My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
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My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
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Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#2Language learning apps are step 5 in the ten step process of achieving programmer hubris nirvana.
1) I'm in college and I'm going to build an app to easily buy and sell books
2) Off campus housing is hard, I'm going to build an app to find roommates
3) Splitting bills with roommates is hard, I'm going to build an app for cost splitting
4) All my previous apps sucked because they weren't social, I'm going to build a social network app
5) I'm bored partying with my new friends, I'm going to level up and build an app to learn a new language
6) I'm lonely, I'm going to build a dating app to find a mate
7) I found a mate and the whole engagement/wedding industry is a fraud, I'm going to make an app to make it easier to navigate
8) My children are awesome, I'm going to build apps to manage their time/friends/eating/sleeping/learning
9) Technology is a waste of time, I'm going to spend my time on other hobbies and my family
10) I've been working 20 years in a boring industry and I see an opportunity to write boring software that solves boring problems that businesses will actually pay for. Jackpot.
Edit: As others pointed out, should have included: ToDo app, Blog App, and a travel app. Travel should probably be 5 with language at 6.
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#3Personally, I would love to learn a language by watching movies/videos with 3 subtitle tracks:
(1) What they are speaking - IN their script (this is called SLS: Same-Language-Subtitling and has been quite successful for literacy programs for one's own language)
(2) What they are speaking - IN my script
(3) What they MEAN - IN my language (i.e. translation)
Data for (1) is easy to find. (2) could theoretically be generated from (1). It's (3) which requires a lot of deliberate manual effort.
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#4Language learning apps are step 5 in the ten step process of achieving programmer hubris nirvana. 1) I'm in college and I'm going to build an app to easily buy and sell books 2) Off campus housing is hard, I'm going to build an app to find roommates 3) Splitting bills with roommates is hard, I'm going to build an app for cost splitting 4) All my previous apps sucked because they weren't social, I'm going to build a s…
Wow, this is remarkably accurate..
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#5I have spent the last 10 months learning italian, spending a total of 7 weeks in the country, 150 hours studying, and 85 hours speaking on iTalki.
I have been using the method's described in Fluent Forever[1] and they have been working extremely well for me. I have a speaking partner that I speak with 3-5 times a week for 1 hour each time (If you want to learn italian email me, he is awesome), and I keep track of literally everything I cant say, and after the lesson make cards, insert them into Anki, repeat.
I can understand 80% of our conversations perfectly, and we talk for the full hour, rarely breaking into english. Am I speaking perfect italian - no, but I have absolutely no problems communicating. I was recently in Sicily with my family and hanging out with a family that spoke no English and was translating for 8 people in both directions with no problems.
This is the first new language I have learned but it seems the key to me is described in the book
1) start with pronunciation and spelling (Gabe created pronunciation trainers for most languages) 2) Learn some basic verbs (I need, I want, may I, to go, to take, etc) 3) Building up a large list of nouns 4) Start using iTalki with a partner very soon into your journey and keep track of what you dont know.
The state departments says it takes around 400 hours to learn the latin based languages, I believe that seems fairly accurate.
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#6Language learning apps are step 5 in the ten step process of achieving programmer hubris nirvana. 1) I'm in college and I'm going to build an app to easily buy and sell books 2) Off campus housing is hard, I'm going to build an app to find roommates 3) Splitting bills with roommates is hard, I'm going to build an app for cost splitting 4) All my previous apps sucked because they weren't social, I'm going to build a s…
Absolutely love it!
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#7Personally, I would love to learn a language by watching movies/videos with 3 subtitle tracks: (1) What they are speaking - IN their script (this is called SLS: Same-Language-Subtitling and has been quite successful for literacy programs for one's own language) (2) What they are speaking - IN my script (3) What they MEAN - IN my language (i.e. translation) Data for (1) is easy to find. (2) could theoretically be gene…
Are there video players like VLC that allow the displaying of more than one sub/srt file at a time?
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#8I have spent the last 10 months learning italian, spending a total of 7 weeks in the country, 150 hours studying, and 85 hours speaking on iTalki. I have been using the method's described in Fluent Forever[1] and they have been working extremely well for me. I have a speaking partner that I speak with 3-5 times a week for 1 hour each time (If you want to learn italian email me, he is awesome), and I keep track of lit…
+1 for iTalki and Fluent Forever. There are so many apps out there that give you the illusion of progress (e.g. the author's "74% fluent") but with nothing to show for it. There is no way you can get around practicing speaking and listening if your end-goal is to speak and listen.
I started learning French maybe 6 months ago and have done ~20 hours of iTalki sessions. You'll sound terrible when you start, but that's okay — you're paying them to hear your terrible French/German/Spanish/etc. It's all gets better.
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#9Language learning apps are step 5 in the ten step process of achieving programmer hubris nirvana. 1) I'm in college and I'm going to build an app to easily buy and sell books 2) Off campus housing is hard, I'm going to build an app to find roommates 3) Splitting bills with roommates is hard, I'm going to build an app for cost splitting 4) All my previous apps sucked because they weren't social, I'm going to build a s…
Don't forget static blog engines
Re: My Journey to a Better Language Learning System
#10Language learning apps are step 5 in the ten step process of achieving programmer hubris nirvana. 1) I'm in college and I'm going to build an app to easily buy and sell books 2) Off campus housing is hard, I'm going to build an app to find roommates 3) Splitting bills with roommates is hard, I'm going to build an app for cost splitting 4) All my previous apps sucked because they weren't social, I'm going to build a s…
That's awesome. It just seems to need a todo app sprinkled in somewhere. Maybe somewhere around 1st job?