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How are you using Duolingo in the classroom!
Hi Educators!
We want to hear from you. How are you using Duolingo to engage your students in the language learning classroom?
Please let us know in the comments below. We are constantly improving the dashboard experience and want to hear how you're using it, so that we can continue to make an even better experience.
Share in the comments below along with the grades/levels you teach.
Thank you! :)
13 Comments
I would like to see a bit more specific what they have learnt, for example: Skills: Colors (rojo, blanco, verde,...)
It's an amazing programme! my studients are enjoying a lot. THANK YOU
I use Duolingo as a warm-up several days each week with my high school Spanish II class. Students either use their phones or laptops we have in class. I give them 5-10 minutes to work, so the sooner they get to class, the more time they have. I post the highest XP per week on a board in my room, and each quarter I give a prize to the winner (usually a homework pass - those are worth gold!). It both reviews vocabulary they have already seen and introduces them to new vocabulary and new structures that we haven't gotten to yet. I like that students can work at their own pace and refresh as needed! I don't take it as a grade - since it doesn't align exactly with my curriculum, I like it as practice.
Hi kristinemc,
Let me preface this by saying that I love that Duolingo is reaching out to educators. I've been with Duolingo for several years now and I've always thought that it would be an excellent supplement to a language classroom. Next year (beginning Sept. 2015), I'll be teaching grade 4/5 (think mostly 9 years old, turning 10 during the school year) and French will be part of my mandated curriculum. How fortuitous that Duo has reached out to my profession just in time for me to take advantage of this excellent resource.
Unfortunately...
I don't think I'll be able to use Duolingo with my students for a few, very specific reasons. I'm disappointed.
Reason #1: I'll be teaching French. As far as I can tell, there is no way for me to restrict what content my students receive while practicing translations. While Duolingo's content is entirely appropriate (and often hilarious) for adults, there's no way I could use phrases like "The waitress is entirely nude" or "I am ready to die" with young children. I'm sure there are also other phrases that are not "age appropriate" for nine year olds, but naked waitresses and imminent death come to mind immediately.
(ETA: I've done a bit more poking around and found solutions for the rest of my concerns. Only the inappropriate content problem is still an issue for me.)
Reason #2: If I am understanding correctly, my students would control their own user accounts and could join into public discussions with other duolingo users and private discussions with duolingo "friends" without any requirement for adult oversight. (Please tell me that I'm mistaken about this?) As a teacher (acting "in loco parentis) I cannot, in good conscience, subject my students to this potential risk. In order for me to use this undeniably valuable resource with my young students, I'd have to be able to limit (or at least vet) such external interactions.
Reason #3: Hmmm... Maybe there isn't a specific #3... But as an educator of underage students, I have to consider factors that might not come into play for adult users, and I'm always a bit hypersensitive when privacy or personal safety issues come into play. Sorry. Occupational hazard. Please remember that my students are as young as NINE years old (sometimes younger). Would you want your nine year old child to jump into Duo without any restrictions? No, I didn't think so. Neither would I. For my students (nine and ten years old), unless I know for sure that there is parental involvement, I'm uncomfortable with letting them loose on their own. Just something to think about...
I have a similar concern to #2 - would you mind letting me know what you found out that made you feel better about it?
When I go to the "settings" on my dashboard, it appears that I have the option of disabling discussions and activity stream for my students. I haven't actually tried it, though, as the content precludes my using this with my students anyway.
Thanks, that's very helpful! And I agree about the content being inappropriate for younger students (I teach 8th grade, and I'm still a little hesitant...)
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Well, my teacher made my class get a Duolingo account. I think that we are getting a special Duolingo report card, but I am not sure.
Hello, I'm Teaching English to young adults in a Mexican University, we started trying Duo as an independent practice for them, they seem to like it better than spending time in the Self-Access Center, however we are not sure yet how to measure their practice by week, as far as I know it has 25 levels, but is it all the way to advanced or just basic? and how many lessons and/or skills does the app have?, since they are required to complete certain amount of skills, we need to know how far does it go, or would it be better to just focus on the days they practice or the XP?
Hi, my students are 9 years old and learning English out of Dutch. We just started. Some of the students can't log in but others are yet studying. And I am studying portuguese myself. It is a very nice app.
I use it as summer homework for my incoming AP students. They get points per skill they learn, and it's their first grade of the next semester. It really helps them review everything they've learned over the summer, and it means I do less grammar review with them and more AP content during the school year!
I started 5 weeks ago with Spanish2,3 in the HS. I have six groups and use it mostly for homework during the weekend. Many students are engaged and overdo activities beyond what is assigned to them. This is good and bad. Then it depends how it reflects on my side, if I can see that they did an assignments 2 weeks ago, that's fine with me, sometimes it doesn't show up in my side and they argue that they already did the assignment, but then in the students' side it doesn't say when did they complete the assignment. They should have the ability to generate their own report. [I just found the 'view activity log' per student, and this the thing I'm talking about. Do they have the same view on their side?]
Grading is still a struggle, I would like to be able to generate a summary report that shows for each class, the activities given last Friday and broken down by 3 cat, on time - late - missing. Then I can give grades quickly. Also, would be ideal to produce a report that shows those students whom have accumulated the largest # of points, some of them have twice or 3 times more than the average, those kids can be rewarded or exalted in the hall of fame. Same with percentage of proficiency, they are always boasting about the 25% or so fluency.
The other issue is assessment. I'd like to generate quizzes that cover recent or specific topics/units, and have the students take them in class, where questions show up to them in random order. This tests would give me some reassurance that students are doing their own work and not having someone do it for them. Questions would take the form of multiple choice, fill in the blank, true/false, translate, type what you hear, matching, etc.
Thanks for all the hard work you are producing to help people learn other languages, you are true heroes.
it would be nice to be able to open up the level that is dealing with the content you are teaching without having to open that level by filling every level before. I hope this makes sense.
Hi! I'm currently teaching english to spanish students and decided to use Duolingo classroom as an extra activity, I invited my students by sending them the generated link and placed a goal. I can see that many of them had already been using Duolingo and was wondering, if I set a goal, the "Travel" lesson for example, would they have to first see the units that come before and then continue until they reach the "Travel" lesson? I'd really like them all to start from the beginner lessons, so would I have to place all the units that come before the Travel lesson?
