As an anecdote, my daughter learned German when she was 6 from Duolingo reinforced with YouTube, all by herself. And English before that. Check my thread history for more specifics. For that, we're greatful that we have Duolingo.
Maybe it's an age thing, that it doesn't work on older people. But for her, I can vouch for Duolingo without thinking.
Lately, she is trying to learn Chinese in the same way. It's not going well but I think she's nowhere near the necessary effort level, based on the experience with previous ones.
> Lately, she is trying to learn Chinese in the same way. It's not going well but I think she's nowhere near the necessary effort level, based on the experience with previous ones.
Duolingo's Chinese module is notoriously bad. I haven't looked at the German but it could come down to huge variance between languages.
Give a child a cartoon in a language they don't understand and they'll do their best to figure out what's going on. Try that as an adult and you'll think it's a giant waste of time. A child can do that for the entirety of the day, an adult will feel completely exhausted after an hour, couple of hours tops.
I am confident that was the key difference amongst my pre-Internet generation. I had access to Cartoon Network, therefore I feel very comfortable with English. Some of my peers had access to German TV channels, therefore they speak German. Lucky ones had access to both.
Usually adults have some kind of extrinsic motivation for learning a language: to use it while travelling, to become proficient so they can live in a certain country, to talk to their boyfriend/girlfriend, to use it at work, in other words to communicate with other people in some set of situations. Duolingo may or may not help towards their goal of communicating with others in the situations they desire.
If you just want to study a language for the hell of it, without a goal in mind, then Duolingo is fine. Adults tend to fail at learning languages with only intrinsic motivation because itβs a huge time sink.
Maybe it's an age thing, that it doesn't work on older people. But for her, I can vouch for Duolingo without thinking.
Lately, she is trying to learn Chinese in the same way. It's not going well but I think she's nowhere near the necessary effort level, based on the experience with previous ones.