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The mindset shift that improves exam grades & self-esteem and redefines success

26th September 2018 by theinterpretingcoach

Are you great at dealing with technical jargon in simultaneous? Are you bad with numbers? Are your notes sloppy? Do you have a bad memory?

These are the stories we tell ourselves about our interpreting skills and professional abilities, and some of these stories can be very damaging.

I often liken learning to be an interpreter to learning to drive a car. You need to master a distinct set of skills, apply them all at the same time (watching out for hazards, steering, using the pedals, signalling, reading the road conditions), and give your passengers a smooth ride. When you first learn to drive, you need to think hard about these things (e.g. ‘I’m approaching a sharp left turn; I’d better change down into second gear.’). Eventually, many of the processes become automatic, except in difficult driving conditions (heavy traffic, bad weather), and you don’t have to think so hard about what you’re doing. This seems to me to be a pretty good analogy for simultaneous interpreting, in particular.

Let me tell you a little story about driving. For years, I didn’t drive. When asked about it, I explained that I ‘didn’t drive’ or that I was bad at it. I was definitely useless at parallel parking.

I learned to drive at 17. I took lots of driving lessons and passed my test first time, then didn’t drive for several years. My then boyfriend got bored of doing all the driving when we went on long trips, and pushed me to drive his car.

Picture this: my boyfriend’s white Citroen, a wooden post in a garage, a sickening crunch, and a bill for £982 (probably around £50,000 in today’s money. Well, that’s a slight exaggeration, but that’s what it felt like as a student).

The most interesting part of this story is not the severe dent in the bodywork that resulted, but what happened afterwards. I developed a driving phobia. It manifested in a very physical way. I felt anxious as a passenger in someone else’s car. My spatial awareness was shot to pieces: when cars came at us in the other direction, I thought they were going to run into us, even though they were in the other lane. My warped perception often led me to believe we were going to hit the kerb, even though there were inches of space between it and the tyres.

I stopped driving completely for 12 years.

The messages we absorb from our nearest and dearest in our first few years of life shape our whole personality and ability to deal with life’s challenges. Some of the biggest messages I subconsciously absorbed from my parents** were ‘it’s only worth doing something if you do it well’ (= you should aspire to perfection), ‘mistakes are disastrous and shameful’ and ‘what other people think of you really matters’. As a result, I grew up with very strong perfectionist tendencies. I felt I should be able to do things perfectly, straight away.

When I crashed my boyfriend’s car, my psychological makeup just couldn’t accept a) that I had done something badly, b) that I had made a terrible mistake, and c) that it was my boyfriend’s car and everyone knew about my embarrassing failure. I find it a fascinating proof of the power of the mind that the result was a phobia lasting 12 years. I was literally incapable of driving, for no other reason than my own limiting self-beliefs.

This is an excellent example of what’s known as a fixed mindset. A fixed mindset sees traits such as intelligence, creativity, character, interpreting skills, or in my case, driving ability, as being either fixed at birth or immutable, carved in stone. My unfortunate encounter with the garage post proved to me that I was a bad driver, so I defined myself as a bad driver.

I had no problem defining myself as good at some things (baking, dancing, writing thank you letters) and terrible at others (bicycle maintenance, driving, small talk). After all, how many times have you heard fellow linguists say ‘I’m useless at maths!’?

None of this struck me as particularly damaging, until I began to hear the same words in the mouth of my six year old daughter. ‘I’m useless,’ she would say. ‘I’m so stupid! I can’t do this!’ It struck me as worrying, and wrong, that such a young child should be so hard on herself when she couldn’t master a new or complex skill straight away, that she equated being a beginner with stupidity or failure, and that she had so little resilience that she didn’t believe she could continue to develop and improve, with effort and help.

That’s when I began to learn about growth mindsets.

Much research has been done on fixed mindsets vs. growth mindsets in the past twenty years (mostly on children). A growth mindset is the belief that intelligence (and other traits or skills) can be developed; that you can train your brain with hard work, effective strategies, and help from others when needed.

The origins of work on growth mindset

The early work on growth mindsets was led in 1998 by Carol Dweck, a professor of psychology at Stanford University. Six studies looked at the effects of praise on students’ behaviour and performance following a test. Those students who were praised on their natural ability (e.g. ‘you did well, you’re very smart’), later chose activities that would make them look clever. They demonstrated less persistence than the other group, and their performance in subsequent tests was poorer. Students who were praised for being hard working, on the other hand, chose to learn new things and performed better subsequently.

Since then, several large scale studies (a 2013 meta-analysis of 113 studies, data from more than 160,000 children in Chile, data from 100,000 middle school pupils from California) have shown that a growth mindset predicts academic achievement, that growth mindset interventions can improve maths test scores, and that mindsets are a significant factor in working successfully towards a goal.

The benefits of having a growth mindset

In addition to being associated with higher academic achievement and working towards goals successfully, having a growth mindset can also help students

cope better with transitions,
develop grit and resilience,
develop pro-social behaviours (defined as behaviours that benefit other people or society as a whole).

A growth mindset may also offer mental health benefits, such as a reduced risk of depression and anxiety.

Now, in case you’re wondering how this relates to you, if you’re reading this, the chances are you are a) an interpreting student, b) an interpreting trainer, or c) a person. Or possibly two out of three of these. And people, whether students or trainers (or professional interpreters) can benefit hugely from shifting their mindset to move away from a fixed view of ability to a growth mindset.

How? Change the way you think and talk to yourself (or your children, or your students) about your achievements or failures.

As a trainer, I see the effects of fixed mindsets every day in my work with interpreting students. More and more students suffer anxiety and stress during the academic year, and their exam performances are severely affected by nerves. Yet these students’ experience of their interpreting course, and the way they respond to challenges, setbacks and adversity (including exams), can be transformed with a mindset shift.

Let me make this more visual for you, and illustrate what happens in the classroom, or after an exam, when a student encounters adversity (e.g. ‘negative’ feedback on their interpreting, or a poor exam grade).

In a nutshell, to people with a fixed mindset, the classroom can be a threatening and stressful environment. This is because they believe their abilities and intelligence are immutable; thus, every class/performance/exam forces them to prove their ability and avoid looking stupid. Every lesson makes them question whether they will be accepted or rejected, whether they will come out the winner or loser, whether they will look intelligent or ignorant (many of the professional interpreters out there will recognise that they feel like this about their work assignments as well).

As a result, people with a fixed mindset tend to value good grades (= proof that they are intelligent) over learning. They have a tendency to avoid challenges (which might make them look stupid, i.e. call into question their perceived intelligence), and to give up when they struggle. Their inner dialogue goes like this: ‘If I have to try hard at learning to note-take/doing simultaneous/getting all the links right in the speech, I must not be very clever/talented.’ They view the struggle negatively, and they think they have discovered they are bad at something.

They have little resilience.

By contrast, students with a growth mindset perceive the classroom as an exciting place to grow and embrace challenges. The work that they do leads to mastery of their chosen subject. They tend to value learning (the process, not the results), and they view effort and struggle positively.

They are resilient.

When it’s explained in these terms, I think it’s difficult to object to the theory behind growth mindsets. What’s not to like in an approach that helps students enjoy learning and achieve more, that makes company employees feel more empowered and committed, and that helps old dogs learn new tricks (since, despite the age-related decline in our little grey cells, our brains are still malleable)?

Old dog, new tricks. See how literal my brain is? Literal, but still plastic.

As a result, the growth mindset approach has been adopted wholeheartedly by the British educational establishment. It’s not all that easy to teach in schools, though; and it is prone to distortions and misinterpretations, which can be quite dangerous in themselves. I’ll talk about those in a moment.

How to change your teaching with growth mindset principles

The first thing I want to convey to you is this: I firmly believe that if you have a growth mindset (most of the time), and you can encourage your students to do the same, the classroom will be more productive, less threatening, more positive, and more fun. In this environment, it’s easier to learn together.

First of all, trainers need to use their influence in a purposeful and explicit way, by modelling a growth mindset. Say what? Well, walk the walk.

When you’re in a meeting or a training session, speak up when you don’t understand. When someone makes a Powerpoint presentation, try saying ‘can you tell me more about that?’ instead of pretending you know it all already. Be curious. Don’t be the person with eyes facing the floor, who never asks questions. In the classroom, show that you’re not perfect or all-knowing, and that you are also still learning and growing. Show that you are someone to learn with, that your students can learn together with you.

Does this sound risky? It definitely makes you vulnerable in a way I, at least, was told to avoid at all costs when I was training as an interpreter. ‘If you don’t know something, cover it up!’ was the mantra. I’m not telling you how to behave in front of your clients, though; I’m making a suggestion about how you relate to your students, if you’re a trainer. Admit your imperfections, so they can let go of the need to be perfect. Show, or say, that you’re still learning, so they can understand the importance of lifelong learning and personal growth (no need to go over the top and let out all your insecurities and self-criticism, though!). Some years ago I watched a fellow trainer, who happened to be an outstanding interpreter and a colleague for whom I had huge respect, demonstrate a consecutive in class. He sailed through it, with the exception of a short section, which he fluffed. Afterwards, he laughed about it, explained what had gone wrong in his technique, and suggested better ways of dealing with it. The students loved it! Instead of consecutive seeming to be an unattainable goal where only perfection was acceptable, his performance made it seem achievable; and more than that, the fact that a professional, highly regarded interpreter had made a (small) mistake also made the profession look more achievable to the students.

Alongside practising your own growth mindset, here are some tips for fostering the same in your students:

teach students about the evidence from neuroscience that the brain is malleable and that intelligence can continue to develop throughout your life.
Change the way you interact with your student. Focus on praising the process (their effort, strategy and results) rather than their ability.
Avoid comparing students. Give students the opportunity to reflect on their own performance, and to evaluate how hard they worked, what strategies they used, and how much progress they have made.
Understand the power of the word YET. If your students (or your children, or you) make absolute statements about their ability (‘I can’t listen and write at the same time’, ‘I’m bad with numbers’, ‘I can never remember the conclusion’), see what happens when you add the word….YET at the end of the sentence. That simple addition leaves room for growth, and shows that you are engaged in a process in which there is hope for improvement.
Remind your students that they are beginners, that they are learning new skills, and that it is normal to struggle.
Accept mistakes in your classroom. Mistakes, if you get the right feedback afterwards, help us learn. But it’s worth making the point that interpreters can’t afford to make the same mistake too many times.

Here are a few examples to illustrate the idea of praising the process rather than the ability:

Praising ability

‘Great! You’ve taken to note-taking really quickly. You’re a natural!’

‘You got a distinction in your first semester exams. You’re a really good interpreter!’

‘You picked up that idea straight away. Told you you were bright.’

‘You’re such a good student. Well done!’

Praising process

‘Great! You worked really hard on that essay.’

‘You’ve done a lot of practice on your symbols, and the result is a real improvement in your consecutive technique.’

‘It was good to see you rounding up the numbers when the speech got too hard. That was a new strategy for you, and it worked.’

‘Today was a challenging session. Your note-taking isn’t 100% reliable yet, but you can already get more detail in the speech than last week.’

In many ways, praising the process rather than the ability ties in with familiar principles of giving constructive feedback to interpreting students: don’t make it personal (‘you’re terrible at this!’), be specific, give examples, comment on the performance and not the person. In this sense, growth mindset theory tallies with and reinforces tried and tested principles of best practice in interpreter training.

Misconceptions about growth mindset

Funnily enough, the growth mindset theory is actually prone to polarised, all-or-nothing thinking, even though that is precisely what the theory frowns on (for instance, ‘let’s test school children on whether they have a growth mindset’, ‘let’s evaluate schools based on whether they manage to inculcate a growth mindset’, ‘if you think the theory doesn’t work, it’s probably because you have a false growth mindset’).

I’ll spare you the complex debate about how to apply growth mindset principles to education policy, and instead focus on three misconceptions I think are damaging.

‘Anyone can do anything.’

Growth mindset theory can come across as a defence of the idea that everyone has infinite potential. If you just try hard enough/are positive enough/embrace your mistakes and failures enough, anything is possible!

Hold on just a minute. Your mindset can get you a long way, but it can’t overcome any and every challenge you may face, or alter luck/opportunity/the way the world works. We’re not all going to be wildly successful multi-millionaires, or prima ballerinas, or the Prime Minister (guess which one I briefly toyed with as a child).*

When growth mindset theory is misinterpreted in this way and applied in the classroom, the risk is that it can lead to boundless optimism and ambition (and why not?), but also a whole lot of unrealistic expectations and a sense of entitlement.

We all have different talents, aptitudes, interests and temperaments; I don’t believe in the idea that we can all do anything we want, as long as we believe we can; but we can definitely all change, grow and improve.

‘Growth mindset is all about effort. You should never praise ability.’

First of all, having a growth mindset doesn’t just mean working hard. Unproductive effort shouldn’t be a goal in itself. It’s important to keep a weather eye on what you’re trying to achieve, and make sure you are trying new strategies if you’re in a rut, or getting help from others.

As a parent, I sometimes find my children’s school overly politically correct in avoiding praise for ability at all costs. Report cards are so non-judgemental and politically correct that I find it difficult to assess whether my children are doing OK. All their reports are couched in terms like ‘has made good progress’, and ‘is working hard towards mastering multiplication tables.’ Huh? What does this mean, really? If you’re a teacher or a parent, focus on praising effort, by all means, but don’t forget that sometimes we need reassurance or a reality check in the form of a reference to achievement. It’s OK to say ‘Wow! What a fantastic result in your exam!’ – you might want to add ‘You put in so much effort, and this is your reward – you can be proud of yourself!’

‘Just adopt a growth mindset and good things will follow.’

Nope. It’s not enough to talk the talk. You have to walk the walk as well. Trainers need to model a growth mindset in their interactions with students. Companies need to have policies that reward behaviours based on growth mindsets, such as sharing information, collaborating, innovating, seeking feedback, and admitting mistakes. If we want our children to become more resilient and adopt a growth mindset, we need to demonstrate the same attitude, and value perseverance and problem-solving, rather than just educational or sporting achievements.

How you can adopt a growth mindset in your own life

Seriously, you have enough energy to read more about this? I’m definitely over my word limit. On the other hand, I’m also over thinking I’m a bad driver. After several lessons and a whole lot of ‘facing my fears and doing it anyway’, I started driving again a few years ago. I’m not brilliant at it: I hate going to new places, I despise multi-storey car parks, and I refuse to drive on the Continent.

But when I catch myself thinking ‘I’m terrible at parking!’, I reframe it (especially if my children are around) as ‘Driving isn’t my top skill, but I’m still working on it. I’ve practised parking and reversing, and I’ve definitely improved. I’m not perfect at it, but my driving is good enough.’

If you’re interested in applying growth mindset principles to your own life, look out for next week’s FREE mindset challenge.

I’ll be sending you 5 day’s worth of simple activities to get you thinking differently about learning.

*no, not Prime Minister. Definitely a poisoned chalice.

** Surely you know the saying ‘they f*ck you up, your mum and dad’? If not, here’s the poem by Philip Larkin. Those easily offended by four letter words should abstain from reading any further.

This Be The Verse

BY PHILIP LARKIN

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.

They may not mean to, but they do.

They fill you with the faults they had

And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn

By fools in old-style hats and coats,

Who half the time were soppy-stern

And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man.

It deepens like a coastal shelf.

Get out as early as you can,

And don’t have any kids yourself.

Philip Larkin, “This Be the Verse” from Collected Poems. Copyright

Source: Collected Poems (Farrar Straus and Giroux, 2001)

Sophie Llewellyn Smith, writing as The Interpreting Coach, is a coach, interpreter trainer, conference interpreter, designer of online teaching materials, and creator of Speechpool. Follow the blog to pick up tips on how to improve your interpreting skills, and check out the website for digital material to complement your face-to-face learning and empower you to take control of your learning. If you’re interested in personal coaching, why not book a free discovery call?

Your trainers are only as good as you make them

12th September 2018 by theinterpretingcoach

I hesitated about the title of this blog post for a long time. Not least because it sounds as if I’m writing about shoes.

At first, I wanted to write about what I have learned from my students over the years. And then I wanted to write about how students can help their trainers step up and do better, because that is what some of my students do for me. Really, I’m writing about the symbiosis between student and trainer that can lead to breakthroughs on one side and excellence in teaching on the other.

But all of this is difficult to encapsulate in a blog title. I reckon if you read on, you’ll see what I’m getting at. So please bear with me. *

What my students have taught me

Every so often, I hear a teacher/trainer/tutor say ‘I learn so much from my students’. And on my jaded days, I think: ‘Nope, I’ve learned diddly squat from my students today. And that’s because they have no life experience, they need a bit more get-up-and-go, and the education system has given them a sense of entitlement and little idea of what independent thought looks like. And now I’m old, they all look about 15.’

And then I give myself a good slap round the head.

Sometimes I just forget what it’s like to start out – not in all areas, because I’ve certainly taken up new activities and learned new skills as an adult (I’m a permanent beginner when it comes to driving and parking, for instance, and have only just begun a long journey in web building and marketing) – but it’s a long time since I was a postgrad student. Let’s face it, when I embarked on my interpreter training course at the tender age of 21, I was deeply ignorant about current affairs, had very little work experience, and was probably more sheltered and naive and certainly vastly less streetwise and tech-savvy than students today. This is, in fact, totally normal. It doesn’t mean I had nothing to contribute, and the same goes for my students today.

I don’t learn from all my students every day (and let’s be honest: they probably don’t learn something new from me every single day), but some of my most valuable lessons as a trainer have come from my students.

Grit and determination

Acquiring the skill set required to become a professional interpreter is hard. Attending an interpreting course where you receive feedback on your performance every day in front of all the other students is very hard, psychologically speaking.

I benefited (if you can call it that) from the bootcamp style of interpreter training: short, fairly brutal, and effective (if traumatic).

drill sergeant meme — * note that I’m not giving any hints about which of my esteemed colleagues at the European Commission had drill sergeant tendencies.

I was fortunate enough to pass the final exam, and start work straight away with a good employer. ~~So all the hard stuff was done in six months, with a good outcome at the end.~~ So all the hard stuff only appeared to last six months (but after that there was a massive learning curve which still hasn’t ended…).

It doesn’t happen like that for everyone. In fact, these days, what with the labour market in general and the interpreting market in particular being quite different from 25 years ago, students have to a) make it through their interpreting course successfully, and b) market themselves successfully in order to find any work in a sometimes saturated and ungrateful market. They need bucketloads of versatility, determination, professionalism, and skills I just didn’t need or have when I started out. And they need many more strings to their bow.

Every so often I come across a student who deeply impresses me with his or her ability to navigate the myriad challenges I’ve just mentioned with grace and enthusiasm, and who demonstrates maturity, resilience, and willingness to learn. A couple of years ago I had a student in my French interpreting class, E., who never gave up. She wasn’t in the top spot at the beginning of the year and it wasn’t all plain sailing. She had issues with her delivery and use of English that needed addressing. But she Never. Gave. Up. She listened to feedback, she applied feedback, she worked hard, she worked well with others, she welcomed advice but didn’t need hand-holding, and after graduating, she set herself some goals and went after them with passion and determination. Perhaps it had something to do with her hobby of weightlifting, and that mental attitude carried over into her interpreting, I don’t know. She certainly had exactly the right mindset to make progress. By the time she graduated, her skills had improved significantly, and she hasn’t rested on her laurels. She is now actively involved in organising collaborative practice groups for colleagues, as well as consolidating her interpreting skills, blogging, and working on a retour.

The reason I mention this student is because she was a great reminder to me of how much can be achieved with tenacity and dogged determination, even if you don’t start from the most comfortable position.

Sometimes there seems to be a feeling among trainers that interpreters are born, not made; that you need special talents to become an interpreter, and that if you lack innate talent, you will fail.

I love this reminder from E., and some of my other students, that you can achieve so much in life by just doing the work without excuses or procrastination, and that success doesn’t have to be immediate. It may take a few months or a few years longer, but it is success nonetheless (some of my former students passed accreditation tests at European Institutions or started work as professional interpreters several years after graduating). The lesson here for trainers is never to give up on students who are struggling or taking longer than expected to pick up skills.

It is a joy to watch students’ tenacity and enthusiasm in working towards and achieving their goals, and as someone who suffers from perfectionist tendencies (if I can’t get something right first time, I tend to give up), I really admire their attitude.

New technologies

I quite like new technologies. Here I am, writing a blog, organising webinars and running several websites. Nevertheless, I am not a digital native, and my son (aged 10) can already do far more than I can with the TV remote and iPad.

technologically challenged — Me, sometimes.

One of the great things about being a trainer is that the contact with students helps me keep up (a little) with new technologies.

Students have a completely different experience at university these days. When I was a student, email didn’t exist, and word processing was in its infancy. I handed in handwritten work and couldn’t consult google.

These days, students have virtual learning environments, timetable apps, access to lecture recordings, Facebook groups, and more. At the universities where I teach, they also have equipment that can record their performances in the booth, video conferencing equipment in the room, and a smart whiteboard.

If not for my students, I would be one of these:

The fact that our students’ learning environment has evolved so much leads us, as trainers, to think about how we can tap into all these new possibilities; how we can use new technologies to enhance learning, improve productivity, save time, or connect with colleagues around the world.

My students’ familiarity with the Internet, file sharing, and Facebook, for example, led directly to the creation of Speechpool. The increasing use of blended learning has led me to create my new site, The Interpreting Coach. Initiatives such as ORCIT (online resources for conference interpreter training), the SCIC/EP speech repository, streaming of mock conference by many universities, and new apps for interpreters, are the direct result of a) the availability of new technologies, but above all b) the way students and early adopters use and want these new technologies.

It’s when students ask the questions (how can I find practice material/find a practice partner anywhere in the world/organise my glossaries?) that we trainers can look for answers and consider how we can do things better inside or outside the classroom.

Questions, questions

They say there is no such thing as a stupid question. And indeed, as a trainer, I welcome questions. Nobody likes to deliver a lecture and see glazed eyes and bored looks; at least questions from the floor suggest that the audience has been listening.

Sometimes my students or coaching clients ask questions – about interpreting technique or use of language – that are very difficult to answer. I struggle with these, because I don’t want to give a confusing or misleading answer; and because language is full of nuance and subjectivity, and I can’t always offer unambiguous or definitive answers.

These questions, though, are my lifeblood as a trainer. They force me to reflect on technique or use of English. They help me to look at my own language differently. They spur me on to give clearer explanations, or to develop teaching materials to explain the linguistic challenge in question.

Just this morning, a coaching client asked me to explain salami technique (also known as ‘chunking’). It was a great opportunity for me not only to explain the principle, but to find specific examples at the syntactic level to explain the advantages of the technique. When I’m asked to explain something I take for granted in my own interpreting, it’s a great opportunity to take a fresh look at it and see if there is a different or better illustration that will be easier for students to grasp.

Another example: in developing materials for my online membership site, Rock your Retour, for English retourists, I have been heavily inspired by my coaching clients’ questions, and also by their mistakes (why did they use a particular word or phrase? What would have sounded better?). If not for them and my students, my relationship with English, and with interpreting, would stagnate. Instead, my students give me an opportunity to grow, learn, and explain better, and I’m grateful for it.

Students, help your trainers rock!

If you’ve read this far, you’ll have understood, I hope, that when I’m not swamped by my workload and the odd bout of pessimism about the profession, I am both grateful to my students and inspired by them. They make me a better trainer. I don’t believe that training and coaching should take an entirely top-down approach; nor do I believe that 100% student-led learning is necessarily successful. Instead, I like to think of the interpreting student + trainer relationship as being closer to the relationship between a mentor and mentee. A mentor guides mentees to reach their full potential; but a mentor cannot teach every student the same thing, or in the same way. He or she must adapt and respond to the students’ needs and wants.

I didn’t want to end this post, therefore, without giving all the students out there some advice about how you can help your trainers help you. We trainers want to give the best of ourselves, and we want our teaching to be useful. And you can help us do that. How?

Ask questions! Don’t be passive. Instead, take control of your learning. Ask (pertinent) questions (have I said that already?). Spur us on to think critically about language and technique and offer you clearer insights.
Listen to feedback and advice. Try it out when you next interpret.
Adopt a growth mindset. Don’t worry if you’re not perfect at first: you are a beginner. All the stages of your learning are building blocks towards success. This means perfectionism (in the negative sense of ‘all or nothing thinking’) has no place in your learning; instead, be determined and hard-working, and remember that mistakes help you learn.
As a learner, be active, responsible and curious. Try to absorb the advice and insights that your trainers and fellow students can give you, and to use them to become an independent learner. You will spend a brief period of time with your trainers, and the rest of your life maintaining and improving your own skills with far less guidance, so remember that your goal is not to absorb knowledge but to acquire skills and the right mindset for success.

In short, be teachable!

I think it would be grossly unfair, though, to encourage students to be teachable without asking the same of trainers. We’ve all heard of lifelong learning, and anyone who is a professional interpreter knows that you have never finished learning a language or picked up every bit of terminology on a given subject. But I think it’s worth considering how trainers can keep learning and improving too.

With the right approach on both sides, it seems to me that students and trainers can push one another to give more and do better, and create a relationship that is genuinely mutually beneficial.

Trainers, what’s the most valuable lesson you have learned from your students?

*This is, in fact, a phrase I hate. But it is ubiquitous in the UK.

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Post-holiday stress

28th August 2018 by theinterpretingcoach

Back to school, back to stress

Here in Europe, the summer holidays are drawing to a close.

How are you feeling? Do you find the rentrée, as it’s known in French, exciting or overwhelming?

In some ways, I quite like that ‘going back to school’ feeling; as a creature of habit, I enjoy getting back into a routine, and getting stuck into new projects. I also like the excitement of a new academic year at University, with new students full of optimism.

On the other hand, a very full schedule can feel oppressive and overwhelming, and I find myself dragging my feet when trying to get back into professional mode. I like to keep that holiday feeling going a little longer, so as to avoid the sense of stress and anticlimax that accompanies a return to grey skies, cooler temperatures, and humdrum domestic hassles (leaky roofs, cars with batteries gone flat). There are many ways to do this; at the moment my favourites are:

eating as if I were still on holiday, with lots of delicious salads.
getting up later than usual – I’ll put off my normal 5.45 wake-up call for as long as possible!
reading a lot (admittedly, this is sometimes a way of procrastinating, instead of facing up to boring chores).

However, with the best will in the world, I can’t entirely ignore my massive to-do list, which makes September look like an exercise in squaring the circle. I often wish the day had 27 hours or so, so I could have a fighting chance of getting everything done.

Here are my top 3 tips for dispelling that horrible feeling of drowning in all the things you have to do.

Prioritise your to-do list

I find lists invaluable for keeping track of all my tasks. But sometimes they outgrow the sheet of paper I’m writing them on, and they look so long.

Here’s a simple way to use to-do lists more efficiently.

Divide your sheet into 4 boxes: urgent + important, urgent + less important, not urgent but important, not urgent + not very important.

Fill in the boxes with all the things you need to get done.

Now you can see at a glance the ones you actually need to do right away: they are in the urgent + important box. After that, you can move on to urgent but not important, then to not urgent but important, and finally to not urgent + not very important.

Hopefully, if you try this method, you will see that not everything needs doing today. You can plan the order in which to tackle your tasks, and they feel less overwhelming. And perhaps you (or I) will feel less like this.

Another advantage of this method, as I see it, is that unless I have guests coming to stay, it almost invariably relegates housework to the bottom of the list.

On the other hand, the result is that my tidier other half (better half?) is constantly irritated at the mess in the house. I just tell him we have different priorities. 😉

Get outside for a few minutes and practise mindfulness

A good way to escape that crushing sense that you have more tasks to do than will fit into 24 hours is to get outdoors, even for a few minutes. Breathe some fresh air and practise mindfulness, which means nothing more than being in the present and using your senses: listen to what’s around you (can you hear birdsong?), look around and find something beautiful to appreciate. If you can see plants around you, go and rub a leaf or smell a flower: how does it feel? Does it smell good?

Lucky me, this is the view from my patio. Instant stress relief!

If, like me, you spend a lot of time studying, reading, researching, using computers, and being indoors, you can end up spending 99% of time in your head, and almost forgetting that you have a body. Ground yourself and use all your senses to remind yourself that you are made up of body, mind and spirit. Exercise is very good for this as well.

Here is my daughter, aged 7 months at the time, practising mindfulness, i.e. smelling the roses. I was instilling relaxation principles in her at a young age. 😉

Alas, five minutes later, I discovered she wasn’t actually sniffing the rose petals, but chewing on them. This had unfortunate results on her digestive system, which caused some stress. Never mind…

Readjust your mindset

Take five minutes to reset your mindset.

When I was talking to my husband about how he manages his (extremely stressful) job, he suggested reminding yourself that you can only do your best, so there’s no point fretting if you can’t be perfect.

The problem I see with this is that perfectionist types tend to think that ‘doing their best’ means ‘doing everything perfectly’ and aren’t always able to accept what they view as lowering their standards.

Instead, if you want a quick re-boot of your attitude, I would suggest one of the following tricks:

Imagine that what you are going through is being described by a friend: the pressure he/she is under, all the stuff he/she needs to do in a ridiculously short time, his/her feelings of inadequacy, etc. What advice would you give your friend? We are generally far more understanding, sympathetic and helpful to other people than we are to ourselves. If you can take a step back and pretend someone important to you is faced with this situation, you are likely to give them (i.e. yourself!) more realistic and objective advice.
Ask yourself: what’s the worse that could happen? What’s the worst case scenario if you don’t complete your to-do list? Your life won’t apart. Likely, there are only two or three items on there that could have serious consequences on your life or career: do those first, and ignore the rest for now, if you don’t have time for them (or if getting enough sleep/food/exercise/fun is more important to your physical and mental wellbeing).

I hope this has given you some ideas for quick fixes when you’re feeling overwhelmed and you’ve got post-holiday blues.

Perhaps your stress is on a different scale altogether: you’ve got a huge work assignment or interpreting exams coming up, or you’re finding your interpreting course very demanding.

If you’re after more tips and some hard-core stress management advice, I will be holding a 60 minute webinar entitled ‘Stress Management for Interpreters on Thursday, 6th September, followed by a Q&A (cost: €40). I know all about work stress from my own experience as a conference interpreter, but I also have a background in fitness training and complementary therapies, so I like to bring that insight about wellbeing and relaxation into the webinar (I’ll spare you a photo of me in a Lycra leotard, though).

You can register here:
https://events.genndi.com/reg…/818182175026322002/0ac73e8e6f
or on the home page of www.theinterpretingcoach.com (just scroll down to find the webinar details).

Hope to see you there!

In the meantime, why not leave a comment below. Did my tips help? What do you do to reduce that feeling of overwhelm?

The best way to develop your retour (and it’s not what you think)

23rd July 2018 by theinterpretingcoach

‘What do you do to develop your retour?’

I sometimes ask my interpreting students this question. I’m curious to know what they do with their limited time outside of class. The calls on their time are so great (writing essays, researching the topic of the week, preparing speeches, practising interpreting into their A language, attending theory modules and other lectures, and having a life!) that I’m quite sure they want all their self-training to be productive.

In their shoes, I would want to wring every bit of juice from the exercises or activities I did to try to improve my retour. I certainly wouldn’t want to waste time on activities with a limited value.

Yet all too often, this is what they say in response to my question:

I listen to the radio in the background.
I watch the news on TV.
I read the Economist/the papers.
I’m flat-sharing with a native speaker, so I get some practice in.
I practise interpreting from A into B (but I don’t have anyone to listen to me).

Can you see what the problem is with these suggestions?

Practising interpreting from A into B is the end goal of a retourist.

If your B language isn’t strong enough, you will produce unidiomatic English (or substitute whatever your B language is). If you don’t have a native speaker or someone with a strong English B to listen to you and make suggestions, you are unlikely to improve your performance next time (although there are ways to get around this – see my blog post for ideas).

In short, although there is definitely a place for practising your interpreting from A into B, it shouldn’t be the be-all and end-all. If you do nothing else, you will get very tired and you may limit your progress. Before you can interpret effectively into your B language, you must have sufficient mastery and flexibility in that language to produce it spontaneously and idiomatically when speaking on a variety of subjects.

Let’s turn to the other typical ‘homework’ activities mentioned by aspiring retourists: listening to the radio, reading widely, watching the news. All these activities are very passive (just think of the implications of ‘in the background’!). They may well improve your knowledge of current affairs and your comprehension of your B language, but you need to go a step further than that. To improve your retour, you need to activate your B language.

Develop your retour by activating your B language

Let’s take another look at those activities and see if we can tweak them so as to make them more active.

Listening to the radio/podcasts or watching TV

Try repeating key vocabulary out loud.
Take note of useful phrases (whole phrases, not just words, so you get the collocations right).
Prepare a short glossary based on the vocabulary used in the programme or podcast you have just heard.
After the programme, give a short summary out loud in your B language.
Jot down a few arguments (e.g. pros and cons) and prepare a short speech in your B language based on what you’ve heard.

Reading the Economist/the papers/classical literature

The good news about reading in this way is that it can improve your background knowledge and your understanding of cultural aspects of your B language. If you choose your reading matter carefully to address your weaknesses (for instance, if you know you tend to be too colloquial in your B language), you can also work on register while acquiring useful vocabulary. It’s always good to kill several birds with one stone!

Take note of useful phrases (whole phrases, not just words, so you get the collocations right).
Think carefully about register. What elements of the language make it more formal? Can you incorporate any of these phrases into your interpreting?

Chatting to housemates or friends

Speaking is certainly more active than reading or listening to the radio, and is a good opportunity to expand your vocabulary and speak your B language with greater fluency. It won’t, however, improve your retour significantly if a) the person you’re speaking to doesn’t correct you when you make mistakes, b) you are not aware of nuances of register when speaking to your friends, and you pick up bad habits or phrases that are inappropriate in the workplace, and c) you only ever talk about the same things.

Make sure you are alert to colloquialisms or vulgarity in everyday conversation, to avoid, for example, telling your tutor that you are ‘pissed off’ (as a student once said to me, not realising how rude it was, as her flatmates said it all the time). Be disciplined in everyday conversations; habits such as saying ‘I mean’, ‘you know’, or ‘like’ all the time are very hard to get rid of.

Consider opportunities to speak your B language in a different context, more relevant to your future career. You could join a debating society, for instance.

‘Pre-interpreting’ exercises to help develop your retour skills

I’m calling these pre-interpreting because they are not interpreting exercises per se, but activities you can do instead of, or before, practising interpreting a speech on a given topic. As I said earlier, production takes precedence over interpretation, and these are exercises that will force you to work on reformulation and expressing yourself naturally in your B

Preparing a speech on a subject of your choice. This is a great pre-interpreting exercise. Pick a topic, read a couple of articles, take note of a few phrases, and articulate your thoughts in a structured speech in your B language. Afterwards, you might like to try interpreting a speech from A into B on the same subject. You’ll be primed and ready to go!
Shadowing. To clarify: I don’t think shadowing in the literal sense of repeating everything you hear is necessarily useful, especially in an A language. However, if your B language is quite weak, shadowing a good speaker is an opportunity to get a feel for intonation patterns and to hear yourself say certain phrases out loud. If your B is stronger, you can use shadowing as a reformulation exercise (listen to the ideas, edit them, and reformulate them); this is a very advanced exercise, but excellent for working on versatility, concision and paraphrasing. Look out for a future blog post about shadowing.
Sight translation. Again, this is a challenging exercise, but a great opportunity to think about reformulation. Howe many ways can you think of to express the same idea? Sight translation is also good done in a group, because other members may come up with good ideas.

Develop your retour skills while having fun

It doesn’t all have to be hard work. There are plenty of opportunities for having fun with language and improving your retour skills almost without noticing

Don’t forget that basic grammar and vocabulary often need work. There are plenty of useful websites and apps for this. How about Memrise for learning vocab? And why not look for quizzes to help consolidate your understanding of aspects of grammar such as prepositions?
Play games. Articulate and Taboo are a lot of fun, and a great way to practise reformulation. A few glasses of wine will help things along! Or why not play your favourite video game, but in your B language?
Sneak your B language into your life in other ways. Change the settings on your browser or Facebook so they’re in your B language. If the Economist seems too heavy, read a cookery/cycling/photography magazine in your B language. Find a boyfriend or girlfriend who speaks your B language (as well as the language of lurve).

Conclusion

It’s worth repeating: you can’t interpret well into your B language until you can speak your B language confidently and idiomatically in a variety of situations.

The way I see it, to develop a strong retour, you need to focus first on improving your active language skills in your B, then move on to interpreting. I’m not suggesting you shouldn’t attempt interpreting for ten years, until your mastery of your B language is perfect (as if such a thing were possible!), but my feeling is that when you start trying to develop your retour, you need to focus more on expanding your repertoire (vocabulary, register), consolidating the language and producing it spontaneously or semi-spontaneously. When you do practise interpreting, make sure you have done plenty of preparatory work to smooth the way for a productive practice session and to boost your confidence, which is absolutely critical to working succesfully into a B language.

As your B language improves and you can use your B with greater flexibility and versatility, the balance can shift and you can spend more time on interpreting.

I hope this post has given you plenty of ideas for developing your retour in ways that are productive and sometimes even fun! What works best for you? Leave me a comment – and if you have friends or colleagues who might be interested, please share this post on Facebook or Twitter!

To your success,

Football: love it, hate it, use it

6th March 201913th July 2018 by theinterpretingcoach

Unless you’ve been living in a parallel universe for the past few weeks, you will know what the big event is this Sunday: the World Cup Final between France and Croatia. Even I know it’s happening.

My Facebook feed has a sprinkling of updates from friends – enough for me to have a vague idea of what’s been going on. I was quite smug at the semi-final stage, knowing that I could happily support three of the four teams (being half English and half French, and having lived in Belgium). In our household, though, switching on the TV is a rare treat, and we’re not going to make an exception for the Beautiful Game.

That being said, everything is grist to the mill for a keen interpreter. When it comes to football, whether you love it or hate it, you can make use of it to improve your interpreting, with a plethora of football idioms. I’ll show you how in a minute, but first, I thought I should reach out to others like myself, who are less than keen on football*, with some sneaky tricks to help you be a football faker.

*otherwise known as pedaspheraphobes

If you’re clueless about footie but want to fit in

Here are some safe options for you to pull out of the hat when you’re watching a match with friends.

Before the match: ‘I think we’re in for a great game’.
In the first half, before things go horribly pear-shaped: ‘It’s early days’, or ‘There’s still everything to play for!’
Generic comments that will get you through most situations: ‘Go on!’, ‘Ooooohhh!’, ‘Referee!’, ‘Unlucky!’, and ‘Surely, that was a penalty!’
When one of your players is threatened with a tackle: ‘Man on!’
After a tackle: ‘Great tackle!’, or ‘Keep your knees to yourself, you idiot!’, depending which side was responsible for the tackle.
After a goal: ‘Back of the net!’ or ‘What a goal!’
After a save by your side: ‘What a save!’. I’m sure you’re beginning to discern a trend here. Sophisticated exclamations are unnecessary, when ‘What a…[insert appropriate manoeuvre]’ is so versatile, e.g. ‘what a header!’
If your side is England: ‘This can’t be happening!’
After the match: ‘We were robbed!’

If you’re clueless but aspire to being an armchair pundit*

*pundit: an expert in a particular subject or field who is frequently called upon to give their opinions to the public. (Oxford Dictionary)

This is more dangerous ground, as you will need some football terminology and the ability to make what, on the surface, appear to be insightful observations.

Here are some of the basic terms you will need: kick-off, the pitch, the goalie (or keeper), formations (i.e. how you place your defenders, midfield and forwards), a striker (an attacking player), a free kick (when a player has been fouled), a throw in, offside (there’s no point even trying to explain this term, as the rules are incomprehensible), the group stage, the knockout stage, extra time, a penalty shoot-out, a goalless draw (also known these days as a boredraw) and a hat trick (scoring three goals in one match), although you’re unlikely to need this one if you’re watching England play.

To sound like a football guru, try some descriptive adjectives for the players, for example: ‘he’s very pacey/versatile/fiery’ and be free with the sweeping generalisations ‘France have got a lot of pace’ (i.e. they run fast!), ‘Italy are good at the back’ (i.e. in defence), ‘Croatia had a lot of possession in the first half, but they weren’t able to create opportunities’, and ‘Mourinho has no other option but to park the bus’ (i.e. focusing on defence and blocking the goal, because you fear losing). Don’t forget to wheel out a few trite clichés, such as ‘some tired legs out there’, ‘that was schoolboy defending’, ‘this is an emotional rollercoaster’, or ‘it’s a game of two halves’ (the fortunes of each team can swing dramatically between the two halves).

If you’re actually after some useful football idioms to improve your work into English

No problem! There are stacks to choose from, and you may be surprised to find you are familiar with some of them already. No need to stick to a sports context, as these idioms are very versatile.

to kick off, to get the ball rolling: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, after that brief introduction from the chairman, the floor is open for your comments. Who would like to get the ball rolling?’. ‘I’d like to kick off the meeting with a brief Powerpoint presentation.’
to be on the ball: ‘Luckily, the Secretariat was on the ball, and noticed a typo in paragraph 2.’
to take your eye off the ball: ‘If we want these negotiations to succeed, we can’t take our eye off the ball for a second.’
to know the score: ‘You don’t need to explain the whole process to Mr. Adams. He knows the score.’
a game plan: ‘The meeting with our competitors went badly because we hadn’t worked out a game plan.’
a game changer: ‘The Ebola vaccine could be a game changer in the outbreak in the Congo.’
to watch from the sidelines: ‘So far, I’ve been watching from the sidelines, but I think it’s time I expressed my opinion in this debate.’
to score an own goal: ‘The European Union scored an own goal with this legislation, which is too restrictive and hampers exports.’
to move the goalposts: ‘I’m frustrated with this project; my boss keeps moving the goalposts, so I never feel as if I’m doing a good job.’
to blow the whistle on someone: ‘He was afraid to blow the whistle on his colleagues.’

So there you have it! A handy little toolkit of useful idioms that can be used in many interpreting contexts (sport, business, diplomacy), AND some useful phrases in case you want to feign interest in the World Cup.

I will leave you with a final little bit of British culture. Some years ago, an ‘iconic’ (I hope you can see my air quote marks here) song called Three Lions was released by rock band Lightning Seeds, and football-obsessed comedians Frank Skinner and David Baddiel. It’s called Three Lions and features the chorus ‘football’s coming home’. At the time, this referred to the fact that England was hosting its first major football tournament for thirty years. However, since then the phrase has evolved to refer to football’s most famous trophy, The World Cup, returning to England, where football was invented.

I will employ a little British understatement and say the song has been enjoying a LOT of airplay in recent weeks. But no more (for obvious reasons)! This is no loss to the musical scene. But just in case you feel you should understand this aspect of British culture, here it is:

And now… best go and practise shouting ‘Allez les bleus!’