The Linguist is a languages magazine for professional linguists, translators, interpreters, language professionals, language teachers, trainers, students and academics with articles on translation, interpreting, business, government, technology
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24 The Linguist AUGUST/SEPTEMBER www.ciol.org.uk FEATURES for effective assessment are needed, not only in search of more objective and consistent product-oriented models but, first and foremost, in determining process-oriented models. Process-oriented forms of assessment allow for a diagnosis of learning difficulties, provide learners with feedback on their progress and, consequently, enhance learning. The last few decades have witnessed an emergence of innovative student-centred assessment methods that can improve assessment practice. 5 Some of these instruments include questionnaires to find out student profiles, surveys on translation knowledge or problems, reflective diaries, translation commentaries, peer- and self-assessment tasks, student portfolios, and recordings of students or professionals while they are translating. These tools and activities provide a successful alternative to the 'read and translate' approach in competence-based training. They encourage critical thinking to justify translation decisions, and help students to evaluate their own competence by monitoring their progress not only during training but throughout their careers. The new ISO 17100:2015, as an industry standard, outlines the processes that would result in a good-quality translation. Perhaps this focus on process will provide a way for the translation industry and training courses to converge in their assessment practices. It would be interesting to see if there is a way to marry the ISO processes to the lists of sub-competences used by universities in order to unify the way in which translation quality is assessed. The one-day conference New Perspectives in Assessment in Translation Training: Bridging the gap between academic and professional assessment will be held at the University of Westminster on 4 September (see www.westminster.ac.uk/ news-and-events/events). Notes 1 Chesterman, A and Wagner, E, 2002, Can Theory Help Translators? A Dialogue between the ivory tower and the wordface, St Jerome Publishing, Manchester, 88 2 House, J, 2015, Translation Quality Assessment: Past and present, Routledge, New York 3 Drugan, J, 2013, Quality in Professional Translation Assessment and Improvement, Bloomsbury, London (for a review, see TL52,4) 4 See e.g, Kelly, D, 2007, 'Translator Competence Contextualized. Translator Training in the Framework of Higher Education Reform: In search of alignment in curricular design' in Kenny, D and Ryou, K, Across Boundaries: International Perspectives on Translation Studies, Cambridge, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 128-142; EMT Expert Group, 2009, 'Competences for Professional Translators, Experts in Multilingual and Multimedia Communication' 5 See e.g, Kelly, D, 2005, A Handbook for Translator Trainers: Translation practices explained, St Jerome, Manchester; Galán-Mañas, A, and Hurtado Albir, A, 2015, 'Competence Assessment Procedures in Translator Training' in The Interpreter and Translator Trainer, 9,1 ACADEMIC MODELS Assessment takes various forms, and examinations are just one element of student translation assessment An emergence of innovative student-centred assessment methods can improve assessment practice © SHUTTERSTOCK