> Duolingo focuses on learning by translation, basically. ... It's an utterly broken approach to learning languages
No it's not. It's not even an approach, it's a method to improve a subset of skills, you need to complement it with other methods to improve your other skills in a given language.
While I agree that Duolingo can be counterproductive for language learning, but it's not because of the "translation", but that they do not communicate two things clearly:
- this alone won't make you a fluent speaker (or reach your goal, whatever it would be), you need to complement it with other methods/materials
> but that they do not communicate two things clearly:
> this alone won't make you a fluent speaker
Pretty sure that they say it, repeatedly, on their blog. I only read a handful of their blog posts and more than one mentioned it.
> at what point you should move on from Duolingo
I won't blame them for assuming common sense. If you haven't reached a level where you can e.g. read news in the language you are learning, then you probably won't try e.g. while waiting 10 minutes for a train. And there, it's better to do 10 minutes of Duolingo than 10 minutes of TikTok.
> Pretty sure that they say it, repeatedly, on their blog. I only read a handful of their blog posts and more than one mentioned it.
Most users don't read blog posts - they interact with the app. If critical information about how to use the product effectively is buried outside the main experience, that's poor communication.
Also, it's worth remembering: Duolingo is a language-learning app for people all over the world, many of whom don't speak English well enough to even understand their blog.
> I won't blame them for assuming common sense.
It's not about "common sense" either. Language learning is not intuitive for most people - especially first-timers (who their target audience are by the way). Many users assume that completing a Duolingo "course" means they are "done."
No it's not. It's not even an approach, it's a method to improve a subset of skills, you need to complement it with other methods to improve your other skills in a given language.
While I agree that Duolingo can be counterproductive for language learning, but it's not because of the "translation", but that they do not communicate two things clearly:
- this alone won't make you a fluent speaker (or reach your goal, whatever it would be), you need to complement it with other methods/materials
- at what point you should move on from Duolingo