After a century of target-language-only orthodoxy, translation is back as a productive task. It’s useful for lexis if three pitfalls are managed: word-for-word output, over-reliance on L1, and L1 gaps (words like shallow, insight, challenge without a neat equivalent).
Activities
- Back translation: English sentences → L1; a week later (or swapped), back to English and compare (You’re better off without him; I should really get going).
- Give me the gist: teacher reads a short L1 news item; learners summarise it in English.
- Revising the draft: orally translate an L1 text, then improve it against an English text on the same topic (notice the gap).
- Alternative versions: groups swap and improve each other’s translations.
- To prevent word-for-word output, ask “How would you say this in English?”, not “translate”.
Theory
V. Cook (2001) Canadian Modern Language Review 57(3); G. Cook (2010) Translation in Language Teaching; Kerr (2014) Translation and Own-language Activities; Linck, Kroll & Sunderman (2009) Psychological Science 20 (L1 is active during L2 processing); Laufer & Hulstijn (2001) involvement load.
Apply in my context (Claude)
- Back translation using Uzbek (or Russian) is ideal IELTS homework for collocation accuracy, and it works for mixed L1 classes too, since each learner uses their own L1.
Connections
Planned translanguaging improved expository reading (MultiEd) · Teach lexically - collocations as minimum units of meaning · ELT Research Bites - reading queue (L1 vs L2 explanation study)