I’ve recently begun to get back into Duolingo, keeping a 50-something day streak alive, following all my friends for the first time and surging into the Amethyst League.
However, considering the fact that I’m currently learning English in English, there’s definitely some things this app can improve on: from manipulative notifications to boring features and straight-up ineffective coursework, Duolingo has a lot to work on before it can claim to be the brilliant language-learning app it says it is.
According to Business Insider, “The nagging goes beyond email subject lines and push notifications; inactive users might look down at their phones to find that the Duolingo app icon suddenly depicts a sadder and older version of the owl’s face — or one that’s melting into a carnivalesque nightmare.”
At first glance, you might be taken aback by this intense and harsh description: but it’s also no lie that Duolingo’s pushy notifications can range from a little bit guilt-provoking at best to emotional blackmail at worst, as recently stirred up by one user’s post on Reddit titled “Duolingo Attempts to Emotionally Blackmail Me.”
Sure, there are a lot of great things, like the feed where you can check out what your friends have been achieving, the fun stories and video calls, and the satisfying orange icon indicating your streak is burning and healthy: but that’s about where it ends.
On the surface, even the “fun things” are jarringly boring: the customizations for your avatar are insanely limited, you can’t buy unlimited streak freezes, and the got rid of the fun outfits for Duo they had in the early days which I worked so hard to buy. Not to mention that one dude in the league who ruins all the fun by constantly hogging first place by being a few thousand XP points ahead of everyone else. Like, how is that even possible?
Going deeper, the courses are also very repetitive, and the curriculum and framework is not conducive to learning different languages. Medium contributor Celine Guerreiro has even made a list of 8 different reasons why Duolingo doesn’t help achieve fluency, among them being the ineffectiveness of translation exercises, memorizing vocabulary out of context, and getting no support whatsoever on speaking and pronunciation. Mille Larsen in her blog AutoLingual has also gone in-depth with even more cons to Duolingo, as the lack of context with grammar and minimum preparation it gives you for real-life conversations also make the top of her list. Duolingo uses a similar pathway for just about every language they teach as well: which is at best ineffective, and at worst fundamentally wrong.
The best way to learn a language is the way native speakers are taught it, and all languages are different. Therefore, the best way to learn German will be different from the best way to learn Korean, and so on. From personal experience, I’ve totally maxed out my course in Chinese, which is one of my first languages, and found the maximum limit of the course to not be sufficient for fluency at all, rather only being just enough to give you a few sentences you can use to impress your friends and ask for directions to the sock store- incredibly beneficial.
I feel that with more dedication and research, as well as deep, thorough consultation of native speakers, Duolingo can tailor their courses to be individualized for each language and actually make you feel like you successfully learned another tongue. For example, even using more of a few certain exercises in one language versus in others can make a huge difference in the effectiveness of the course.
Overall, I feel Duolingo was good in concept but bad in execution. The dark, violent memes of the app’s trademark green owl are not helping the case either, as well as the app’s lousy organization and disappointing features. I’m not sorry, Duo: you can’t hurt me.
