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Translation as a career
Translation as a career

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3.3 Your CEFR levels

You will have noticed that we have emphasised reading, writing and, to some extent, listening skills. One important thing to bear in mind when thinking about levels of language proficiency is that it is not necessarily homogeneous across the different subskills. So, for instance, if you have learned a language by living in a country, you might have very good listening and speaking skills, but be less proficient in writing. Translators, on the other hand, might be more proficient in reading and writing than in speaking in their second or passive language (or indeed in any other languages they may have).

Europass is a set of documents that enable employers and educational establishments to understand your language skills and qualifications. One of these documents is the Language Passport, a self-assessment tool to record your language proficiency. On the Europass website you will find some information about the different Europass documents, where there is a link to how to create your Language Passport online, as well as templates and instructions, and examples of completed Language Passports.

Before you start working on your language passport, have a look at the reference slides below. To navigate through the slides, hover over them and click the black arrows.

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Now, create your Language Passport online [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] and fill in the levels for the different skills for your language(s). When you’ve finished, download the document, and save it. You will come back to this again later.