How to Duolingo

Get the most out of that threateningly needy green owl.

When I was 27, I took a secondary school level (British GCSE) exam in German. I had only studied a few lessons of beginner’s German alongside my students at the school that I worked for over a couple of weeks but as I was also coming to the end of my contract at that school, after I left, I decided to continue my learning with Duolingo. For 5 years, Duolingo was my only teacher and when I finally took the exam, I passed with an 8 (highest grade is 9) which is the equivilent of an A.

Stories like this are not unusual and they are indeed inspiring, however, background is important. I have a bachelor’s degree in Spanish and Portuguese, and I was a language teacher. I mention this because my craft is already in languages and as I stated in a previous blog post, I already had the skills to know how to learn a language. So is Duolingo alone enough? For me, it was but if you are finding that it isn’t enough for you, let’s look at how you can best utilise our little green friend in your language learning journey.

There have been numerous occasions when I take on new students and ask about their prior experience with their target language and they’ve responded with “I’ve done a bit of Duolingo”. For language teachers, it’s important that we acknowledge that this is a part of our students’ learning journey so rather than go against it, encourage it. Of course, it has to be stated that Duolingo is not for everyone and that is, of course, okay. After all, what works for one person might not work for someone else. However, it might be worth looking at how you Duolingo (yes, I’m using it as a verb now) and compare it to the tips that I have to see if you might consider going back to it from a new angle. So, let’s answer the question; how do you Duolingo?

Vocabulary

Not all Duolingo courses are created equally. Some language courses have more content and grammar explaination than others, however, the one thing that all courses have in common is a range of vocabulary. Duolingo is an excellent tool for not only introducing vocabulary but also embedding it. I have heard previous complaints in the past that “it’s all the same sentences” which can be a fair criticism but repetition is still one of the most effective techniques for language learning.

Don’t take it at face value

Another common criticism that I’ve heard is that the sentences given are not practical. I have seen countless memes describing moments of arriving in a country and only being able to say “I am an apple” because it’s what you learnt on Duolingo. However, give the platform some more credit. The content was originally created by experts in the field of language learning. These sentences may be silly but that’s how they grab your attention. You also learn one of the most important skills in language mastry - manipulation. Yes, knowing how to say “I am an apple” or “he has a donkey” are somewhat useless sentences on their own but what you have learnt are two incredibly useful verbs - “I am” and “he has”. You can take these verbs and start applying them to sentences where it does make sense but you are doing that yourself, not simply repeating from a recording.

Pay attention

Part of the brilliance of Duolingo is that it’s interactive. Not only does it grab your attention with ridiculous sentences but it also requires you to engage with the content. This is fudamental - you need to actively engage with the content. A lack of progress in anything can come because you’re not investing the time nor attention in it but rather passively going through it. Passive learning isn’t ineffective, it’s just slow. So the next time that you do your lesson to maintain your streak, really put 5 minutes aside to be fully immersed in the lesson. It will all build up.

Consistency

Aristotle once said: "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” In other words, by staying consistent, we become good at something. It can be really tempting to say that we don’t have enough time but we do all have what I call “dead time”. This is the time that you spend waiting for a train, or in line at the supermarket, or even on the toilet. We live in a world where we are never bored because we have our phones with us and it provides a constant stream of entertainment. Those 5 minutes of learning that I mentioned would be a much better use of your time than social media and there is quite a satisfying feeling of having someone stand behind you seeing that you are using that time to “better yourself” by learning a new language. It’s even more satisfying when you finish the lesson and then get to show off your 1000+ day Duolingo streak. On one of the loading screens of Duolingo it would say: “15 minutes of Duolingo a day can make you learn a new language. What can 15 minutes of social media do?”. They have a point…

Manage your expectations

As with beginning to learn any new skill, it’s important to figure out what your goals are for it. For a lot of people, they say that they want to learn enough of a language so that they can use it on holiday but this still remains quite vague. After all, this can range from a simple “I want”; “please and thank you” to arguing with hotel staff about an undefined stain on the chair of a room with fewer beds that what you had originally reserved. The latter requires far more mastry and goes beyond the scope of “holiday-language”.

Unlimited lives can be limiting

One argument against Duolingo is the cost and that’s a very fair argument. However, there is a free version of Duolingo which I personally think is better. When you have unlimited hearts, you are less worried about getting things wrong and thus pay slightly less attention. When you don’t have unlimited hearts it can be frustrating when you run out of them and have to either pay your gems (collected from previous lessons) or wait for the hearts to reload but it does add slightly more pressure. Some of the features on Super Duolingo are pretty good but even without them, you can still gain something useful from the app. From my own personal experience, I never had Super Duolingo for my GCSE.

Combine Duolingo with your lessons

As I previously mentioned, not all Duolingo courses are created equally. When I was learning Dutch on Duolingo, I didn’t understand why it was “het grote huis” but “een groot huis”. Why does the “e” suddenly appear on the end of random adjectives sometimes? Unfortunately for me, there was no grammar explaination for this but what I could do was bring this question to my Dutch teacher and have it explained to me. A previous student of mine asked for an entire lesson on commands in Spanish because she was struggling with it on Duolingo. This is where we can work in collaboration with Duolingo rather than against it.

Use the community

Last but absolutely not least, get accountability buddies. Duolingo has done an excellent job of creating a community space where we can cheer each other along, work together in friend quests, and let out our competitive sides in rankings. My husband and I even used to make a competition out of the monthly badges; whomever got the badge first could claim a favour at any point until the next month. By using this, you’re more likely to stay consistent and make progress.

So, there you have it. A few tips on how to Duolingo. Look out too for the little Easter eggs that they hide in their lessons. I once had the sentence “there is a horse in the hallway” come up in one of my Dutch lessons and my husband smiled and began to sing. Apparently, it’s a carnival song so maybe those silly senteces might actually make sense after all.