Yesterday I scored a 365 day streak on Duolingo. Duolingo is an app that helps you learn different languages. As you complete lessons, you score experience points (xp) to keep track of how far you are, and if you meet your daily xp goal it adds to your streak*. I'm a real fan!
I've been using it to:
refresh my German (21,328 xp)
learn Spanish (17542 xp) and Chinese (6918)
and putter around in Portuguese (2089) and French (1526).
The German lessons have mostly succeeded in reminding me of which gender various nouns are and added some words and phrases that a missionary rarely needs to use, like business terms for handling accounts.
Before trying Spanish on Duolingo I had read the Book of Mormon in Spanish twice. The app has been VERY helpful in filling in a lot of gaps and making me very confident in my ability to read Spanish. Hearing it or having conversations with native speakers? Still not so much. I can follow along a Spanish church lesson or talk as long as I already know what they're talking about and it makes a lot of sense, but if anyone starts telling a story about something that happened to them I don't already know, I get completely lost.
Joy has joined me in working on Chinese. The other day she listened to a sentence in Chinese and asked if I could translate it. I could tell it was in the lesson on nationalities, but I couldn't figure out what country they were saying. I admitted that and asked, "So what country IS he from?" And that was correct: What country is he from? *LOL* I was able to say a few phrases to a transfer student successfully. That was nice. My favorite sentence is "Teacher please help my younger brother," because with Chinese tones it sounded like a perfect background for a techno song. I'll mutter that phrase over and over, banging out a beat with my dry erase markers or what have you just having fun.
They recently added a competition, where you are paired with 49 others who are active this week. At the end of the week they total your xp for that week. The top 10 of you go up a level, the bottom 5 go down a level, and everyone else stays where you are. After a few attempts, I've made it to level 4/5, where I hope to stay for the foreseeable future.
* - So the confession is that you can buy a pass so that if you happen to miss one day, your streak doesn't go away. I've had to use a few of those. Maybe 10-20.
I've been using it to:
refresh my German (21,328 xp)
learn Spanish (17542 xp) and Chinese (6918)
 |
| Duo, himself |
The German lessons have mostly succeeded in reminding me of which gender various nouns are and added some words and phrases that a missionary rarely needs to use, like business terms for handling accounts.
Before trying Spanish on Duolingo I had read the Book of Mormon in Spanish twice. The app has been VERY helpful in filling in a lot of gaps and making me very confident in my ability to read Spanish. Hearing it or having conversations with native speakers? Still not so much. I can follow along a Spanish church lesson or talk as long as I already know what they're talking about and it makes a lot of sense, but if anyone starts telling a story about something that happened to them I don't already know, I get completely lost.
Joy has joined me in working on Chinese. The other day she listened to a sentence in Chinese and asked if I could translate it. I could tell it was in the lesson on nationalities, but I couldn't figure out what country they were saying. I admitted that and asked, "So what country IS he from?" And that was correct: What country is he from? *LOL* I was able to say a few phrases to a transfer student successfully. That was nice. My favorite sentence is "Teacher please help my younger brother," because with Chinese tones it sounded like a perfect background for a techno song. I'll mutter that phrase over and over, banging out a beat with my dry erase markers or what have you just having fun.
They recently added a competition, where you are paired with 49 others who are active this week. At the end of the week they total your xp for that week. The top 10 of you go up a level, the bottom 5 go down a level, and everyone else stays where you are. After a few attempts, I've made it to level 4/5, where I hope to stay for the foreseeable future.
* - So the confession is that you can buy a pass so that if you happen to miss one day, your streak doesn't go away. I've had to use a few of those. Maybe 10-20.
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