Duolingo is my best tool to learn English <3
I don't mean to nitpick, but the phrase "my best" sounds strange. "It is my favourite" or "It is the best" sound notably better.
Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
61–70 of 189 posts
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#62I am currently in Uruguay learning Spanish and Duolingo is one the the 4 tools I use on my phone for it. The other three are: Ankidroid: A flashcard app for adding vocabulary I need and phrases I want to come more fluidly. Spanish Trainer: A spaced repetition verb conjugation app as Duolingo doesn't give me enough practice with this. Google Translate What would speed things up for me is the ability to easily import t…
("What sped things up for me" or I suppose you could say "What speeds things up for me;" hope this is received well by commenter HN community in the spirit of helping someone learn/improve their language)
That isn't a correction. Both "sped things" and "speeds things" are both legal English and both mean similar things (although as another commenter correctly notes, the tenses are subtly different).
Downvoters can read this: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/114620/speeded-v...
Sped is a perfectly valid English word. If you don't believe so then you should question your own knowledge of the language.
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#63Only complaint is they appear to have no priority in supporting languages of the East, where the majority of the world lives. I guess their main demo, at least at one point, was Western students, who aren't typically taught those languages in school. In the least, teaching Mandarin should be a higher priority than half the languages they support.
Yes, the majority of the world lives in the east. That means they should target (eg) Mandarin -> English instead of English -> Mandarin. Which is precisely what they're doing.
Their aim is to maximise their learning audience.
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#64With regards to learning Spanish, here's a free resource I like: https://www.laits.utexas.edu/spe/
Short, graded videos with transcripts and translations.
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Since clearly you will have forgotten everything you knew about that language in 2 years time... They are not wrong. I passed Duolingo Spanish course (it might have been extended since then) and barely remember anything now. I was also studying German in school, and later French by myself to the point where I could even speak with native speakers a little. Hardly remember anything either. English is the only foreign…
This, to me, is very telling I spent a lot of time barely using certain foreign languages (+ than 2 years). Of course you get 'rusty', but far from forgetting everything. And it came up back quickly This tell me Duolingo doesn't make you learn it, but rather memorize their game.
And while that may be the case, it is ultimately a free Rosetta Stone. So if it fails to work you're only out just time, with Rosetta Stone you're out time and also hundreds of dollars.
I'd love to see a independent study into its reliability/retention. But even if it is completely useless, it is still no more wasteful than any other mobile game people play daily.
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#66I miss livemocha , I met a ton of people in real life thanks to that app. Rosetta Stone just killed everything that was good about it.
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#67I miss livemocha , I met a ton of people in real life thanks to that app. Rosetta Stone just killed everything that was good about it.
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Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
("What sped things up for me" or I suppose you could say "What speeds things up for me;" hope this is received well by commenter HN community in the spirit of helping someone learn/improve their language)
That isn't a correction. Both "sped things" and "speeds things" are both legal English and both mean similar things (although as another commenter correctly notes, the tenses are subtly different). Downvoters can read this: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/114620/speeded-v... Sped is a perfectly valid English word. If you don't believe so then you should question your own knowledge of the language.
Neither are legal English.
In this context 'legal' can only mean 'having to do with the law' as there is no statutory definition of the English language (well not British English at least).
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#69I am currently in Uruguay learning Spanish and Duolingo is one the the 4 tools I use on my phone for it. The other three are: Ankidroid: A flashcard app for adding vocabulary I need and phrases I want to come more fluidly. Spanish Trainer: A spaced repetition verb conjugation app as Duolingo doesn't give me enough practice with this. Google Translate What would speed things up for me is the ability to easily import t…
> I would love the ability to make a certain drill or word as Finished or Very Confident so I don't have to waste time practicing stuff I already know. It's my understanding that Duolingo (and similar tools) aren't quizzing you just to make you prove that you know a word. It's actually part of the process of ensuring retention, and the act of recalling the word is actually part of the process of storing the informati…
I don't need to have certain words drilled into me because I've known them for over a decade. I also know what words come easily and immediately when I am trying to speak and thus are drilled into me by constant use.
The two other spaced repetition tools I use (which I mentioned) allow me to specify how well I know the answer and use when I have a high level of confidence in my knowledge, the words will come less frequently.
(edit: added second paragraph)
Re: Duolingo Raises $45M, Now Valued at $470M
#70I am currently in Uruguay learning Spanish and Duolingo is one the the 4 tools I use on my phone for it. The other three are: Ankidroid: A flashcard app for adding vocabulary I need and phrases I want to come more fluidly. Spanish Trainer: A spaced repetition verb conjugation app as Duolingo doesn't give me enough practice with this. Google Translate What would speed things up for me is the ability to easily import t…
("What sped things up for me" or I suppose you could say "What speeds things up for me;" hope this is received well by commenter HN community in the spirit of helping someone learn/improve their language)
What I should have written was "What would speed things up for me"