A comparison and analysis of interpreting notes by professional interpreters and 3rd year students of translation interpreting felte

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION GRADUATION PAPER A COMPARISON AND ANALYSIS OF INTERP

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHER EDUCATION

GRADUATION PAPER

A COMPARISON AND ANALYSIS OF

INTERPRETING NOTES BY PROFESSIONAL INTERPRETERS AND 3RD YEAR STUDENTS OF TRANSLATION & INTERPRETING, FELTE

Supervisor: Vương Thị Thanh Nhàn, M.A

Student: Nguyễn Thị Phương Hà Course: QH2016.F1.E22

HANOI – 2020

ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI

TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ KHOA SƯ PHẠM TIẾNG ANH

KHÓA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP

SO SÁNH VÀ PHÂN TÍCH BẢN GHI CHÉP CỦA PHIÊN DỊCH CHUYÊN NGHIỆP VÀ SINH VIÊN NĂM THỨ 3 CHUYÊN NGÀNH BIÊN PHIÊN

Signatures of Approval

Date: June , 2020

ACCEPTANCE

I hereby state that I: Nguyễn Thị Phương Hà, Class QH2016.F1.E22, being a candidate for the degree of Bachelor of Arts (Translation & Interpreting) accept the requirements of the College relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or reproduction of the paper

Signature

Nguyễn Thị Phương Hà

Date: May 11th, 2020

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to my

supervisor, Mrs Vuong Thi Thanh Nhan (M.A), for her tremendous support,

clear guidance, detailed review and considerable encouragement Not only did

she provide me with constructive feedback on my writing, but she helped me in

the process of approaching a wide range of participants and collecting the data

as well

I would also like to thank all the teachers and students from four

mainstream classes of QH.2017 in Translation & Interpreting Division for their

permission and participation in the questionnaire activity

I would also like to send my gratefulness to the professional interpreters,

who are former and current lecturers at University of Languages and

International Studies, for providing me with an enormous and essential source of

information in their interview despite their busy schedule

Finally, I want to express my gratitude to my family members and my

friends, who gave me their full support and sound advice so that I could have

enough motivation and determination to finish my graduation paper

ABSTRACT

Note-taking is one of the primary strategies in consecutive interpreting This study is conducted to analyse the interpreting notes between third-year student interpreters and professional interpreters in order to offer an insight into the similarities and differences in the notes of two examined groups, the difficulties students encounter while taking notes in consecutive interpreting and the advice from professional interpreters In order to achieve the targets of this study, questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and documents analysis are carried out, and there are several major findings The study finds that most of the interpreting notes from third-year students and professional are different in terms

of the use of note-taking principles Moreover, the data from questionnaires illustrate there are challenges faced by third-year students during the note-taking process, which are related to content, speed and layout Therefore, the interviews with professional interpreters offer students relevant advice and suggestions on the methods to improve note-taking techniques in consecutive interpreting, most

of which involve theoretical review and practice

CONTENT

ACCEPTANCE 1

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vi

LIST OF PICTURES AND FIGURES vii

PART A INTRODUCTION 1

I Research problems and rationale 1

II Objectives of the study 2

III Significance of the study 3

IV Organization of the study 3

PART B DEVELOPMENT 4

CHAPTER 1 LITERATURE REVIEW 4

I Interpreting 4

1 Definitions of interpreting 4

2 Types of interpreting 4

2.1 Consecutive interpreting 4

2.2 Simultaneous interpreting 5

2.3 Whispering 6

2.4 Sight translation 6

2.5 Dictation 6

II Interpreting notes 6

1 Definitions of note-taking 6

1.1 Note-taking in general 6

1.2 Note-taking in consecutive interpreting 7

1.2.1 The role of note-taking in consecutive interpreting 7

1.2.2 The process of note-taking in consecutive interpreting 7

2 Principles of note-taking in consecutive interpreting 8

CHAPTER 2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 10

I Sampling method 10

II Participants of the study 10

III Data collection instruments 11

IV Setting of the study 12

V Data collection procedure 13

1 Data from questionnaires 13

2 Data from semi-structured interview 14

3 Data from documents 15

VI Data analysis procedure 15

1 Data from questionnaire 15

2 Data analysis from semi-structured interview 15

3 Data from documents 16

CHAPTER 3 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 17

I What are the similarities and differences between the note-taking strategies of professional interpreters and those of third-year students of Translation & Interpreting, FELTE? 17

1 Noting the idea and not the word 17

2 The rules of abbreviation 18

3 Links 19

4 Adding emphasis 20

5 Verticality 21

II What are the difficulties encountered by the target students during their note-taking process? 21

1 Benefits of note-taking in consecutive interpreting 22

2 Problems during the note-taking process in consecutive interpreting 26 III What are the suggested note-taking techniques from professional interpreters for students to boost the quality of their interpretation? 33

1 Note-taking theory revision 33

2 Practice 33

3 Other suggestions 35

PART C CONCLUSION 37

I Summary of the findings 37

II Implications of the study 38

IV Suggestions for further studies 39

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

FELTE: Faculty of English Language Teacher Education ULIS: University of Languages and International Studies SL: Source Language

TL: Target Language

E-V: English – Vietnamese

V-E: Vietnamese – English

LIST OF PICTURES AND FIGURES Picture/

Picture 1 Examples for Principle 1 (Student’s note on the left and

professional interpreter’s note on the right) 17

Picture 2 Examples for Principle 2 (Student’s note on the left and

professional interpreter’s note on the right) 18

Picture 3 Examples for Principle 3 (Student’s note on the left and

professional interpreter’s note on the right) 19

Picture 4 Examples for Principle 4 (Student’s note on the left and

professional interpreter’s note on the right) 20

Picture 5 Examples for Principle 5 (Student’s note on the left and

professional interpreter’s note on the right) 21 Picture 6 Examples for symbols and abbreviation 35

Figure 1 Students’ opinion about the benefit of note-taking in

Figure 3 Speech structure formation 24

Figure 5 Fluent and accurate translation 25

Figure 6 Students’ opinion about the difficulty when taking notes

Figure 7 Excessive number of unnecessary words 27 Figure 8 Writing full words instead of symbols/ abbreviated words 27 Figure 9 Focusing too much on writing 28

Figure 11 Inconsistent use of symbols/ abbreviations 29 Figure 12 Not knowing whether to note SL or TL 30 Figure 13 Inability to listen and take notes simultaneously 30

Figure 15 Not diagonally or vertically organizing notes 32

PART A INTRODUCTION

I Research problems and rationale

It is known that note-taking is one of the key techniques in interpreting besides other skills such as language proficiency or memory Particularly, in consecutive interpreting where interpreters perform their tasks after parts of the original speech are delivered, note-taking assists them with high level of accuracy and details because a part of a speech’s segment could sometimes last for several minutes In addition, although note-taking is commonly perceived as personal, it still requires a systematic strategy so that the interpreters could effectively benefit from the notes According to Andres (2000), “the often repeated argument that notes are an entirely personal affair, and the implicit suggestion that they cannot therefore be taught, does not hold water” More importantly, it cannot be denied that note-taking could have a significant effect

on the interpretation’s quality Despite understanding the original speech, the interpreter cannot remember all the details in a long speech because short-term memory, according to The Human Memory, can contain only a small amount of information in an available state for a short amount of time (from 10 to 15 seconds, or up to a minute at times) Therefore, in the interpreter training curriculum, note-taking is one of the central focuses

However, the application of note-taking in reality still encounters a number of problems The result from a study of Ribas on the “Problems and Strategies in Consecutive Interpreting” (2013) showed that novice interpreters encounter more problems in note-taking such as the information density or the lack of practice Another perspective in Dr Aladdin al-Zahran’s research (2007) imposed a problems of students’ inability to manage the length and content of their notes as they may over rely on note-taking Moreover, it is reflected from both the feedback of students and class observation within the scope of university students majoring in Translation and Interpreting that despite the introduction of note-taking techniques and practices throughout translation courses, the majority

into the interpretation process In other words, it is commonly seen in the notes

of students that they write down long and unorganized sentences instead of evenly distributed words and symbols

The importance of note-taking and the aforementioned concern from students have motivated the researcher to conduct a study on interpreting notes

of professional interpreters and third-year university students whose major is Translation and Interpreting University juniors of FELTE, ULIS are suitable participants for this research due to their third-year curriculum, in which note-taking is one of the core contents in the consecutive interpreting course Along with the interpreting notes from students, those from professional interpreters are also analysed so that the similarities and differences can be shown; difficulties encountered by students can be revealed, and recommended note-taking strategies or techniques can be derived

II Objectives of the study

This research is expected to analyse the interpreting notes by students and professional interpreters for several purposes Firstly, the similarities and differences between the notes of the two target groups of participants will be identified Furthermore, the study may also reveal the difficulties that students encounter during their note-taking process Lastly, some note-taking strategies for students will be derived from analysing the notes of professional interpreters

The study aims to answer the following questions:

- What are the similarities and differences between the note-taking strategies of professional interpreters and those of third-year students of Translation & Interpreting, FELTE?

- What are the difficulties encountered by the target students during their note-taking process?

- What are the suggested note-taking techniques from professional interpreters for students to boost the quality of their interpretation?

III Significance of the study

This research will provide an insight about note-taking in the aspect of consecutive interpreting The findings from this study will be of importance not only to students’ learning and practices but also to lecturers’ teaching activities

First and foremost, not only will this study raise students’ awareness of the essential role of note-taking in interpreting but it will also assist students in their translation process with the recommended strategies, which are developed from the professional interpreting note analysis Therefore, students might enhance their translation output quality by applying note-taking skills more effectively

Furthermore, teachers might benefit from this research as well More specifically, the difficulties faced by students during their note-taking process and the suggested methods from professional interpreters will serve as a source

of reference for lecturers to design their note-taking lessons

Lastly, this small-scale research could be referred to as a background for larger-scale studies in related fields of interpreter training

IV Organization of the study

This research is organized logically with three main parts

Part A is the Introduction, which states the research problem, its objectives and significance along with three research questions The second part, Part B – Development, includes three categories: Literature Review, Research Methodology as well as Finding and Discussion Part C, which is the Conclusion, covers the study’s key findings, implications, limitations and suggestions for further studies

PART B DEVELOPMENT

This chapter provides a critical review on several previous studies related

to the topic of the study as well as an insight into some key concepts, such as interpreting or interpreting notes Subsequently, the research gap can be identified

1 Definitions of interpreting

According to the formal ISO (International Standards Organization) (2014), interpreting means “rendering a spoken or signed message into another spoken or signed language, preserving the register and meaning of the source language content”

Cynthia Roy (2000), from a linguistic approach, considered interpreting

as a conversational procedure between two groups of people, “who do not speak

a common language”, via a third party – the interpreter, who has proper language proficiency of both the languages and the skills to cope with cross-cultural conversations

It can be seen that interpreting is a form of oral or spoken translation, which is distinguished from written translation In order to effectively perform interpreting, apart from language proficiency, the interpreter need to acquire a large set of skills such as memory, note-taking or public speaking Additionally,

it is important to note that unlike written translation, interpreting does not allow the opportunity of revision or dictionaries within such a limited amount of time

2 Types of interpreting 2.1 Consecutive interpreting

According to Andrew Gilles in his book “Note-taking for Consecutive Interpreting: A Short Course” (2017), consecutive interpreting is defined

“listening to what someone has to say and then, when they have finished

speaking, reproducing the same message in another language” with the assistance of notes, memory and background knowledge The length of the speech can range from a minute to twenty minutes

In a lecture at Mustansiriyah University about the definition of consecutive interpreting, “consecutive interpretation may be defined as a mode

of oral translation in which the interpreter speaks after the source-language speaker has finished speaking The speech is divided into segments, and the interpreter sits or stands beside the source-language speaker, listening and taking notes as the speaker progresses through the message.”

Regarding an insight into the process of consecutive interpreting, Daniel Gile (1995) claimed that the process contains two stages Phase 1 requires the interpreter to listen to the source speech, using his short-term memory and notes

to reserve the messages of the speaker The 2nd phase is the reformulation phase,

in which the interpreter recall the messages through their memory and notes to deliver the speech in the target language

It can be drawn out that note-taking is one of a considerable part in consecutive interpreting regarding its characteristic of performing the interpreting task after the original speech whose length could be a challenge for the human’s short-term memory

2.3 Whispering

The Language Scientific defined whisper interpreting as another form of simultaneous interpreting The difference is that “the interpreter sits next to the person (or group of people) who require interpreting and whispers or speaks

softly while interpreting in the target language”

2.4 Sight translation

In a working paper of the National Council on Interpreting in Healthcare (2009), sight translation is defined as “the oral rendition of text written in one language into another language and is usually done in the moment Sight translation is often requested of an interpreter during an interpreting assignment.”

2.5 Dictation

According to the definition from Wikipedia, “dictation is the transcription

of spoken text: one person who is "dictating" speaks and another who is "taking dictation" writes down the words as they are spoken.” While the speaker is delivering his speech, it is the task of interpreters to transcribe the speech into texts

II Interpreting notes

1 Definitions of note-taking 1.1 Note-taking in general

Richard Nordquist (2019) attached great importance to note-taking in the research process, defining note-taking as “the practice of writing down or otherwise recording key points of information” He stated that in a classroom context, notes can function as a study assistance while in an interview, notes are helpful material for writing essays or articles

Regarding the characteristics of note-taking, Walter Pauk and Ross J.Q Owens (2004) said that “taking notes doesn't simply mean scribbling down or

marking up the things that strike your fancy It means using a proven system and then effectively recording information before tying everything together."

Shelley O'Hara (2005) implied in one of her books that the note-taking process requires much work from the brain, in which the note-taker needs to sort out essential pieces of information, put them in a logical order and decode

1.2 Note-taking in consecutive interpreting 1.2.1 The role of note-taking in consecutive interpreting

Among the skills for consecutive interpreting, note-taking is considered one of the focal points for the significant benefits it brings to the interpreter

First, in a study of Wei Lu (2013), the author indicated memory enhancement is one of the two special roles of note-taking As the human’s short-term memory can only bear a small amount of information (around 7 items or less), according to the Human Memory, it is unlikely that the interpreter can memorize all the details such as proper names, time, places or statistics in a several-minute-long speech In other words, notes can be perceived as hints or aids for the interpreter to recall the original speech more effectively

Moreover, Roderick Jones (2002) said in his book “Conference Interpreting Explained” that memory relief is also one of the main purposes of note-taking This means that with the assistance of note-taking, the interpreters can reduce the amount of language input that they have to remember, especially

in long and intensive section of speech which could last several hours

interpreting

Andrew Gilles (2017) cited in his book “Note-taking for Consecutive Interpreting: A Short Course” that Gille (1995) outlined the process of note-taking in consecutive interpreting with two phases containing multiple tasks as follow:

“Phase 1 (while the speaker is speaking): listening and analysis, taking, short-term memory operations, coordination of these tasks.” In other words, in the first phase, after listening to the original speech, the interpreter will have to process the messages of the speakers by reserving them in their short-term memory or taking notes

note-“Phase 2 (while the interpreter is speaking): note-reading, remembering, production” More specifically, in this second stage, the interpreter retrieves the speakers’ messages from their memory and notes and read them out loud into the target speech

It can be seen that the note-taking process takes place in phase 1; therefore, this study will focus on note-taking in line with other activities comprised in this phase

2 Principles of note-taking in consecutive interpreting

There have been many studies and analysis about the note-taking principles or systems It is also important to note that note-taking is rather personal so there should be no exact rules one must comply with In this study, the researcher would like to cite a set of seven principles of note-taking in consecutive interpreting developed by Jean-François Rozan (1956)

Noting the idea and not the word: This means the interpreter need to pay

attention to the primary ideas as well as the clear and logical way to illustrate them, “preferably in the target language, although this is not essential.” Therefore, “it is through the analysis and notation of the ideas that the interpreter will avoid mistakes and a laboured delivery.”

The rules of abbreviation: This principle indicates that the interpreter

needs to note down abbreviated form of the word instead of the full word This will help the interpreter to save a considerable amount of time to catch up with the speaker’s speech For example, instead of writing the whole word “hour”, it

is much shorter and time-saving to write “h”

Links: The most essential and the most difficult part in the note-taking

process is the links between each part of the speech (Jean Herbert, 1952) If the links are mistakenly noted down, the messages could be distorted

Negation: Gilles (2017) explained that “negation might be noted by

means of a line running through a word or symbol.” For example, if “OK” is noted for “agree”, “disagree” will be noted as “OK.”

Adding emphasis: This rule can be illustrated by using lines, double lines

or dotted lines to underline and emphasize the word or ideas “The use of underlining to denote nuance allows us to qualify the word (or idea) underlined without noting the qualifier.” (Gilles, 2017)

Verticality: According to Andrew Gilles’ explanation (2017), “verticality

means taking notes from top to bottom rather than from left to right.” This method enables the interpreter to organize their notes logically with “stacking” rule (placing different elements of the text above or below one another) or brackets

Shift: “Shift means writing notes in the place on a lower line where they

would have appeared had the text on the line above been repeated.” (Gilles, 2017)

The Chapter of Literature Review has indicated several relevant studies regarding the topic of note-taking, giving this study a theoretical frame-work The chapter has pointed out from previous research the definitions of interpreting, particularly consecutive interpreting as well as the roles and principles of consecutive interpreting

However, as most of the previous studies focus on the difficulties by interpreters in general and the analysis of note-taking principles, this study aims

to compare the interpreting notes of student interpreters and those of professionals to provide an insight into the gap between these two groups; thus proposing an appropriate set of techniques to improve interpretation training at

CHAPTER 2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents the process of collecting and analysing the data There are three instruments used in the process, including questionnaire, semi-structured interview and document analysis

The researcher used cluster sampling for the student group because this group of participants is already divided into different classes with a nearly even number of students

Regarding the professional interpreter group, the researcher used convenience sampling Because of the limited time and the participants’ personal working schedules, this group was not readily available in a large number of participants

II Participants of the study

This research studied two main groups: third-year students of FELTE, ULIS and professional interpreters

The first group consists of 104 third-year students from four mainstream classes majoring in Translation & Interpreting They are currently studying Interpreting course, one focus of which is note-taking skills The CLC classes are excluded from the participants because of their different curriculum from the standard one Moreover, mainstream classes represent the standard of English proficiency output for third-year students of ULIS

After the data collection process, the actual number of third-year students who participated in this research was 69 out of 104 To be more specific, there were 11 participants from the first class, 18 participants from the second class,

21 participants from the third class and 19 participants from fourth class

In the second group, there was going to be around 5-10 full-time professional interpreters They have an academic background related to Language or Translation & Interpreting major They have had a number of years

of experience in interpreting, particularly consecutive interpreting Moreover, according to the aforementioned significance of the study, one of which is

improving the note-taking lesson design, the second group included teacher interpreters, who have professional experience in both teaching and interpreting

Due to the COVID-19 outbreak and the tight schedule of the interpreters, the actual number of professional interpreters was six and they were all teacher interpreters who are former and current lecturers at ULIS

III Data collection instruments

This study applied both quantitative and qualitative methods for the data collection, which were questionnaires, interviews and document analysis

Questionnaires were used in this study for the student group to firstly discover the difficulties that students encounter during their note-taking process Moreover, the benefits of note-taking in the interpreting tasks conducted by students were indicated through questionnaires

The questionnaires include two main parts: the personal information and the questions The personal information of the students is optional The question part is divided into two sections, analysing the students’ opinion about the benefits of note-taking and their problems during the note-taking process

The questions are presented in the form of likert scale, from 1-5 (from Strongly disagree to Strongly agree) There are totally six statements illustrating students’ opinion towards note-taking’s benefits and ten statements about the problems students may encounter while taking notes The questionnaire is written in English because its vocabulary range is basic and easy for third-year students to convey

The questionnaires were intended to be distributed to all 104 students However, because of the students’ absence in class for personal reasons, there were 69 out of 104 students completed the questionnaires

The interviews were carried out with professional interpreters, which was

of great assistance for professional interpreters to explain and elaborate on their

note-taking strategies as well as giving recommendation on note-taking techniques for students

The interview includes four questions, in which the first one relates to the frequency of note-taking, the second one is about note-taking methods, the third one involves difficulties while note-taking and the last one refers to recommended note-taking strategies from professional interpreters The interview questions are translated into Vietnamese so that interviewees can present their ideas more conveniently and elaborately

Around five professional interpreters were expected to participate in the interview Due to the COVID-19 outbreak and the tight schedule of the interpreters, it was difficult to reach out to full-time interpreters There were six teacher interpreters taking part in the interview

In this study, the researchers collected the interpreting notes of students

in their end-term tests as well as the notes of professional interpreters in their consecutive interpreting tasks These documents of the two groups were compared to reveal the similarities and differences of their interpreting notes The comparison was carried out mostly in terms of the principles of note-taking

in consecutive interpreting which were applied in the notes

The students’ interpreting notes were collected right after their end-term Interpreting tests for the first semester of school year 2019-2020 in December There were around 160 notes including both V-E and E-V translation under the topic of “The social role of family” The students’ notes are paper drafts provided during the exam Meanwhile, the professional interpreters’ notes were collected via email in the form of pictures There were roughly 40 interpreting notes written in both English and Vietnamese and these were from interpreters’ real-life consecutive interpreting at conferences and workshops

IV Setting of the study

The study is conducted at FELTE, ULIS, and at the places where the professional interpreter group perform their consecutive interpreting process

The note-taking methods are introduced to the student group during several sessions by ULIS lecturers After that, students begin applying those methods into the interpreting process by doing in-class interpreting exercises Interpreting notes of the students during their practice were collected by the researcher for analysis

Regarding the professional group, according to the initial schedule, the researcher intended to be present at their workplace to observe their note-taking and interpreting process However, the unexpected social distancing has resulted

in an adjustment to the previous plan, and the professional group’s interpreting notes is collected through email

Step 1: Formatting and designing questions

The likert scale was chosen as the rating scale to format the questionnaire with a list of detailed statements about students’ opinion towards note-taking benefits and problems The entire questionnaire was designed concisely within two A4 paper pages to minimize students’ reluctance to finish the questionnaire

Step 2: Piloting the questionnaires

The questionnaires were distributed to five students in this stage The aim

of this activity was to detect any problems of the questionnaires relating the wording or misunderstanding in the content There was feedback from the students that the criteria/ statements listed in the questionnaire were not clear and elaborate enough

Step 3: Adjusting the questions with the consultation of the supervisor Upon receiving the feedback from students, the questionnaire was revised with the advice of the supervisor, in which the benefits and problems of note-taking were provided more specifically and explicitly

Step 4: Distributing the questionnaires

brief explanation about the content of the questionnaire and detailed instruction were given to the students on how to complete it before answering the questionnaires to avoid confusion and misunderstanding

Because the process was carried out during the break, there were some difficulties in keeping track of students going in and out of class Therefore, it was necessary that the researcher arrive early and wait outside the class before break time so that the aforementioned problem could be avoided

Step 5: Collecting and Categorizing the questionnaires

The questionnaires were collected right after being finished by the students in class Then, the completed questionnaires were categorized into four different files of four classes to be easily kept track

Step 1: Formatting and designing the questions

The interview questions were open-ended ones with the main aim to answer the last research question about the note-taking strategy suggestion from the professional interpreters The interview questions were written in Vietnamese with detailed description so that the interviewees could thoroughly understand the aim of the questions

Step 2: Making appointments with the interviewees

It was the original intention of the researcher that the appointment would

be carried out face-to-face However, because of the unexpected COVID-19 outbreak, direct meetings were avoided and the interviews were conducted online via email Although this method led to the lack of interaction and detailed exchange of information between the interpreters and researcher, it enabled the study to approach more professional interpreters and it was more convenient and flexible for interpreters in terms of time and place to answer the questions

With the help of the supervisor, there was permission for interview from eight teacher interpreters After emails were sent to the interpreters with a brief introduction of the study and an attached file of the interview questions for the interviewees to fill in, there were a total of six responses from the interpreters

3 Data from documents

Step 1: Collecting and the interpreting notes

As a consequence of the social distancing, there were no direct meetings with the professional interpreters on the day they were performing consecutive interpreting Therefore, the participants were contacted online via email to provide pictures or scans of their interpreting notes

For the student group, the supervisor and the researcher met them on their end-term exam day Then, interpreting notes were collected with the help of the supervisor after their end-term exam finished

Step 2: Create soft copies of the interpreting notes (in picture form) Some typical interpreting notes were scanned to be presented in the findings and appendices of the study paper

VI Data analysis procedure

Step 1: Preparing the data

The questionnaires were divided separately into four groups of four classes to avoid confusion when inserting data into the computer The data collected from the questionnaires was then input into Google Forms, an online survey application developed by Google

Step 2: Analysing the data

Google Forms processed the data by calculating the frequencies of the answers The final results were indicated through bar charts and detailed description

2 Data analysis from semi-structured interview

Step 1: Preparing the data

All the email responses from the teacher interpreters were collected and compiled Because some of the interviewees recorded their answers instead of filling in the attached file, those recordings were transcribed into words and all

Step 2: Developing coding strategies

After all the interview answers were thoroughly scanned through, they

were put into different groups, in which each of the group supported each

research question Moreover, the same answers from interviewees were also

noted

Step 3: Analysing the data

The content of each answer group was analysed and its results were

reported with detailed description

Step 1: Preparing the data

As there were more than a hundred interpreting notes collected from

students’ end-term test, the researcher scanned carefully through the notes in

order to pick several typical notes that represented the way most students take

notes during consecutive interpreting Similarly, some typical interpreting notes

from professional interpreters were also selected

Step 2: Developing a comparison scheme

The data were sorted based on the note-taking principles, which was

illustrated in Chapter 2, in order to point out the similarities and differences of

interpreting notes of students and professional interpreters

Step 3: Analyzing the data

The strategies and methods that two groups of participants used to take

notes were compared and reported with detailed description

CHAPTER 3 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

This chapter gives an insightful answer to three research questions of this study by presenting the key findings of from the data collected and critical discussion for those results

I What are the similarities and differences between the taking strategies of professional interpreters and those of third-year students of Translation & Interpreting, FELTE?

note-This section presents the similarities and differences between the interpreting notes of the two participant groups based on the note-taking principles during consecutive interpreting developed by Jean-François Rozan (1956), which was mentioned in the first chapter of Literature Review

Picture 1 Examples for Principle 1 (Student’s note on the left and professional interpreter’s note on the right)

By looking at the number of words written down in the notes of students and teacher interpreters, it can be clearly seen that the number of words in students’ notes far outweighs that in professional interpreters’ ones with a high