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Article published In:
Translation and Translanguaging in Multilingual Contexts
Vol. 3:2 (2017) ► pp.210–228

Translation from L1 to L2 vs. direct writing

A new assessment model

| Sharif University of Technology, Tehran
| Sharif University of Technology, Tehran
This study explores the issue of non-native speakers writing a text in their first language (L1) and then translating the text to the second language (L2) to enhance the final text in L2. Writing samples taken from 25 Iranian engineering students in an intermediate level compulsory general English as a foreign language class served as data. The students were provided with a form which instructed them to write their first essay in Farsi (L1) and then translate it into the foreign language, English. The compositions were suggested to be two paragraphs long to provide enough text to analyze. The second composition done by the same group of students a week later on a second topic was written directly in the target language (English). Each student’s work was evaluated in detail using a rating scale divided into two main sections, writing skills and effective writing. This study showed that intermediate level EFL students writing in L1 and then using a translation strategy did not produce better writing samples in L2 than when they wrote directly in L2.
Keywords: second language writing, translation, writing strategies, contrastive analysis of writing texts, writing assessment methods
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
  • 3.Research question
  • 4.Methodology
    • 4.1Participants
    • 4.2Materials
    • 4.3Data collection procedures
    • 4.4Data analysis
  • 5.Results
  • 6.Discussion and conclusion
  • References


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Published online: 23 June 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ttmc.3.2.04jah
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Schlam Salman, Julia & Irit Haskel-Shaham
2023. Noticing and metalinguistic awareness in the L2 writing process: A translation-based writing task for L1 Arabic speakers preparing to teach Hebrew as a second language. Journal of Second Language Writing 62 ► pp. 101065 ff. DOI logo

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