mood depending on what language I use to talk to him: French=just kidding, English=everything is OK, Japanese=I'm getting upset, Spanish=I'm really angry, Romanian=he's dead LOL
I sometimes dream in languages that I don't speak and I don't understand, that's weird!