TL;DR at the top: I want to build a (free) self-testing app anyone can use to filter their learning materials. I'm looking for feedback on: A) would people use this, and B) what features would people want to see?
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For every two people on this sub-reddit, there are probably three approaches to learning languages. Some of us use SRS apps. Some use other types of apps. Some of us read newspapers, write out vocabulary lists, etc... there's a lot of variety, and that's totally cool.
To varying degrees, I use most of the methods (and others) listed above. I don't know if I"m alone here, but I tend to run into a common issue: No matter which approach / platform / stock of content I study, I always run into a bunch of stuff that "I know I know", and other stuff, "I'm not sure I know".
Whether it's Anki / Memrise / Duolingo / personal notebooks / physical flashcards, etc... whether I'm studying vocabulary, simple sentences, phrases or verb conjugations, I often get to the point where I KNOW I know a good chunk of the material, but I'm stuck wasting time reviewing it in the context of whichever method I'm using.
On the other end of the spectrum, sometimes, I'm just genuinely curious... across a spectrum of content (vocab, sentences, phrases, idioms, etc...) what do I know, and what do I need to really keep focusing on?
In a perfect world, I'd have a private tutor take a list of my study materials, give me the English translation and see whether I know the content in my target language. Of course, I don't have the time or money to hire a private tutor to do this.
I've searched and posted here several times, but I'm not aware of any app that just simply tests the user against a stock of content that the user specifies.
Theoretically, there are some (clunky) ways around this. For example, I could create a custom deck in Anki, hide all the target language cards, and show all the English translations 1x. Then I could delete all the cards I know and download the remaining content for further study. (Or I could leave it in Anki and just focus on it.)
That feels very clunky, and it only really works if I am an active Anki user. If I use other methods (other apps, off-line journals, etc..) it's even more clunky, b/c I need to mess around with downloading an Anki deck, unpacking it and then playing with the remaining content. Also, if I goof up and delete something that I really didn't know, then it's lost.
So I'm interested in developing a very basic, simple app that does one thing, and one thing only: You upload your content, and it tests you, to confirm what you know vs. what you still need to study.
Functionally, it would probably look like any of the myriad of SRS apps that are out there. But the user experience would be optimized for self-testing. Additionally, I'd envision the ability to quickly / easily upload and download content using an Excel file or Google Doc.
So, if you've read this far, I'll go back to my questions in the TL;DR:
A) would people use this, and;
B) what features would people want to see?
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from Merħba| Languagelearning http://bit.ly/2UszIqT
via Learn Online English Speaking
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