Google Translate is another great, free, tool from Google that educators might find useful. I learned about Google Translate from Terrie Byrne (we’re not related that I know of) at Learn Perfect English. There are two options for using Google Translate. Option one is to copy and paste chunks of text from a website into the translate text box provided by Google then select the languages you wish to translate from and to. The second option is to copy and paste a website’s url into the url box provided by Google Translate then select the languages you wish to have the content translated from and to. It’s a simple system and is still in beta, but it worked well for the few websites I tested it with today.

The image below shows what the Google Translate system looks like.

Applications for Education
Google Translate should be a useful tool for ESL students and teachers. Google Translate will also be useful for foreign language students to practice and check their translations of vocabulary. One way that a foreign language teacher might use Google Translate is to have students search the Internet for a current events story (either hard news or entertainment news) then translate it into the language they’re learning. Using Google Translate students will be able to check their work individually which allows the teacher more flexibilty in differentiating classroom instruction.