The Five Best Learning Language Tools

[True2marie]

What are the five best learning language tools? According to Life Hacker, they are Anki, Memrise, Duolingo, Pimsleur Method, and Livemocha.  Visit link: http://lifehacker.com/five-best-language-learning-tools-1448103513.

The one rated the highest is Duolingo which involves memorizing words and phrases. Would you use this method?

[Meera]

I agree with the list mostly, except for livemocha and pimsuleur. Livemocha used to be very good until they changed everything. Pimsuleur I don't like at all. I think it is one of the most overated systems, it is too slow and when completing the course you will only know basic touristy phrases.

[Trellum]

I personally love Pimsleur   For a beginner I think the Pimsleur approach is better than nothing, but isn't for everyone tho. It can work for some people, but for others might not.  The usual method used to teach a language doesn't work for me, so I have to find ways that catch my attention, at least for a few minutes   Pimsleur is one of them. 

I think it does a good job at teaching you the basics and some culture bits   I love it!  I'm so happy with my Dutch audio course... now, if I only had the time to study it, lol! 

[Meera]

That's great it works for you, Trellum. I can't stand pimsleur, it's just way too slow. But it is useful because you can take it on the go with you and it's great for prounciation.

[linguaholic]

That's an interesting question. It's pretty hard to answer though, as different languages need different resources. For instance, Duolingo is pretty much useless for my Chinese studies, as they don't offer Chinese lessons (yet) :=) Therefore I would like to answer this "on a broader scale", not naming specific resources.

The most important tools for me are:

1. Texts (all kind of different texts in the native language)

2. Dictionaries (Thesaurus, target language - native language, etymological dictionaries)

3. Spaced repetition tool (something like the program Mnemosyne)

That are the most important tools for me (as the question was asking about tools, I am assuming you are solely talking about "material" and "online" tools.

[mareebaybay]

I have never heard of some of the tools given, but I would love to try some of them some time. One of these days I will come around to dong so.

[sidney]

Same here, I have never used any of the tools that were mentioned because I'm just a casual language learner. Maybe when I become more serious in my studies then I would probably try out one of those tools. But for now, it's just the dictionary and Google Translate for me.

[littlebelgianwriter]

I currently use Duolingo to study basic Spanish.

Mostly I use the app for Ipad, and I like the way Duolingo works for me.

I must say that I previously have tried to learn Spanish in a class and I liked that too, but there were not enough pupils/ students to continue.

That was a long time ago, by the way.

I stumbled upon Duolingo because one of my friends was trying to learn French using the app.

I like it because you are sort of emersed in the language and you pick up words, grammar and pronunciation as you go along.

It does not really feel like studying at all.

That is why I like it.

[1inamillion]

What are the five best learning language tools? According to Life Hacker, they are Anki, Memrise, Duolingo, Pimsleur Method, and Livemocha.  Visit link: http://lifehacker.com/five-best-language-learning-tools-1448103513.

The one rated the highest is Duolingo which involves memorizing words and phrases. Would you use this method?

Yes I would use the Duolingo. It is good to use especially in memorizing words and phrases. It has six languages and it is not expensive, the method it uses to teach is fun. Anki carries  cross platform flash cards, pimsleur method, Livemocha, Memrises all these learning language tools carries gamefield flashcard and memorization tools with a variety of languages.