Writing test 1. Correction activity using machine translation

1.   Typewrite the text you wrote for Writing test 1. Avoid using any extra aids.

2.    Look for 2 or 3 machine translation systems (e.g., Google Translate, DeepL, and/or Microsoft Translator) and translate your composition into your mother tongue.

3.    Evaluate if the translated text makes sense and make a list of errors, classifying them into categories (and subcategories, if possible), such as:

-Focus on form vs meaning: fluency or well-formedness of the target text (e.g., errors in grammatical agreement, word order, collocation, punctuation, etc.) vs adequacy if the meaning of the target text is not consistent with that of the source text, including cultural references or register.

-Word order errors: incorrect word order at phrase or word level.

-Mistranslations: incorrectly translated word, wrong gender, number, or case.

-Omissions (e.g., words from the source text have been omitted from the target text) vs additions (e.g., words not in the source text have been added in the target text).

4.    Try to fix problems in the translated text following the post-editing guidelines posted on this blog on 25/11/2024.

5.    Translate the post-edited translated text back into English using the same MT systems and compare this back-translation with your first version in English to identify your own mistakes.

6.    Pre-edit your English texts correcting your own errors and following the pre-editing guidelines posted on this blog on 25/11/2024.

7.    Translate the pre-edited English texts into your mother tongue again using the same MT systems.

8.    Compare:

-The initial source text in English and the pre-edited source text in English.

-The initial target text in your mother tongue and the post-edited target text in your mother tongue.

9.    Reflect on the whole process and implications (including practical and ethical considerations) and discuss orally or write a report.