Duolingo – My New Favorite Way to Learn Languages / Duolingoで50日連続語学学習中
About two months ago, we took a trip to Paris. That’s when my daughter decided to start learning French with an app called Duolingo. At her enthusiastic recommendation, I began using it too — and now, somehow, I’ve passed a 50-day streak 😅
I learned English when I was six years old in the US, and it came pretty naturally after that. Talking about programming languages, once I picked up one, the rest flowed more easily. But when it comes to human languages, it’s still a challenge!
After almost 10 years in Germany, my German is just good enough to get through daily life and run a business, but I still have a long way to go and I’d love to improve. And I was dreaming to learn cooking in Italy or France in my twenties — so I’ve dabbled in both those languages. Also Spanish as I heard at Hive Fest and Hive Creators Day. The enthusiasm to languages is probably in my blood — my mother who was a translator loved reading dictionaries, and my grandfather was a tanker captain who traveled the world.
I can’t say for sure whether Duolingo has dramatically improved my German, but I love that I can study anytime, anywhere. My whole family uses it too — my daughter is learning French, Japanese, music, and math, and my partner is working on Japanese — and even some of my friends I meet regular basis use it too. It feels more like playing a game than studying. Recently, I’ve started playing around with a few lessons in Italian and Spanish on top of German.
As for Spanish — I was so inspired by @ninaeatshere’s friendliness at Hive Fest last year and I thought “Next year I’m going to surprise her by speaking Spanish!” I bought a Spanish textbook, but I only opened it a few times... So now I think it's better to just have fun and learn a little every day with Duolingo, even if I don’t become fluent anytime soon.
So it looks like my Duolingo life will continue. Honestly, the most effective reminder to keep going comes from my daughter constantly asking, “Did you do your Duolingo today?”, "How much XP do you have?" “What league are you in now?” etc ... 😉
Do you have any favorite ways to study languages?
Have a nice weekend, everyone!
二ヶ月ほど前にパリに旅行に出かけた時に、子供がフランス語を勉強すると言って、「Duolingo」というアプリを使い始めました。子供に熱烈に勧められて、私も毎日のように使っていて、先日連続学習記録が50日を超えました 😅
英語は小さい頃にアメリカの学校で覚えて、そのあとするするっと入ってきて、プログラミング言語も一つ覚えたらあとはどんどん書けるようになったのですが、外国語はなかなか難しい・・・。ドイツ語はとりあえずこの10年で、日々を生き抜いて商売ができるくらいにはなりましたが、まだまだで、もっとうまくなりたいです。さらに欲を言うと、20代に料理留学するならイタリアかフランス！と思ってかじったイタリア語やフランス語、Hive FestやCreators Dayでも度々耳にしたスペイン語も覚えたいです。AI時代というのにね。きっと言葉が好きで辞書を読むほどだった母、船長であちこち旅していた祖父の影響です。
Duolingoでどこまでドイツ語が上達したかは謎ですが、いつでもどこでも気軽に学習できて、家族（子供はフランス語と日本語と音楽と数学、相方は日本語を学習中）や普段顔を合わせる友人たちも使っていて、ゲームのように楽しいんですよね。ということで、最近、ドイツ語に加えてイタリア語とスペイン語もちょこちょこ問題を解いて遊んでいます。
スペイン語は実はHive Festで @ninaeatshere のフレンドリーさに感動して、「来年のFestではスペイン語で驚かせるぞ！」と気合を入れてNHKのテキストの電子版を買ったのですが、数回開いたのみでした。それなら上達するかは謎でも毎日楽しくDuolingoで何かしら覚える方がよさそうです。
ということで、私のDuolingoライフはまだまだ続きそうです。日々うるさいくらいに子供が「かあさんDuolingoやった？」「今何リーグ？」などと聞いてくるリマインダが一番効いている気がします。
みなさんはおすすめの語学学習方法はありますか？
Woooow that's so cool hahaha I didn't know you bought a book to learn Spanish, in fact you have already surprised me just by knowing that you are excited about it. It's great that you don't think it's weird to hear us talking in our language in the meet-us, I'd love to meet again and share some words in Spanish to practice hahaha.
Tasty food Spanish please 😁
Greetings from Spain @akipponn
on behalf of the @hive-spain team! 👋
Duolingo is an extremely fun learning tool, you're right, it's so much easier when you learn by playing than by cracking your head over books, so great that your daughter encourages you to move forward! kids, teach us a lot of things that we don't expect.
Much success with your streak and your learning, we were delighted to read that you have ventured to learn a little about this rich and vast language.
Enjoy the learning process very much! ;)
And if you feel like keep writing about your visits or content related to spain. just adding a Spanish translation, and you could cross post it on Hive España 🇪🇸 community 😉
Reach out to us on Discord
Sending you a big hug! 🤗
I started using Duolingo for French before a trip to Canada and I am now on a 740 day streak! I am picking it up, but I do not get to use it much. I think you need to talk to people to really get into a language.
I learnt French and German at school, but did not really get into them then. When I lived in Germany for 2 years I had to learn the language. I started with some Berlitz tapes that my dad had and took an evening class there.
Other members of the family are using Duolingo, so we may start paying for it. My daughter is living in Germany now. She is taking lessons to improve.
@themarkymark, haven’t you figured it out yet? Downvoting doesn’t change the truth. Here’s what needs to happen:
The evidence is clear, and the community deserves better. It’s time to take responsibility and make these changes—now.
More than two years! Respect 👏 I agree I must practice with real people. But I wonder why Germans speak English well?? My partner's generation did not have many foreigners around when they are young 🤔
I’m also think about subscribing the Duolingo family plan 😁
I think it helps to be exposed to the language. Germans and other nationalities will hear a lot of music in English and a lot of advertising uses it too. In the UK you don't get that exposure to other languages.