Ever since I learned that learning a new language would help in our cognitive abilities as we age and reduce the risk of diseases like Alzheimers' and Dementia, I wanted to do it. I think the use of mobile phones has spoiled us a bit. When everything is at our fingertips and we do not need to store a lot of information, especially for non-students, hardly any effort goes into memorizing things. Everything can be looked up easily over and over again, we can set reminders for tasks and also there is no longer a need to memorize phone numbers any more. I was no different, and a was/am a good candidate for memory loss. I decided to learn a language and then another one.
Slightly over a year ago, I decided to learn French using Duolingo. Why French- well, I have a lot of French speaking colleagues at work, made it a logical choice. When I started, DuoLingo was a free app where you can make any number of mistakes but gradually, it moved to a paid model. Ads started popping up and also, you cannot make more than 5 mistakes per day. I didn't mind this to be honest, mainly because I do not spend more than 5 mins a day on learning.
The biggest positive for me with Duolingo is the gamification of our learning. No one likes to be on a losing streak and as long as you complete a lesson, you can keep extending your streak on a daily basis. For someone as competitive as me, I like this very much and it has surely helped me stay consistent.
Apart from this, the other positive is the possibility to learn multiple languages simultaneously on the app. A few months ago, due to my love for Chinese dramas, I took up learning Mandarin Chinese on the app.
Also, there is a spaced repetition concept built into the app, so it is quite unlikely that you will forget most of what you have learnt in a couple of weeks.
The biggest negative for me is the lack of real conversations. Though there are several speaking exercises, I personally did not find it as effective as having a real conversation in the language I am learning. If someone directly speaks to me in French or Mandarin, I am unable to understand them well or if I have understood, respond appropriately. Basically, there is a lack of confidence in having good conversations.
The other negative is the lack of basics being taught. For French, it was still okay as the script is similar to English. However, there are several accents and there was no priming on how these could be used. For Mandarin, it was way too difficult as the script is something unfamiliar. The pinyin is not always pronounced the way it is written. So, for someone from India, it is really difficult. There are no basics on how we are supposed to read and understand the characters. There are some written exercises for Mandarin characters, but I do not remember any of it because it is just some random words and characters.
My verdict- Use Duolingo to get into language learning and practice some common words, phrases and sentences but use it as a supplemental tool, rather than as a primary tool for learning languages.
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