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Duolingo: opinions, progress, levels? | ||
Tags: Internet | Language Program | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes |  | |
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4691 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 1 of 35 16 March 2013 at 11:46am | IP Logged | |||||
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I did a text search for Duolingo, and it came up with no results, so I thought it would
be good to start a thread. I just started Duolingo for French yesterday, and so far it's pretty good. I like the fact that a lesson is pretty quick, and involves a variety of response types. You type responses in English or French, you see a sentence to translate, you hear a sentence to type in, and so on. I haven't got a microphone, so I switched off that option and can't comment on how good that is. I know some people say it gets boring after a while, but my initial feeling is that it is pretty fun, and the idea of working through the level tree adds motivation. So far I am working at a level far below what I know, but as it is helping my spelling, I am working up from the bottom. The final point I will make is that there are two main learning sections in Duolingo: a sort of course where you work your way through language levels. And a translation section where you read sections of the internet and translate it into your tl (or the other way around). I have looked at this part, but not tried it. However, when you read Duolingo's advertising, that seems to be most of what they talk about. Here are a couple questions I have about Duolingo: Does anyone have any idea of what sort of level you could be at when you've finished your language tree? How many words does it cover, does it cover all the main points of grammar? What is the best way to approach the translation section? And before anyone says "There is no one best way," etc, I mean, what has been effective for you? ;) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| vrvitor Diglot Newbie Brazil Joined 4060 days ago 7 posts - 10 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishC2 | Message 2 of 35 16 March 2013 at 6:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I have tried out the French and the German courses of Duolingo so far. I haven't gone
too far in any of those, but I've already done a few lessons. For me, Duolingo seems to cover a good amount of vocabulary, even at the first lessons. And, as you mentioned, it can be of good help to improve spelling skills. As far as grammar is concerned, Duolingo is fairly helpful in German, but not at all in French. Almost all German lessons (at least the first ones) have a section named "Tips and notes", containing clear explanations of grammar topics. On the other hand, there isn't such thing in the French lessons and, therefore, sometimes it gets extremely complicated to understand why sentences that are presented to us during the lessons are structured in certain ways. It's a good thing that there is a discussion topic for every task, where people can post their questions and are often answered by other users of the website. To sum up, my opinion is that Duolingo can be a pretty useful tool to develop reading and writing skills as well as to acquire vocabulary. Used along with other methods, I believe it can make a difference in the learning process! 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Gala Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4332 days ago 229 posts - 421 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Italian | Message 3 of 35 17 March 2013 at 2:09am | IP Logged | |||||
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From looking at the topics (both grammatical and lexical)covered on the skill trees for
French & Spanish, it looks like it covers pretty much the same ground as most college textbooks used over the course of 2 semesters of beginning language classes, in the US. Of course, such classes in many colleges often haven't completed an entire textbook of that sort after 2 semesters. Anyway, after finishing Duolingo, you should be at lower intermediate level. I won't try to equate that to a CERF level, as their criteria includes much more than what grammar and vocab you have "learned," but rather how much of it you can effectively use which, IMO, cannot be determined by the completion of any course. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| MultipackCan Newbie Ireland Joined 4066 days ago 20 posts - 28 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Esperanto | Message 4 of 35 17 March 2013 at 11:25am | IP Logged | |||||
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I think it's a great supplementary tool but I'd imagine it's very frustrating to 'learn'
from. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Jinx Triglot Senior Member Germany reverbnation.co Joined 5475 days ago 1085 posts - 1879 votes Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Catalan, Dutch, Esperanto, Croatian, Serbian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Italian, Spanish, Yiddish | Message 5 of 35 17 March 2013 at 6:48pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Warning: the advanced levels of their courses include enough inaccuracies and even actual mistakes that they are not worth using. I enjoyed the basic levels as well, but when I reached the higher levels I was frankly very disappointed by the low-quality content. It's too bad, because I love the concept, but I'm afraid I can't recommend the site to other learners yet.
8 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| vrvitor Diglot Newbie Brazil Joined 4060 days ago 7 posts - 10 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishC2 | Message 6 of 35 17 March 2013 at 7:29pm | IP Logged | |||||
Just out of curiosity, which language did you take on Duolingo and from which level the mistakes and inaccuracies started to show up? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| schoenewaelder Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5342 days ago 759 posts - 1197 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 7 of 35 18 March 2013 at 3:43pm | IP Logged | |||||
Here's a thread from ... last month Don't use "text search", use "g search" or just use google directly to do a site search, which turns up the same results. Edited by schoenewaelder on 18 March 2013 at 3:57pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Jinx Triglot Senior Member Germany reverbnation.co Joined 5475 days ago 1085 posts - 1879 votes Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Catalan, Dutch, Esperanto, Croatian, Serbian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Italian, Spanish, Yiddish | Message 8 of 35 19 March 2013 at 10:09pm | IP Logged | |||||
I did the basic levels of Spanish, and French and German at more advanced levels. From about levels 10-15-ish for the latter two languages, I was noticing enough incorrect/incomplete content to make it frustrating to use. Another problem is that the computer-generated voices often mispronounce or "swallow" syllables, which makes the dictation lessons pointless. 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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