Literature review
Learning a new language is tedious and demands a lot of practice. Luis von Ahn doesn’t want all that effort to be wasted.
In fact, it might be a gold mine. Von Ahn, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University, is the co-creator
of Duolingo, a free language-learning site that turns students into an online workforce. His software uses their answers
to simple exercises in a translation service that he expects to charge money for.
From
Conversation, Conversation, Conversation. If there’s a “secret” or “hack” to learning a new language, it’s this: hours and
hours of awkward and strenuous conversation with people better than you in that language. An hour of conversation
(with corrections and a dictionary for reference) is as good as five hours in a classroom and 10 hours with a language
course by yourself.
From
The fact is that we not taught languages in the ideal way. Students study languages in huge groups and think that a few
worksheets and grammar exercises will be enough to learn a language.
Yet almost no one actually learns to speak.
In actuality, by doing worksheets, we are practicing for just that—for worksheets. But if you want to learn to speak, well,
you actually have to practice by speaking.
From
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