Eves wrote: In fact, based on how the lessons are progressing, I'm not sure if I will eventually be able to formulate basic sentences when completed with the tree. However, I am beginning to realize that I can pick out certain parts of German conversation when I hear it, at least understand and pick out some words. I think it's a good beginner's resource. I plan to stick with it and complete the German tree before moving on to other things (Clozemaster, News in Slow German, etc.)
I had learnt quite a lot from the first third or so of the German tree. The not too complicated things were clicking well and I was using them while speaking (Duolingo was my first German resource, I was unsure whether I'd want to continue).
But there came a point, after which I was unable to really learn anything from it, due to to lack of explanation and too few examples. Instead of real practice and thinking about the grammar, I suddenly caught myself memorising the few examples, to be rid of the exercise I was stuck on. That was not real learning.
To me, it was like two separate things.
Cainntear wrote:
First up, it's great that Duolingo encourages people to keep at it, but it's a squandered opportunity. Once you've got the habit, you should be upping the complexity.
Von Ahn says that upping the learning means upping the drop-out rates... in that case he's doing it wrong -- both teaching and gamification.
Very true. The problem is that Duolingo (based on all the articles about it that I have read) thinks the goal is to keep people using Duolingo eternally. In one article, they were clearly dividing learners into the "successful" ones, who kept using Duolingo, and the "unsuccessful" ones, who stopped. No sign of the idea that the people leaving Duolingo may have actually been the successful ones, who had learnt the content and moved on.
And when eternal reviewing is the goal (I guess ads being an important source of income for Duolingo has a lot to do with that), you don't actually need people to learn much.
Also, people are more likely to stay and stick to your product, if you make them feel as if they were awesome at language learning. Upping the complexity might not be flattering enough for a part of the public.
Gamification:
The single biggest mistake Duolingo has suffered since day one is that they've totally misunderstood XP.
...
A related problem with XP is that they've copied the idea from RPGs that "levels" need progressively more XP the higher you get... but that's done explicitly to encourage taking on harder, higher-risk fights, which is not an option in Duolingo.
..
This means that the difficult questions not only aren't getting a fair reward, but end up being an obstacle that stops you getting rewarded for what you did do right. It triggers problems of "loss aversion", so yeah, of course people are going to dislike difficult tasks (you know, the ones that lead to actual learning).
Yes, this is extremely true. Duolingo missed out on the opportunity to use the crown levels or exp levels meaningfully. Neither lead to harder exercises. And it supports the mentality that the eternal reviewing of Duolingo is the goal, not actually learning.
And I don't think Duolingo have opened up the market for language apps either, because by running for years on a $0.00 price tag funded by immense amounts of venture capital, they've killed the value of language apps in the public imagination. There have been people trying to do interesting things with language technology, but who's really got anywhere? Babbel is actually pretty old-school when you look at it -- it's just a slick version of the sort of language course that's been around since the 90s. Anyone who has tried to make an incremental improvement on Duolingo is killed by being too small and invisible, and not being able to charge enough money to stay alive.
As I say, I reckon Duolingo is a squandered opportunity that has actually hampered innovation.
[Edit: fixed unclosed [I] tag.]
I don't think that it being free is the main problem. The high quality products with an appropriate price can definitely succeed. But there are actually few of them.
Kwiziq is great, but it is actually quite expensive and only two languages are available. The price may reflect the investments, but doesn't reflect the fact its competition is not DL, the competitor are the normal grammar workbooks with a fixed price for which you get the book and keep it forever.
Lingodeer annoyed the userbase by changing the prices like a dozen times in the first month of becoming paid (and the changes were in a range from 20 to 99 dollars for the same subscription) , with payment related bugs, and with lack of official communication about the issues.
Babbel and similar ones offer absolutely nothing better than the paper based resources, in my opinion, compared to the two examples above.
Lingvist (which I have tried and I had concerns about the content) has bad paid functions and little new content for the money. The users complain about it online and not many see a reason to pay for something not that much better than other services. If you offer too little to the paying customers compared to the free users, it is not Duolingo's fault.
DL has too good PR, true. I would say the biggest blow to the rest of the market is not the 0.00 pricetag, it is the attack on the schools. There is no better PR than forcing lots of people to use it through the schools. Becoming that program the official institutions trust has been a very important step.
But I think that thes zero price you dislike so much will be "fixed", as DL is gonna be more and more paid. The ads are already rather numerous. The "Duolingo Plus" offers no good service and the paying customers are annoyed they are being treated just like the non paying users (for example their language tree is being upgraded and their progress seemingly lost without the DL having asked them or at least announced it before). The hated "health system" in a part of the mobile apps is punishing people for making mistakes and feels too greedy, and it might be spreading to the rest.