Published on March 22nd, 2017 | by Guest

5 Apps to Improve Translations for Students

Studying a foreign language is always a challenge. You need to remember thousands of words, you need to learn the grammar structure that may be completely different from your mother tongue, and you need to find the differences in pronunciation of different sounds and learn how to pronounce them correctly. Of course, the process of studying a foreign language involves many different aspects, and these three are just the basic problems everyone faces. However, when a person starts to translate the sentences and texts, they understand that learning of words and grammar is not the most complicated thing in studying languages.

Why Translations Are So Difficult for Students

Many students admit that translation is the most difficult part of learning languages. They explain it by a very simple fact: when you translate, you need to implement all the knowledge you have. You need to remember that the words may have different meanings and that there are different phrases that may express certain thoughts.

Besides, you should never translate word-by-word, as it will sound artificially. Additionally, you need to stick to the grammar rules of the language that you study and remember to edit your translation in such a way that it sounds like the original text.

Although the translation is considered to be one of the most complicated aspects of studying a foreign language, this is the most effective method to learn new words and the ways how to use them in texts. Besides, when you translate from the language that you study to your mother language, you understand the differences in the languages and see how exactly the sentences are built in two different linguistic structures. It is always useful to compare these things, and when you do that, you acquire a better understanding of how the language works.

How Students Can Make Their Translations Better

Of course, the best way to improve the translations is to learn the language perfectly. However, we do not always have time for that, especially if we are still students. That’s why we need to look for some additional methods that will help to improve the quality of translations. Here, we collected 5 best apps that help us in studying foreign languages.

Memrise

The motto of this app states that it is learning made joyful, and it really becomes joyful when you start to use Memrise to study foreign languages. Currently, it has more than 200 available languages for studying for free. It has courses that explain the peculiarities of studying certain languages. Also, it provides adaptive learning technologies which make the process of learning foreign languages suitable for all students.

You will definitely like the possibility to compete with your friends using Memrise. In the community of app users, you will find those who will gladly compete with you and you will be able to study languages together.

Among the advantages of this app is the possibility to install it on any Android or iOS-based device.

Duolingo

Duolingo is perhaps the most famous app and community that is aimed at making studying foreign languages available to anyone. The access is free and you don’t have to pay for some additional options at all. That’s what makes Duolingo a leader in their niche.

Students and teachers love Duolingo due to the gamification that the developers implement in all stages of language studying. You will do different exercises connected with reading, writing, and speaking. Your progress will be recorded automatically so you will be able to see how much time you have already spent on studying a foreign language and what you have achieved.

Also, Duolingo is now available for using in classrooms. This is a great opportunity for teachers to introduce modern technologies into the process of studying.

Rosetta Stone

If you want to speak with confidence, make use of this app. It really deserves to be called one of the best apps for developing speaking skills. It has several popular languages, including French, Italian, German, and even Hindi, Arabic, and Hebrew! The demo version of the app is free and you may try it in order to understand whether it works for you.

Speaking is not the only aspect of learning a foreign language with Rosetta Stone. The app also allows broadening your vocabulary by studying new words and phrases and understanding how to introduce them into the conversation. The grammar aspects are also perfectly explained here.

Coursera

Coursera is one of the most known studying platforms all over the world. Although it does not have courses that are aimed at language studying, students can easily use it as a resource for the improvement of their vocabulary and grammar. The matter is that most of the courses have subtitles that you may use as a translation in case you do not understand what the speaker is talking about. Besides, you may choose linguistics-related courses that will reveal some hidden secrets of languages and that will make the process of learning easier.

Google Translate

In case you have no time for studying and doing translations, you may use the most straight-forward method to work with the text. This is Google Translate. You just need to insert your text and it will be automatically translated into the language of your choice. Of course, the quality of the translation is rather low but if you edit and proofread it, you can get quite a good result. This may also be a good way to translate something that you do not understand at all just to catch the main idea and perhaps find a way to start working on the text.

There are many other apps that help with learning foreign languages. We would also recommend that you install a couple of dictionaries, a thesaurus to find the synonyms and antonyms to the words, and a dictionary of idioms. In this way, you will be able to work on your language all the time even when you do not have some translations to do. And remember the golden rule of studying foreign languages – you need to work on them regularly to get the best results.

Author’s Bio:

Kevin Nelson started his career as a research analyst and has changed his sphere of activity to writing services and content marketing. Currently, Kevin works as a part-time writer at the BreezeWriting. Apart from writing, he spends a lot of time reading psychology and management literature searching for the keystones of motivation ideas. Feel free to connect with him on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Linkedin.

Tags: improve, students, translations