Tool: ImTranslator

Yesterday in the MusicFirst Teams Company chat, I saw a post by Matt Ferry - one of our amazing Education Managers - alerting us to an absolutely INCREDIBLE tool called ImTranslator. ImTranslator is a FREE Chrome browser extension that translates text, phrases and webpages between more than 100 languages using translation providers: Google, Microsoft Bing, Yandex. At first it doesn’t sound that exciting - I know. Another translation tool? Yawn. This tool is different. It translates all of the text that appears on any website instantly into one of 100 languages. What this means is that if you teach any ESL or ELL students and use online tools such as the MusicFirst Classroom, all you need to do is turn on the ImTranslator extension, and your students will be able to complete ANY assignment in ANY online software in their native language.

The MusicFirst Classroom translated into German

ImTranslator includes four translation tools: ImTranslator, Pop-up Bubble, Inline Translator and Webpage Translation , and other language tools such as Text-to-Speech, Translation History and Dictionary. ImTranslator Features:

• Translation of words, phrases and text between more than 100 languages

• Multiple translation providers

• Web page Translation - Translate entire web pages with just one click.

• Inline Translator translates a selected text on a page by splitting it into sentences and inserts the translation into a webpage.

• Automatic language detection of the source text

• Back translation of the target text to the original language Text to speech of the original text and its translation

I set up a keyboard shortcut to translate ANY webpage content by clicking Alt P or Option P (on a Mac). It takes a second or two (so be patient) but then WHAM - whatever content is in your browser window is instantly translated into whatever language you choose. Here is what PracticeFirst looks like when I selected Spanish and clicked Option P:

PracticeFirst translated into Spanish

Pretty incredible! There are some types of webpage content that won’t work though. Any text that is a part of an image will not translate, so if there is a button with text that is actually a part of the image, it won’t translate. For example, in Soundtrap, most of the interface is made of images, so it looks like ImTranslator doesn’t work. However, ALL of the menus are translated and any other text will be too. Still very useful.

There are quite a few more impressive features included with ImTranslator. Translation history keeps track of all your translation activity in ImTranslator, Bubble Translator, Inline Translator, or Webpage Translation, and stores translation records in the Translation History until you manually delete the records. Language list customization - you can customize the list of languages just for the languages that you need for your students. Shortcuts customization - ImTranslator shortcuts are fully customizable, and can be defined for each translation application.

Focus On Sound translated into Vietnamese

If you teach students who speak another language and need help with translating the tools that you use in your classes, grab this FREE Chrome extension now. I am rarely impressed by browser extensions, but ImTranslator is amazing. It definitely has some UX and UI improvements that need to be made (it’s a little clunky) but it does exactly what it says it will do, and the translations are really good. Not perfect - but really good. Enjoy!