Autonomy and feedback: the digital portfolio in translation didactics

The aim of the study is to present the results obtained by applying a reflective learning portfolio in a Spanish translation subject of the Mestrado em Tradu4 & atilde;o e Comunica4 & atilde;o Multilingue taught at the Universidade do Minho. The implemented portfolio is part of the Eramus+ project "Fostering higher education students' autonomy through blended learning". One of the central objectives of the project is to analyse to what extent the development of this instrument and the feedback given by the teacher foster students' autonomous competence, helping them to develop their metacognition skills and to regulate their learning. The use of the portfolio is preceded by the application of a questionnaire to obtain information about the students' previous experiences with this learning tool, their perceptions and expectations. In order to collect homogeneous study samples, a rubric was developed and applied to the different subjects chosen to pilot the project, including the one we teach in the master's degree. Using this rubric, teachers provide feedback on the students' contributions to the portfolio at three different times during the semester. Both individually and collaboratively, students carry out translation assignments in the Portuguese-Spanish language pair, using computer-assisted translation and machine translation tools. At the end of the experience, feedback is collected on the contribution of this tool to their training as translation professionals.