My 2 cents would be more on the lines of what I miss/want from a learning experience:

I’m trying to learn French, and Duolingo seems to be the best option given my budget and time/commitment constraints.

Unfortunately, I need to learn French for a more text-based approach – being able to read fluently, rather than for conversations. I believe Duolingo focuses more on the latter.

I also struggle significantly with time management, notification anxiety, and I’m quite demand-avoidant. Therefore, what I would seek in a Duolingo alternative is something that is more stress-free, yet thought-provoking enough to keep me interested.

@eazt yeah, for me in general reading practice is significantly more beneficial than listening or speaking practice, at least until I have to use it. I’ve found with duo lingo that I just end up memorizing the shape of the sentences rather than directly translating, and pass most of my lessons that way, which is not actually helpful. 

If my course had things like read this short story and summarize I think it would be more helpful in actually having to learn the  language, plus all the accidental learning you do, intuitively, by seeing the way sentences are structured. 

I’m with you on the demand avoidance and notification anxiety. 

According to Stephen Krashens input hypothesis, languages are primarily adquired through exposure of messages that are comprehensible. And reading is especially conducive to learning because of the way the language is presented. I think having some lessons where you get a short text, and there is audio attached to it, would be really useful to build up this exposure. It doesn’t allow you to practice writing or speaking but that kind of practice should come from another kind of lesson. However, reading and listening to content should definetly come before writing and speaking, since in that way you are reinforcing what you learnt by reading removed link This is also why the duolingo courses that don’t offer reading practice are a worse experience to you, the kind of messages you are adquiring input from are much less meaningful. I also don’t believe exercises attached to reading lessons should be mandatory, there is an app for chinese (Dot chinese) which is based on reading but it forces you to drill the vocab at the end of the reading exercise, and it is tedious because you need to do the drills to progress and there is no way of marking that you already know a word so the app drills you on words you already adquired, so i’m of the opinion that drills related to reading practice should be optional.

PS: I’m using an alt account because I’m unable to restore my normal account (that I forgot I had, the links I get sent to mail don’t work), does anyone know who to contact?

@seele What’s your discord username?

I agree about the reading, especially since one of my linguistic motivations is reading-based, but I feel like it could become passive learning if there aren’t comprehension questions at the end. That’s how my French teacher made sure that we got learning out of the books and articles we read in class, and it helped me better understand the article because I was trying to get information out of it rather than reading for reading’s sake.

Engagement is key to learning.

Learning a language in a classroom with a physical book is vastly different from learning at home with an app, in my opinion. Nowadays, I primarily use Duolingo for vocabulary practice. Yes, I’m remembering how to correctly use the accusative and dative endings more often; which I’ve had struggles with, but I much prefer learning in person. That way, you could practice with others who are also learning that language, which is great. Sometimes you still make mistakes, and that’s okay. By making mistakes, we learn how to avoid them the next time around.

like Dysfuncnoodle said, there’s a limit to what an app, however interactive & gamified, can provide as a learning tool.

That said, the possibility of being part of a learner’s community through the app is cool. The sentence forums, basic and specific as they were, were frequently the most interesting part of a lesson for me, back when. So i hope the Lingonaut project encourages user interactions.

As for me i admit to being linguistically privileged, since i don’t need to learn a language for, say, work or residency. I’m probably in a minority of users who use duolingo for the sheer gratuitous nerdy pleasure of exposure to other languages.

This has so far not been my primary mode of gaining fluency in a language, nor did i ever expect it to be. I find the gamified approach satisfactory enough, i think it works for me, i like the emphasis on short, daily practice, i appreciate the ease of use and the cutesy design. I’m frustrated with the increasing lack of flexibility: it used to be possible to jump around, and i hear now you can’t even practice for hearts?? (i was gifted a premium subscription, which btw didn’t add anything useful for me, at least for the languages i study. except infinite hearts, but that used to already be the case, for all intents and purposes. grumble.)

There are things i like about duolingo which are often decried: i enjoy the whacky sentences. i much prefer having to translate “I work for my cat’s company” or “Ivan smokes too much” than the braindead tourist dialogues of your typical language method.

i also like that it doesn’t always tell you the rules, instead leaving you to figure them out or look them up elsewhere. I think the suggestion that your app is not a one-stop-shop and you still need to be actively involved in your language progress is a good one.

i also like the silly little characters, especially in languages where they each have their unique voice. That’s definitely not an important aspect, but i do find it delightful.