It’s never been easier to pick up another language — or so the language learning apps claim. Duolingo, like many other similar apps, claims to be able to teach you how to read, write or speak a new language, all from the comfort of your smartphone.
It sounds too good to be true: spend just 20 minutes a day and you’ll be fluent? No need for expensive language classes or travelling abroad for immersive learning?
I’m a third-level student from Co Clare and attending college at Tilburg University in the Netherlands, where I study international business.
While I studied French at school and was quite good at it, I’m far from an accomplished polyglot.
For instance, I’ve been to Spain many times over the years and have a good friend who lives there, but got by speaking English. I found the language barrier limiting, however, especially when talking to his friends who aren’t as fluent in English as he is.
So, I decided to start teaching myself on Duolingo and see how far I’d get. I’ve spent the best part of two years doing daily exercises on the app and here’s how I got on.
The good
The app is free to those who don’t mind an onslaught of advertising and at a small cost to those who prefer uninterrupted learning.
It makes it really easy way to get going as you just download the app and start lessons immediately. There isn’t any cost, but the ads can be quite annoying as you have to keep stopping and starting to let them play out, but right from the beginning it gets you into learning the basics.
It only takes a few minutes every day and the streak feature is great as it kept me motivated to stick with it and not lose the momentum I’d built up. It’s also more like a game than a tutorial and there are lots of different lessons, some which involve listening to stories or pairing words with the English equivalent and others which are a bit stressful as they are about beating the clock to get as many words as possible in a short space of time.
The learning is rewards-based and you can move up the league table, with the option of pairing up with people to compete with each other.
So it can be more fun than hard work, which makes it easier to do it every day. And I went from not knowing anything, apart from a few very basic words to being able to have a simple conversation. Doing just 10 minutes or less a day, over two years, I am certainly in a much better position than I was when I started and as well as being able to get by with the Spanish I speak, I can also understand quite a bit more from listening to people.
This is the other good aspect of Duolingo as it allows you to learn how the language is spoken — there are lots of different characters with various accents and tones which help when it comes to listening to real people speaking Spanish. So, I think that this is helpful and will make it much easier to continue learning in the future.
The not-so-good
But, like everything, there are a few downsides — the first being that it can be quite repetitive. I guess this is so the words sink in properly, but when you know them, it can be a little boring.
Also, it can take a long time to learn the different tenses as lessons are done by theme rather than subject matter – so instead of lessons in the past or future tense, they are focused on something like travel or eating out and all the tenses are mixed up within those categories.
Duolingo’s infamously persistent notifications can pester you to come back and keep your streak going. It can mean you end up more focused on hitting your targets rather than learning.
Ultimately, though, language apps are not like real people. The point of learning a language is to be able to communicate with other people. So, you can learn as many words or sentences as you want, but you’ll never be fluent until you can have a real conversation.
The real thing
I was keen to get a proper lesson, so I signed up to attend an in-person weeklong course during the summer at the Camino Barcelona in the centre of the city. Unlike scrolling on an app, it meant I could combine the lessons with a holiday.
I had to have a chat with a teacher via Zoom beforehand so my level could be established to place me into the right class. On the morning itself, I joined about 100 others who were all gearing up to improve their language skills.
We had two classes each morning — one from 9.30 to 11am and the other from 11.20am to 1pm — with two different teachers and teaching styles. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but you are thrown right into it with conversation in Spanish right from the beginning.
From my initial interview, it was decided that I was at level “A2″ — fairly basic — and should be in a class which would be focusing on tenses and grammar as this is something that is lacking on Duolingo.
I was worried initially that I wouldn’t be up to the same standard as the others, but I had learned enough phraseology to keep up and the tenses were corrected as we were going along.
We were encouraged to talk as much as possible, with the teachers asking about our day, what we had done the evening before and what plans we had for the day ahead. At the start, it was a bit daunting to be talking in Spanish in front of other people, but everyone was in the same boat, so it wasn’t a problem.
Overall, I found the classes to be effective. Over the week I became more comfortable speaking in different tenses. I also found the teaching method to be really good as by combining games with varied conversations, we all became comfortable speaking with each other in the language.
There were also free conversation sessions every afternoon. In the evenings and on weekends there were optional activities which were a great way to keep speaking the language unconsciously, with people who were at the same level.
In conclusion ...
Having experienced Duolingo and in-person classes, I think there is a place for both.
I learned an awful lot in just one week at the school in Barcelona, but I don’t think I would have got as much out of them in such a short time if I hadn’t already got the basics from Duolingo.
(Having said that, one of my classmates didn’t have a word of Spanish when he started and when I met him, on week four of his course, he was already at the level I was at after two years of learning with the app.)
So, yes, Duolingo is beneficial as it helps develop the foundation of the language and allows for easy, everyday learning. I’ll continue to use it, but it’s just a starting point. It will never make you fluent.
By upgrading to an in-person class, or finding a native speaker to practise with, you’ll make far greater strides.
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