Did you know you can learn hard languages with Ling and make the journey much less challenging? One of the key objectives of the Ling app is simply to make learning easier. With that in mind, the app and its lessons are designed in a way that simplifies complex topics, makes reviewing easy, teaches vocabulary with examples, and much more.
In this post, we’re going to take a look at what’s behind Ling’s approach to languages. We’ll go over the motivation for creating the app, the evolution of its design, the importance of user feedback, and how its features can help you learn complex languages.
In sum, we’re going to learn how Ling built a simpler way to learn hard languages.
How Ling Built A Simpler Way To Learn Hard Languages
The Ling app’s goal has always been to make language learning easy. Its short, gamified lessons, day-to-day vocabulary, native speaker audio, review features, and more all have to do with giving learners an easy way to learn hard languages.
But where does that all come from?
To find that out, we’re going backstage and getting some input from Minh, Ling’s Product Owner. I sent her several questions before sitting down to write this, and she had the patience to reply to all of them. My goal is for you to discover how the Ling app came to be, what drives its continuous improvement, and how it strikes a balance between simplicity and teaching complex languages.
The Origins Of The Ling App
Some users may already know that the Ling app came from a love story. Our founders are Simon and Khwan, and it all started when they met and fell in love. You see, Simon sought a way to learn the Thai language to communicate with Khwan’s family, as she’s from Thailand, but couldn’t find good learning materials for a not-so-popular language.
The solution? Make the material themselves. They started creating a language learning app, focusing on Thai at the beginning but growing exponentially from there.
How The Ling App Evolved Into What It Is Today
The Ling app wasn’t the first language app they worked on; it’s actually the product of all the learning and improvement that came along the road.
Earlier versions of the app had simple gamified short lessons, quick reviews, clear user flows, and instant feedback. The idea was always to make the user feel successful from the very start, something that’s still essential on the Ling app.
Furthermore, the core elements of earlier versions of the app were: getting users to start learning right away, access to practical words and phrases curated by native speakers, gamified lessons, and progress tracking. All of these features are still present on the Ling app today!
The Philosophy Behind Ling’s Way To Teach Hard Languages
One of Ling’s most important goals is to make hard languages approachable and enjoyable. There are two pillars on which this stands: First, giving users access to real-life language from day one, through short, structured lessons, practical conversations, and real native-speaker audio. Second, using a game-like progression system and smart scaffolding that builds confidence step by step.
As such, in Minh’s words, “Our goal is to bridge linguistic and cultural gaps by serving the underrepresented languages and letting everyone learn to practically use the language, not just memorize words.”
The Importance Of User Feedback
User feedback has always been central to the Ling app’s evolution and improvement. New features are created and prioritized according to learners’ needs. Minh explained how the team constantly reviews user reports, direct messages, reviews, and in-app analytics every quarter and every month to plan for the future. And after launching new features, they are evaluated based on user reception and feedback.
In her words, “multiple feedback channels (customer support tickets, app reviews, direct social media channel messages) allow continuous refinement in real time.”
And this is essential for allowing users to learn hard languages with Ling. After all, even when the Ling team has many experts, we need to know what challenges users actually face to be able to help them overcome them.
Inside Scoop: New Features The Team Is Working On
As mentioned, the Ling app is constantly improving. Some of the latest additions include: a personal vocabulary bank that lets you save words to review later, the launch of four new languages, the Streak Saver feature that lets you skip a day and keep your streak, and offline learning.
As for what comes next, we’ve got an inside scoop from Minh on what the team is currently working on: The addition of even more languages, focusing on endangered and underrepresented ones, the improvement of progress tracking, integrating more speech recognition for speaking practice, and smart reviewing. There’s also ongoing development of gamification and personalization features.
So keep an eye out for what’s coming soon. You can follow us on social media to keep up with all the new features and language releases, or you can join Ling’s Discord community!
The Challenges Language Learners Face: How You Can Learn Hard Languages With Ling
You now know where the Ling approach to language learning came from. How everything started and how the app became what it is.
Now, let’s get practical and find out how the Ling app actually makes learning hard languages easier. We’ll go over some of the main challenges language learners encounter and how the Ling app can help you overcome them with its many features:
Pronunciation
One of the most common issues language learners face right from the start is pronouncing words and phrases correctly. Even more so when they’re learning a language that’s vastly different from their own. This is made even harder when they have no access to real, native speaker audio.
The Ling app teaches users correct pronunciation right from the start. Ling uses real audio by native speakers, so you can be sure you’re listening to the proper pronunciation of words and phrases. Then you’re made to repeat them out loud and get instant feedback from speech recognition; you’ll know right away if you made a mistake.
Persistence
One of the most essential practices for learning a language is persevering and sticking to your learning goals, even when things get hard. But it can be a challenge sometimes, especially when motivation runs low.
To keep learners motivated, the Ling app uses Banana Points, achievements, leaderboards, statistics, and streaks. But making sure they keep learning day after day is not that easy. That’s why the Ling app relies on simple lessons, a gamified approach, and a step-by-step method of learning. By making the learning process easy and less stressful, Ling ensures users keep coming back for more.
Avoiding Boredom
Let’s just say it. Memorizing huge lists of verbs and conjugations is quite boring. There’s no escaping memorization when learning a language, you’ll have to learn thousands of words, but there are always ways to make things more interesting.
The Ling app excels here. Its lessons are far from boring, with a gentle gamification approach that keeps learners focused and interested throughout its lessons. All exercises take the form of mini-games, such as matching cards, choosing the correct answer, unscrambling words to create sentences, and more.
Speaking Practice
To truly reach fluency in a language, speaking practice is essential, as you’re not only working on your pronunciation and communication skills, you’re learning to think in your target language. Unfortunately, speaking practice can be hard to come by sometimes, especially if you’re learning with an app.
Ling’s native speaker audio is essential here, too. After all, what good is speaking practice if you don’t know how to say the words? Moreover, the Ling app’s Dialog feature lets you practice your conversational skills in a safe environment, having pre-structured conversations with a friendly chatbot. That way, you can prepare for the real world without worrying about making mistakes.
Feedback
Another essential thing to truly master a language is to know if you’re actually doing things right. If you’re pronouncing words correctly, conjugating verbs properly, and building sentences the right way. But like with speaking practice, learners don’t always have access to good-quality feedback when they need it.
For that, the Ling app has instant feedback on every exercise. If you said a word incorrectly, the app will let you know, and the same goes for building sentences incorrectly or mixing up translations. Moreover, you have the option to correct your mistakes at the end of every lesson.
Grammar
Understanding grammar rules in your own language can be hard, so it’s no surprise learners have to work hard to fully master their target language’s grammar.
The Ling app teaches grammar with Grammar Notes in select language courses (we’re working on adding more). These are bite-sized grammar explanations that tell you what you need to know with examples taken from the lessons. This makes it much easier to understand what you’re learning, as they teach you the rules in a simple, direct way.
Writing Practice
There are hundreds of different alphabets and scripts around the world. And some can be really complex for people who aren’t familiar with them, especially if their native language’s script is very different from the one they’re learning. For example, it can be a challenge for English speakers to master Chinese characters, as they’re very different from the Latin alphabet.
The Ling app has you covered here, too. For languages that don’t use the Latin alphabet, you’ll find writing practice with the finger tracing method. That way, you can learn how to write all the characters or letters as you progress through the lessons.
Tones
Tonal languages can be tough for learners whose native language doesn’t make this distinction, such as English. And this can lead to funny (and not-so-funny) mistakes, since words that seem to sound the same are pronounced quite differently depending on their meaning.
By using real, native speaker audio, the Ling app makes sure you’re listening to the correct intonation of words and phrases. Then, with the voice recognition system, it analyzes what you said and gives you instant feedback on whether or not you said it right.
Being Overwhelmed
Last but not least, when learning a language with an app, things can sometimes get a bit overwhelming. The apps can have too many features, too many things to learn at the start, even too many notifications! And it can be hard to learn a language if you have to figure out how the app works first.
That’s why the Ling team works hard at analyzing user feedback. As we said, it’s always taken into account for new features and improvements, to ensure learners get what they need and have a good experience when using the app. Moreover, the Ling app’s design always aims to be intuitive and easy to use, letting you focus on your learning without unnecessary struggles.
These are far from the only challenges students face when learning a foreign language, we know. That’s why the Ling app is constantly improving and releasing new features. As Minh said, “We do the hard work so users don’t have to.” Just focus on your learning!
Frequently Asked Questions About Learning Hard Languages
What Are The 10 Hardest Languages To Learn?
The top 10 languages considered the most challenging are: Mandarin Chinese, Arabic, Japanese, Korean, Hungarian, Finnish, Icelandic, Basque, Vietnamese, and Navajo. That said, the difficulty of a language can greatly vary depending on the learner, how close their target language is to their native tongue, their previous experience with language learning, and much more.
Why Is It Hard To Learn A New Language As An Adult?
Learning a language as an adult can be hard due to several factors. First, children have more plastic or "flexible" brains that can learn organically, something that diminishes as we age. Adults' brains are also wired to recognize and produce the sounds of their native language, which can lead to difficulties with pronunciation.
Additionally, adults tend to learn in a conscious and analytical way, as opposed to the more natural and organic learning of children. There are also the time constraints, responsibilities, and a lack of energy that come with being an adult. Plus, adults also fear making mistakes more than children, and can be hindered by stress and pressure.
What Is The Most Complex Language?
There's no straight answer to this, as determining the most complex language is very subjective and depends on many factors, especially the learners' native tongue. That said, Mandarin Chinese is considered to be the most difficult language for English speakers to learn due to its tonal pronunciation, writing system, and complex grammar.
There are many other languages that are very complex. One of them is Icelandic (which you can learn with the Ling app!), as it has many word changes, a complex vocabulary, and three grammatical genders. Another language that's very difficult for English speakers is Navajo, with grammar that depends on context, extremely irregular and complex verbs, and a sentence structure that's very different from English.
Find Language Learning Overwhelming? Try The Ling App!
If you’re trying to learn a hard language like Icelandic or Mandarin Chinese and feel like it’s too much, don’t give up! Discover how much easier it can be to learn hard languages with Ling!
I’m not gonna lie to you, though. Learning a language can be hard, and some are much harder than others. But gamified lessons that keep you engaged, review options to go over everything you learn, real native speaker audio, and instant feedback based on speech recognition, can make things easier.
With Ling, you’ll start learning new words and phrases right away, with day-to-day vocabulary you can actually use to have conversations. You’ll get notifications to remember to practice, streaks to remain motivated, fun mini-games and quizzes, and everything else you need to make the learning experience less like climbing a mountain and more like going up a not-so-steep road.
So go ahead, download the Ling app today (you can try it for 7 days for free) and start your language learning journey.
