The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

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IronMike
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby IronMike » Tue Dec 03, 2019 8:25 pm

IronMike wrote:I'm not offering to run it; I'm probably moving in January. But I'd like to provide feedback.

I love the 365 Day Language Challenge. I think the one and only thing that could be changed is the penalty for missing one day. I believe 7 days penalty (8 days total) for missing one day is too much. I know a bunch of folks dropped out of the challenge early for missing a few days because their score dropped so much. I've missed a bunch of days. (Just look at my current score.) But that hasn't stopped me from still trying to do 30 min minimum per day.

I think a penalty of 3 days for a total of minus 4 days for one day missed is probably a better number. For instance, I missed 4 days last month due to work/family stuff. That 4 days translated to 32 days or -1 day for the entire month of October. Yet I studied a minimum of 30 minutes/day for 27 days. Studying at least (30 x 27 =) 810 hours shouldn't be the same as not studying for 32 days.

Other than the penalty, I've found no problem with this Challenge, and I will continue to participate in 2020. Good job, @PeterMollenburg!

Again, can't offer to run 365 for 2020 due to an impending move (but I'm available to co-run it, anyone?), but just had a thought for scoring.

As I stated above, I think many dropped out due to missing a few days and their scores suffering so significantly. Below are a couple options:

A) Miss one day, lose one point plus one penalty point. Example: IronMike misses 4 days in November due to the holiday. November hath 30 days. 4 days = -4 points, plus -4 points penalty. 30 minus 8 equals 22 points. IronMike's 26 days of studying a minimum of 780 hours (26 x 30) garners him 22 points, instead of -2 (30-32) old style. (Theory: Any day missed is as bad as another day missed.)

b) Miss one day, lose one point plus one penalty point. Lose another (consecutive) day, lose (another) one point plus two penalty points. Three consecutive days, lose one plus three. Example: IronMike misses 4 consecutive days in November due to the holiday. November hath 30 days. 4 days = -4 points, plus -1 (for day 1), plus -2 (for day 2), plus -3 (for day 3), and plus -4 (for day 4), which is -4 and -10, so 30-14= 16. IronMike's 26 days of studying a minimum of 780 hours (26 x 30) garners him 16 points, instead of -2 (30-32) old style. (Theory: Consecutive days missed are worse for your studying than non-consecutive misses.)

Again, I raise these options primarily because in no way should studying 780 hours be considered the same as not studying for 32 days (see my quote above). I think we'd have more participants with one of the above options.
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby Sedge » Thu Dec 05, 2019 1:10 am

I've been busy with unexpected family stuff since Thanksgiving; I was planning on giving this another look and offering to co-run the challenge for next year; I'm still a n00b here so would appreciate some back-up.

Of the options you suggested, IronMike, I like option A better mostly because it's a lot simpler math.
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby Adrianslont » Thu Dec 05, 2019 5:16 am

I’m not sure that I’ll even be doing the challenge next year - I feel like doing a different kind of challenge just for the experience, maybe an output or transcription challenge.

So feel free to ignore my comment.

I think you should lose 1 point for everyday missed. That’s it. Not 1 + 1, not 7. You just don’t get a point that day.

Setting other values for a missed day just seems like the worst, most pointless (no pun intended) kind of gamification to me. If there were other scoring mechanisms eg a way to maybe make up points such as lose 7 but get 4 if you do an extra half hour the next day then it would make sense to me. That would motivate people more I think. But anyway, I’m not actually advocating for that - I’m advocating for 1 day = 1 point.

Cheers.
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby Elsa Maria » Thu Dec 05, 2019 3:14 pm

I recently had the chance to use my 365 Day challenge language on a 10 day trip to Denmark, and I was overall really pleased with my Danish. I'm going to give the credit to the 365 Day challenge. I think it really made the difference. I feel like my Danish is a lot better than it was this time last year.

I had days that I wanted to skip. I had days that I wished I had never signed up for this challenge. But I figured out, day after day, how to at least squeeze in 30 minutes for Danish. Some days were great study days, and other days I merely stayed present enough to check the daily box as done. But it all added up to progress in the end.


Thank you for this challenge, PM!
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby lingua » Thu Dec 05, 2019 4:02 pm

I have to agree with Elsa Maria. I felt like it kept me focused on Italian. As a mega procrastinator it's easy to put off until tomorrow indefinitely. Some days my 30 minutes was only reading but on most days I did 2-4 different activities. The habit has been created so I probably don't need to do it again. Next year I'm going to focus on output (reading & recording).

Thanks to PM for coming up with this brilliant challenge.
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby PeterMollenburg » Sat Dec 07, 2019 10:56 am

I appreciate the positive feedback that several people have provided through the course of this challenge. Thank you. Of course, the challenge/myself is open to constructive criticism, of which there has been some at times that's also been useful, so thank you also.

For me personally... I've had a few days that turned into near-on torture when I kept nodding off completely exhausted and would wake again and try yet again to finish say 30 minutes of a TV program or reading. This would repeat and while my body was telling me perhaps at 10pm that I absolutely needed to sleep after a day of exhaustive whatever. Consequently, I'd not end up finishing my 30 minutes for another couple of hours or so due to the constant falling asleep-waking-trying to do 30 minutes again (or finish it) pattern. I don't think such nights are all round great for general well being. However, they are good for keeping up the study habit.

I don't think I've necessarily needed this challenge myself to keep up my French learning. I think I figured it would be good for me when I was to attempt to learn several languages every day, which changed due to a planned move to Saudi Arabia not going ahead. Still, it has been a particularly tricky year in which we left our house, lived at several addresses in various towns and the countryside before settling in my parents home town (what an odd experience going back to the town I spent close to two decades in and returning after 13 years away) and then leaving and moving back into our own house a couple of weeks ago. Not to mention much turmoil going on.... Perhaps when I look at all that, this challenge has probably been good for me to keep me studying with all else going on. If I can manage to keep studying through all that, then I'd like to think that little will stop me in future. Look out peoples, PM has his eye on CEO of the world!

Many days I barely got 30 minutes studying/learning done. That's unusual for me, but this year was unusual as already mentioned. Perhaps it made me get crafty at times, knowing I needed to do 30 minutes of French at some point during the day meant I'd look for opportunities that would work for me around some crazy days and nights.

As much as this might sound.. I dunno, like I'm trying to make myself sound good... I am really glad to see that this challenge has helped others with their consistent studying and therefore progress in their chosen language(s). I also want to acknowledge that this challenge doesn't work for everyone. Still, I hope it's helped a few who otherwise would not (yet) have forged that language habit yet.
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby rdearman » Wed Dec 18, 2019 8:57 pm

OK Participants! I have a question. I signed up for this and then bailed out on day one, but for those of you who stuck with it let me ask a question.

Do you feel this helped you progress? I'm especially interested if you're an intermediate/advanced learner in your comments. Should I bother to sign up?
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby Lianne » Wed Dec 18, 2019 10:40 pm

rdearman wrote:OK Participants! I have a question. I signed up for this and then bailed out on day one, but for those of you who stuck with it let me ask a question.

Do you feel this helped you progress? I'm especially interested if you're an intermediate/advanced learner in your comments. Should I bother to sign up?

I think whether this challenge helps you or not depends on whether or not you currently struggle with consistency. For me, this challenge made a HUGE difference. I have historically been extremely terrible at sticking with things consistently. I jump from interest to interest and have trouble sticking with one long enough to make noticeable progress. Studying for the last 352 days (and counting), never missing a day, has been huge because even if there are days when I'm not super productive, the fact that I've made it a habit means that I won't accidentally go weeks without studying, which turn into months...

At the start of 2019 I thought of myself as an eternal beginner. I wasn't progressing. Now I think of myself as an intermediate learner.
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IronMike
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby IronMike » Thu Dec 19, 2019 1:19 am

It most definitely helped me. 100%. I will do it again in 2020.
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Re: The 2019 365 Day Language Challenge - Sign Up and Discussion

Postby Adrianslont » Thu Dec 19, 2019 3:24 am

rdearman wrote:OK Participants! I have a question. I signed up for this and then bailed out on day one, but for those of you who stuck with it let me ask a question.

Do you feel this helped you progress? I'm especially interested if you're an intermediate/advanced learner in your comments. Should I bother to sign up?

I think the main benefit for me was that it helped me be consistent with TWO languages.

I have been learning French and Indonesian for x years and tend to work hard on one and less hard on the other, depending on travel plans and other stuff. So, in the past, I have gone months where I might do an hour or two on one language but just 10 minutes of anki reviews on the other. Loss of momentum was palpable on the “other”. Making sure I did at least half an hour has meant that there has been actual progress in both languages over the year.

For the last ten months I have been spending much more time with French each day but feel that my Indonesian has strengthened, too.

If I were just studying one language this challenge wouldn’t really be helpful to me because I already find it easy enough to do half an hour of study or extensive activity per day.
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