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I am a free Duolingo user ("freeloader" in STW parlance). Until recently, I started the day with 5 hearts and if I was careful I could make them last for a load of lessons before running out. With the new system I start the day with 25 energy units, but even if I answer every question correctly (hypothetical situation) I can only do 2 lessons before running out of credit, which makes the process very slow and dull. I'm wondering what to do - give up, or subscribe. Anyone got any thoughts on this fascinating subject?
The version of the app I use is old enough (10 year old iPad won't run the newer one) that I still have the hearts. Having fewer chances/less ability does not fill me with confidence.
I still have hearts, when did it change?
After a couple of years of Duo French, I can barely muster the enthusiasm to do more than 2 lessons per day. Any more and I have dark intentions towards some of the characters and I fear the chances of me getting another easy answer wrong due to fat thumbs is high enough to push me over the edge!
Does that answer your question?
I’ve subscribed for a couple of years. It’s not as good as it was, and there’s increasing and irritating AI.
Anyone any recs for alternatives?
I still have hearts, when did it change?
For me about a week ago. MrsJ is still on hearts so it seems a bit random!
I joined a family plan for £17/year which is the absolute limit I'd pay for the app at the moment.
But even still the damn thing drives me crazy.
I need to find an alternative 🤣
I need to find an alternative
language transfer. free, and very good.
Yep to language transfer and go to proper classes with a real foreign person teaching you.
go to proper classes with a real foreign person teaching you.
That's a very good option, if you really want to learn, but it ain't cheap :-). I find group classes very frustrating because I can't believe that people can be so slow to learn. Probably the other students think the same about me when they have understood something and I'm struggling to grasp it. I've done individual classes when my employer was paying and they were massively helpful, but ££££
(should probably be a smiley in there somewhere- I'm not that much of a snob )
language transfer. free, and very good.
I pay £90 a term, pretty good value I'd say for a weekly 90 minute lesson.
I’ve been on Duolingo for 18 months now and it’s given me a reasonable ability to read and understand written French - quite happy with the app updates but I’m still limited by talking and listening. I’ve signed up with Preply.com for online in person lessons. Prices vary significantly- £8 per hour up to £40+ depending on quality and location of the teacher. There is definitely a limit to how far you go for free - at some point you’ve got to pay to make real improvements. I can’t commit to evening classes due to work commitments, so this works for me - off to Paris next week for work and will mangle a lot, but I do have confidence that at least 50% of what I say is comprehensible.
For talking and listening, id definitely recommend language transfer. That's what it does best rather than written.
After 20 years of being a teacher, Duolingo taught me a very valuable lesson. In lockdown, like millions of other people I gave it a try. I wanted to learn. I gravitate to things 'computercentric'. I like self learning. But if you put me in a room and forced me to use Duolingo again for half an hour then the door opened and in walked a bloke in a green bird outfit and there would be violence. Significant, irrational and disproportionate violence. Duolingo guy would find my phone inserted where the sun don't shine. Sideways. And you'd need Keith Harris and his extensive experience of having his hand up a green bird's arse to find it. The premise, the UI, the stupid rewards, the language which is meant to encourage but I find teeth itchingly condescending...everything single thing about it...single handed stripped me of wanting to learn. More than that, it actively made me stubbornly refuse to learn. I suspect me and the language I was trying to learn will never now be friends as however else I try to learn it, it will forevermore be associated in my head with that stupid green ****ing bird!
So there you have, a career teacher approaching 50 was taught a valuable lesson that people have different learning styles and forcing them to use one that does not work for them will have life long learning consequences. Who knew!
Here's the thing - nobody forced you. If it didn't work for you, fine - try something else.
Aye the limits of duolingo are reached pretty quickly.. I have a daft streak on the go and I realise I only do it to maintain this streak. I feel it's taught me all it can and now the lessons aren't going in. Its too gamified and silly quirks, lightening strikes this week for every 5questions correct, **** off I'm nearly 50 not 5.
The fact the thing incessantly messages me, I know, I need to turn the notifications off, is just weird...
I should give language transfer a proper go and kill the bird. Once the kids are less reliant on me I think I'll do an evening class.
Back to the OP, they have mucked about with the UI a number of times over the years and it's frustrating, I cant say it's any better than when I started with 5years ago, in fact I miss how it was when I started.
Hoping your experience doesn't get rolled out widely, it sounds awful but make help me escape.
Here's the thing - nobody forced you. If it didn't work for you, fine - try something else.
I stopped after about 18months. Many reasons.
The hearts thing. I don't really understand how losing lives and then being locked out helps. Although it is a method I'd like to apply to my classroom.
The Americanism of it. Having to mentally shift cinema in french, to cinema in English, to movie theatre, just got on my wick.
Then languages like french where the word ending is specific to the situation and they sound the same but the spelling is different. It just got too picky.
Then got slightly freaked by the purple haired girl asking me to pay up for real conversations with her. No thank you there are telephone numbers in the back of the paper for that sort of learning.
Only recently started using so not sure how much it's changed but can echo the frustrations of the gaming nature of it, and the frequency of adverts now. Obviously they want you to pay but nothing is encouraging me to pay. More feeling I'll uninstall it as its too irritating.
I'm not sure I'm learning much with it anyway.
My existing French knowledge is pre-GCSE level mixed with stuff picked up on holidays. Basic level stuff.
Everything so far has been that level and it's very easy multiple choice type answers generally. Sometimes it gives a more complex speech and I don't know half of what's being said, but it mentions Mexico (a lot) and just asks what country they live in and that's the only logical answer. I'd like to know what they were actually talking about though.
Anyway, been recommended Babble also, had a go but free trial is short and now wants money. It seemed more tolerable though.
I pay a subscription to Duolingo. It's limited but is pretty much the only option for the language that I most want to learn. Because of work I can't attend evening classes in person or online. So that leaves Duolingo
The hearts thing. I don't really understand how losing lives and then being locked out helps. Although it is a method I'd like to apply to my classroom.
Especially since it doesn't tell you the rules, you just have to try and figure them out with trial and error. In the case of my attempts to learn Italian, a lot of errors.
I have just completed a lesson without making a mistake and was told "You're like a pristine, freshwater pearl"! So that was nice 🤩 🤗
I'm on a 1,235 day streak (French) and, frankly, the only reason I don't stop is because I don't want to loose my streak. Agree with the complaints above. I don't think I'm improving much (I normally only do one lesson a day), but it has to be better than nothing? I have been considered Babble, but it sounds like you have to pay (I don't pay for Duolingo). I did a couple of terms of night classes in French and found them just as frustrating and more expensive. Not really sure the best way forward
Just started listening to Languagetransfer French and it's basically a rip off of the old French with Michel Thomas CD's. So great that it is free, but not new and a bit unfair
3202 day streak here, and I feel that I can confidently say that Duolingo is the worst it's ever been right now. I've been on the paid version for quite some time and I really need to cancel it. Agreed that it's become too gamified, but the bits that really hurt were the closing of the forums and the increasing use of AI. The forums were great because if you got a question wrong, you could click the forum link and find a discussion as to why you were wrong, which made you feel less stupid when others had made the same mistake! The AI nonsense? Christ, the number of times recently when it's given me the 'English' translation of a sentence and it's just gibberish, literally worse than 'American English'. And if an ostensibly English-speaking company can't get an English-language sentence correct, what chance do they have of getting the foreign ones right?