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Further education

You'll find discussions about A Levels and universities on our Further Education forum.

Original poster

language learning apps

6 replies

elvinever · 15/03/2020 16:33

Not sure if this counts as further ed, but does anyone have any experience of learning a language (or at least starting) from apps like Duolingo, Busuu, etc? Which would you recommend?

OP posts:
Prokupatuscrakedatus · 16/03/2020 18:53

Duolingo is good for getting and revising the basic vocabulary and grammar, but it is mainly based on translation, which is not the best of ideas if you want to get practically useful knowledge (My turtle eats all the strawberries - will get the words into your head and the endings, but you can't actually use the phrase outside of the zoo.)

Babbel offers basic language, grammar and special language courses in accordance within the European frame of reference (A1, A2 B1 etc.).

Memrise is a collection of all sorts of different types of language courses, grammar and vocabulary - you have to find the right one for your needs.

Futurel learn, too, offers language courses up to A2-level.

Babbel and FL are great, Duolingo is useful in combination with other apps, Memrise is too unstructured for me, but most people like it.

Theer are other aimed at a single language only.

ShanghaiDiva · 18/03/2020 14:00

Memrise is good for learning vocabulary. Dd and I use it for Chinese.

Original poster
elvinever · 20/03/2020 11:16

Thank you both for your help and suggestions & sorry to reply so late - been a bit distracted by real world stuff this week.

OP posts:
Prokupatuscrakedatus · 20/03/2020 12:29

@elvinever
We are supposed to stay in as much as possible (like everybody else), so these courses are great to spend time on.

Stay safe.

Original poster
elvinever · 20/03/2020 12:57

Prokup yes it's a good time to learn a language. I was planning to learn a bit of German because I deal with several German suppliers at work (who all speak perfect English, but still...) But now my work is all up in the air and no idea if I'll even have a job by the end of the year, but I'm still planning to have a go at learning German - at least I have a lot more time available for the next few weeks/months.

OP posts:
Prokupatuscrakedatus · 20/03/2020 17:47

@elvinever
Try it - German is quite easy Smile. There is a "German for the workplace" course running on FL at the moment.
If you use Duolingo you will learn about turtles and strawberries or
Schildkröten und Erdbeeren

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