Stepping Stones for Novice Interpreters
  • Are you looking to elevate the level of your interpreting skills?
  • Are you interested in being ready to interpret in a variety of work settings?
  • Are you looking for no-cost high quality options?

Check out this free online course on building capacity for interpreting in work settings.  It is an offering in Stepping Stones for Novice Interpreters, a self-directed track from the CATIE Center’s Dive In project.

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Description

Build your ASL and interpreting knowledge and skills for a variety of work settings!

Interpreters work in a variety of employment settings and how language is used will vary depending on the setting as well as the people involved.

This online course is designed to give novice interpreters opportunities to review possible  frameworks for approaching interpreting, with practical applications to work settings.

  • Engage in deliberate practice to build your interpreting capacity.
  • Learn from and practice interpreting for Deaf people talking about their work in a series of videos created by the National Association of the Deaf .
  • Increase your competency in a variety of work settings that include a Deaf person being interviewed in ASL about their work, a hearing person in a similar position being interviewed in English about their work, and then those two people having a conversation about their work. You can practice interpreting the interaction and then see a sample interpretation with a reflection by the interpreter who was there for the original conversation.
  • Learn about interpreting for vocational rehabilitation, including perspectives from two VR counselors.

Over ten work settings are presented including marriage and family therapy; library and information science, and architecture.

Learning Objectives

Participants completing this course will:

  • List characteristics of effective interpreters in vocational rehabilitation settings
  • Identify interpreting strategies for at least 4 work settings
  • Assess their own interpreting work
  • Compare and contrast their interpreting work and samples from other interpreters
  • Reflect on their own work using the sample interpreter reflections as a model

The course is designed to be completed at your own pace. Each module have a specific focus and include opportunities for application and reflection.

Attention: Certified Interpreters

Anyone is welcome to take this course to learn, but CEUs are not provided by the CATIE Center.  If earning CEUs or CEHs is important to you, you can find a CMP Sponsor on your own who processes PINRA (participant initiated non-RID activity) CEUs. The Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf maintains a list of CMP sponsors here.. We have compiled the information you will need to apply for a PINRA:

  • Workshop Flyer, Description & Agenda: Information available in a Google Doc.  You can download as a PDF and submit with your PINRA application.
  • Documentation of Learning:  This course will take at least 24 hours to complete and you will receive a certificate of completion at the end that you can share with your sponsor. Additionally, if your sponsor requires reflections on what you have learned, you can copy your reflections from the course to share with them.
  • CEUs to request:  2.4 CEUs in Professional Studies
  • Dates of Activity:  You can choose to start the activity any time before October 31, 2023.  When you complete it is up to you, but there will not be any facilitation after October 31, 2023.

Register for Course

Registration open from October 1 -31.  

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The registration form will provide you a link to enroll in a free Canvas course.  It will also ask for optional demographic information which will be helpful for the CATIE Center in evaluating the effectiveness of these resources for supporting the diversity of novice interpreters who are entering the interpreting field.

About Stepping Stones for Novice Interpreters

This course is part of a series developed by the Dive In project of the CATIE Center at St. Catherine University. Each module will have a facilitator from the CATIE Center who monitors a Support Forum.  The activities are designed so that you can do them asynchronously. Though possible to do independently, we encourage you to either join as a group and work through the material together – or use the introduction forum to seek out others in the course who might work with you in the discussions. Collaborative learning can be a really important tool in professional development.