Bringing the Real World into the MA Translation Classroom

Between 2009 and 2011 I facilitated an MA course called Translation Studies and the Real World. My aim was simple: bring the working life of the translation profession into the classroom. What I learnt along the way says as much about students and institutions as it does about pedagogy.

Starting from the students, not the syllabus

The course was being taught for the first time, so I had to choose, plan, deliver and assess the content myself, drawing on my early reading in translator education. I arrived with a preliminary outline, but I was lucky: the students had just returned from their internships. I asked the course administrator for their placement reports and spent about half of the first day discussing their internship experiences.

That discussion reshaped my course outline. The more teachers know about their students' learning styles and needs, the better placed they are to assess their own teaching and improve it accordingly (Viau et Bouchard, 2006, p. 1).

Active pedagogies and simulations

Since the course dealt with professional issues in practice, I relied on active pedagogies: workshops combined with ICT tools. The focal point was to simulate the real world of translation, showing how language services are delivered in physical and virtual (online freelance) settings, and under what constraints. The intention was to link the course directly to the profession (Viau et Bouchard, 2006, p. 38). From time to time I gave a short lecture to supply the declarative knowledge students needed, so they could apply it and reflect on it while working through problem situations and case studies.

Where it got difficult

I must admit that applying active pedagogies and ICT tools in the MA class ran into two obstacles:

• Student unease. Students were still shaped by the old paradigm in which knowledge flows from a single fountain (the teacher), is absorbed by learners, and is displayed through competition to stand out. In that paradigm the professor is judged on how brilliantly he or she delivers content.
• Infrastructure and means. I encouraged students to bring their laptops, or use the internet at home, to communicate in online discussion groups and research specialised sites, since the online environment takes up a large part of their future work. Neither the university infrastructure nor the students' financial situation allowed this to run smoothly.

Takeaway: a professionally oriented course lives or dies on two things the teacher does not fully control: the learning culture students bring with them, and the resources the institution puts behind the course.