Not that I have to, but that I want to
Last week, I watched a Netflix documentary named ‘Perú: tesoro escondido’ or ‘Peru: Hidden Treasure’. The film runs for 1 hour 16 minutes which is a tad long to watch in one sitting for most people. After a lengthy but beautifully filmed and narrated prologue, the first theme is surfing along the coastline. I as …
Duolingo is my top Spanish learning app (see earlier post). There are other good apps such as Babbel, Busuu, Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone. Personal anecdotes aside, is there any scientific evidence supporting the effectiveness of such online language learning apps? A recent Michigan State University study reports that all participants who ‘completed the requirements improved in …
In the Youtube video, Marianna Pascal compares 2 attitudes in learning a language: mastering an art or getting the desired results. Although Marianna was specifically addressing the issue of learning English for a Malaysian audience, I believe it applies equally well for a Spanish learning one. The experience of learning a new language to many …
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Lima, Peru is at the top of my list of places to visit. Of course, all travel plans are suspended for now because of COVID-19. While the situation in Canada is stabilizing, the situation in Peru is anything but. Please read the NY Times article entitled ‘Virus Exposes Weak Links in Peru’s Success Story’ for …
It is fitting that this blog’s first post is about Duolingo, the app that ‘has organically become the most popular way to learn languages online’, and on which ‘more Americans are learning a language than in the US public school system’. On a personal level, it was my first Spanish learning tool, one that I …
Continue reading “Duolingo: the constantly improving language learning app”