Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material • Hacker News Board

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#201

Post by selectodude » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 2:39 AM UTC

3pt14159 wrote: post #190

amaccuish wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having left school 3 years ago, I can confirm there is still no grammar taught in english lessons. It was all taught to the AQA exam we did. I studied french and german too, and all my grammar knowledge comes from there and from languages at uni. There's obviously basic things in primary school but that's like where to put commas, that's it.

It's because English grammar is either obvious and doesn't need teaching or is inexplicable and isn't worth trying to make a pattern out of. I ran, she ran, he ran, they ran, we ran, y'all ran. I run, she runs, he runs, they run, we run, y'all run. I'll run, she'll run, he'll run, they'll run, we'll run, y'all'll run. I thought I'd run, he thought he'd run, they thought they'd run. We'll have wished we ran, they'll h…

Also everything in English has dozens and dozens of exceptions that you just need to memorize.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#202

Post by ajmurmann » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 2:39 AM UTC

poisonarena wrote: post #128

firefoxd wrote: post #45

I did Duolingo seriously for more than 370 days in a row. Spanish: I speak french and English so Spanish is relatively easy to complete. After completing the course, I tried having conversations with people (with friends but mostly uber drivers) and I was surprised how many times i learned it all wrong. I had to read a lot or children book to remedy that. French: As a french speaker, I went through it as a meta cours…

Disagree, I went from no spanish knowledge to being able to basically text/whatsapp. Some of the phrases were retarded but I was still learning new words and a bit of grammar. 4 years later and I am fluent and still credit duolingo for giving me a boost and making it fun/gamifing the very basics. I also disagree about Japanese, I used to it learn the kanas and I am continuing to learn with it. I don't understand why…

I agree that the kana were pretty good. Everything after that was just incoherent and I'd rather sit down and read through Genki instead, memorise what I learned with a Anki deck and maybe even spend some money for a teacher in iTalki. I've also had good success listening to Michel Thomas recordings while commuting. While none of this except most versions of Anki is free, neither is my time and learning a language especially Japanese is a massive time investment to begin with. I'm happy to throw money at the problem, especially if we talk $50 for a text book or $15-$20/hour with a native teacher.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#203

Post by sotojuan » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:05 AM UTC

chrischen wrote: post #110

firefoxd wrote: post #45

I did Duolingo seriously for more than 370 days in a row. Spanish: I speak french and English so Spanish is relatively easy to complete. After completing the course, I tried having conversations with people (with friends but mostly uber drivers) and I was surprised how many times i learned it all wrong. I had to read a lot or children book to remedy that. French: As a french speaker, I went through it as a meta cours…

I’m trying to learn Japanese and 99% of the apps out there focus on memorizing phrases out of context that could be applied to any topic, and market itself as a language learning system. I’ve yet to find a single app that beat out a one-time read through of a Japanese grammar guide. That being said memorization apps can be useful, such as for vocabulary, but I’ve yet to find an app that markets itself as that.

Skip the apps and hit the books. Apps aside from Anki are useless.

https://djtguide.neocities.org/guide.html

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#204

Post by sotojuan » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:10 AM UTC

poisonarena wrote: post #128

firefoxd wrote: post #45

I did Duolingo seriously for more than 370 days in a row. Spanish: I speak french and English so Spanish is relatively easy to complete. After completing the course, I tried having conversations with people (with friends but mostly uber drivers) and I was surprised how many times i learned it all wrong. I had to read a lot or children book to remedy that. French: As a french speaker, I went through it as a meta cours…

Disagree, I went from no spanish knowledge to being able to basically text/whatsapp. Some of the phrases were retarded but I was still learning new words and a bit of grammar. 4 years later and I am fluent and still credit duolingo for giving me a boost and making it fun/gamifing the very basics. I also disagree about Japanese, I used to it learn the kanas and I am continuing to learn with it. I don't understand why…

Measuring Duolingo’s quality by kana learning is not a good idea. Kana are so simple you can learn them in a week using any method ever. What Duolingo fails at is the important part of learning Japanese (aside from kanji) - grammar and sentence structuring.

You’re much better off reading an actual textbook.

I personally don’t hate on Duolingo because it’s free but it tends to waste people’s times and gives them false impressions about language learning.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#205

Post by fapjacks » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:12 AM UTC

salimmadjd wrote: post #78

avid Duolingo user here. 1 - the new update is a massive disaster (I'll explain in a bit). Maybe it's different for other languages, but for Russian language I vehemently hate the update. I dislike it so much that I tracked down Duolingo PM person on LinkedIN and tried to message them directly. The app updated for me a week ago with one dialogue that I tapped to confirm. Thinking it's just another incremental update.…

I understand viscerally this comment about something becoming a source of stress. Actually a couple of apps have done this to me in the past, and I immediately reject them (by uninstalling them) when I recognize that the app is using the anxiety and stress to twist the screws and get me to pay for something. Fuck that. I'm curious here, though. Except for not having an exceptionally long streak number associated with your username that you have earned, what penalties exist for not maintaining your streak? Does Duolingo like cut you off from completing lessons or otherwise impose restrictions on using the app if you don't maintain a streak?

Also, I've been putting a lot of time in the Russian module and I'm really disappointed that there's no way to learn the grammar rules in Duolingo. Russian especially has surprising behavior depending on the characters used.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#206

Post by freedomben » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:15 AM UTC

rayxi271828 wrote: post #159

strken wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would matter to those of us trying to learn a language, because if another app was better, we could use it instead of duolingo. At the moment I'm supplementing duolingo by nattering away to my father in French and asking the half-French guy at work how to say various things, but if the app is teaching me things that are plain wrong, I'll have to either find another app or start taking real life classes, which is w…

I've been trying a few of these lately. I passed French DELF A2 late last year and going for B1 in a week. My chronological progression of picking up French via apps/courses (lots of trial-and-error): 1. Duolingo 2. Michel Thomas audio course - this has its critics but it gave me a much more solid, if limited, foundation on grammar. 3. Lingvist - I was lucky to find this early. Added around 2000 words to my vocabular…

I did the Michel Thomas Spanish course and I found it to be excellent. It can be a lot harder to stay engaged than a gamified app, but you come away knowing a lot more than you would expect.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#207

Post by liberte82 » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:26 AM UTC

firefoxd wrote: post #45

I did Duolingo seriously for more than 370 days in a row. Spanish: I speak french and English so Spanish is relatively easy to complete. After completing the course, I tried having conversations with people (with friends but mostly uber drivers) and I was surprised how many times i learned it all wrong. I had to read a lot or children book to remedy that. French: As a french speaker, I went through it as a meta cours…

I also don't like that it's mostly reading and listening comprehension, with little writing and as far as I know no spoken.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#208

Post by puppet_heart » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:28 AM UTC

This thread is living proof why many people are seemingly unable to learn languages (well): they're more concerned with tools and methodologies instead of simply putting in the effort and learning the language they want to learn (emphasis on "want to learn"). Yes, it's (sometimes hard) work to learn a language and there is no magical fairy dust.

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#209

Post by freeloop10 » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:29 AM UTC

jakobegger wrote: post #84

savanaly wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't understand that-- compared to the cost of developing and marketing the app itself, surely the cost to hire someone whose only qualification is that they be bilingual is trivial, and you would only need them for long enough for them to run through all the questions to double check they are correct.

That‘s probably what they thought, too. If you just pick a random bilingual person and let them proofread your learning material you are going to end up with crappy learning materials. If you want good content, you need good editors, and they are neither cheap, nor easy to find. The reason why companies try to save money with editors is that they don‘t „scale“ (one dev and a designer can program an interface that can…

Why do you need 20,000 questions, though, when a typical user isn't going to need that many?

Re: Duolingo Suddenly Has Over Twice as Much Language Learning Material

#210

Post by timr » Fri, Apr 13, 2018, 3:41 AM UTC

mikekchar wrote: post #179

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nice resources. I should probably elaborate on my actual study methods: - Vocabulary study with Anki - Kanji study (RTK order) with a script that shows vocab on my desktop - Grammar study via Tae Kim - Listening practice with regular consumption of Japanese music & television - Reading/writing practice by engaging in Japanese discussions on Mastodon, IRC, 2channel - Reading practice with Japanese manga and novels - R…

For me, I think this list is almost optimal. I'll only add a couple of things. I recommend karaoke as a way to learn pronunciation, tones and pacing for language. Songs aren't in any way indicative of actual language, but it gets you listening for rhythm and tones (even though it's different than natural speech). It also allows you to internalise common contractions, especially with fast songs. Another great way to l…

"Then learn vocabulary, memorising the kanji as you go. Make up stories using the radicals and feel free to revise stories as you go. Once you see kanji regularly, you won't need the stories anyway -- so optimising order to make your stories consistent is a wasted effort. My 2 cents."

Not just your 2 cents...this is the way they teach in Japan, both to natives and at language schools. They have a kanji ordering that is loosely based on frequency, and the kanji are individually presented for reading(s) and (hand)writing, but the actual learning involves memorizing lists of words. In fact, now that I'm not taking exams in Japanese anymore and I care very little about handwriting, it's more efficient to memorize words. I find that new kanji sink in automatically. It's kind of magical, really.

To overgeneralize a bit, the folks I've met who are most dedicated to the RTK method are the ones who have been "studying" Japanese for years and years with little discernable progress. Lots of people get sucked into the kanji memorization black hole because it's gives the impression of steady, incremental progress to a process that is not incremental at all.