Choosing the Translation Key for a School Notice
In an Assamese-medium HSLC section, a teacher is preparing a 5-mark English-to-Arabic translation item. The source sentence is: “All students must assemble in the library at 8:30 a.m. on Sunday; those who have not returned the borrowed books will not receive their report cards.” The draft key offers two versions for the second clause: (A) الذين لم يُرجعوا الكتب المستعارة لن يستلموا كشوف نتائجهم; (B) الطلاب الذين ما أرجعوا الكتب المستعارة لا يستلمون بطاقات درجاتهم. A colleague objects that (A) uses a masculine plural relative pronoun for “students” although the English is gender-neutral, and that “report cards” should be “بطاقات التقرير” rather than “كشوف النتائج.” The class has 28 candidates. Nine wrote يجب كل الطلاب without على; 12 correctly wrote في الساعة 8:30 صباحًا; six translated “those who” as هؤلاء الذين; and four used لن يستلموا but attached it to the wrong subject. The teacher must choose a key, decide what to accept, and write a short justification for the marking scheme.
1. Which version, A or B, should be the preferred key? Discuss the relative pronoun, negation, tense and the term for “report cards.”
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Version (A) is the better key. Its advantages are grammatical and register-based:
- الذين is appropriate for human masculine plural. English “students” is gender-neutral, but Arabic uses the masculine plural as the default for a mixed or unspecified group. If the school wants explicit inclusivity, the natural expansion is جميع الطلاب والطالبات, not a different relative pronoun. The colleague’s objection is therefore weak for a generic notice.
- لم يُرجعوا is a standard negated past with لم + jussive; the final ن is dropped, which is correct for الأفعال الخمسة. Version B’s ما أرجعوا is understandable but less controlled in this register, and it can sound more like a dialectal or less formal negation.
- لن يستلموا expresses future negation, matching “will not receive.” B’s لا يستلمون is present habitual, which shifts the meaning.
- كشوف النتائج is the usual school-administration term for report cards. بطاقات درجاتهم is understandable and can be accepted as a synonym if the candidate’s sentence is otherwise correct, but it is not the preferred term.
So A should anchor the key, with B accepted only with deductions for tense and register, and with بطاقات الدرجات allowed as a lexical alternative where clarity is preserved.
2. Explain how to treat the errors يجب كل الطلاب, هؤلاء الذين, and the misplaced لن يستلموا. Give corrected forms.
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- يجب كل الطلاب is not idiomatic for “all students must.” يجب needs the obligor introduced with على: يجب على جميع الطلاب أن يتجمعوا. An acceptable alternative is على جميع الطلاب أن يتجمعوا. The error changes the meaning towards “all students are obligatory,” so it should lose the structure mark, not the whole item.
- هؤلاء الذين is redundant in Arabic relative-clause use here. Either use الذين alone or use a demonstrative without the relative pronoun, but not both in this construction. Correct: والذين لم يُعيدوا الكتب المستعارة.... A candidate who writes هؤلاء الذين should lose the relative-clause mark once, not twice for the same slip.
- لن يستلموا attached to the wrong subject usually means the candidate made the books or the library the recipient. The teacher should check the subject chain: the subject must be the same people as الذين. Correct: والذين لم يُعيدوا الكتب المستعارة لن يتسلموا كشوف نتائجهم. If the verb form is right but the subject is wrong, award the form mark and deduct the meaning mark.
A workable 5-mark split is: 1 for يجب على/على... أن; 1 for time and place; 1 for the relative clause; 1 for negation and future; 1 for report cards and overall clarity.
3. Produce a final 40–50-word Arabic translation and state one place where a literal English word order should not be copied.
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A suitable final translation is:
يجب على جميع الطلاب التجمع في المكتبة الساعة 8:30 صباحًا يوم الأحد؛ والذين لم يُعيدوا الكتب المستعارة لن يتسلموا كشوف نتائجهم.
One place not to copy English word order is “those who have not returned the borrowed books.” English puts the relative clause before the main verb phrase; Arabic is smoother with والذين لم يُعيدوا الكتب المستعارة followed by لن يتسلموا.... Also, “must assemble” is better rendered as يجب على ... التجمع or على ... أن يتجمعوا, not as a bare imperative, because the notice is formal and general. The semicolon can be kept to mirror the two-part English notice, but the Arabic sentence must still have a clear subject for لن يتسلموا.