Mondly, A Language App Review
I usually don't do software reviews, but I wanted to make an exception in this case. I just started using a product called "Mondly", which is a somewhat clever French/English blend of saying "Worldly". This is available on the iPhone App Store for free, with some in-app purchases. So... I am trying to learn German and Russian in my spare time. German, I have some experience with. Russian, on the other hand, I have absolutely no experience with speaking. However, I learned the Cyrillic alphabet the week before this exercise, so I have that advantage. With Mondly, my goal is to learn more Russian, but you can select multiple languages to learn at once, which is pretty cool. Of course, I cannot expect to be fluent in Russian by the end of this exercise, but I can at least gauge whether there is an improvement or not. For the purposes of this exercise, I will say that my goal was a success. I can speak more Russian than I could before. I went through different steps to accomplish this - I open the app, select the lesson I wish to use, answer questions and learn material for over 10 or so interactive slides, and then complete the lesson and move on to the next. I do this for as long as I wish, and I gain "experience" points every time I complete a lesson.
In terms of interface, I am very familiar with technology so I don't think I actually learned any new interfaces, per se. On the main screen, they have little bubbles in which you can activate your lessons. You click on one, and the aforementioned interactive slides show up for your learning pleasure. They use different techniques to help you to learn, which are "swiping" in a direction to select the correct word, typing what you hear (in English and the language you are trying to learn, depending on what comes first), speaking into the microphone to mimic words that were spoken to you, having you match English and the other language's words, and having you select pictures with your finger. There are possibly some other combinations, but these are the main ones. These are standard interfacing techniques available on a touchscreen phone, so I had no issue whatsoever in completing them.
As for the technical aspects of the app, I found it quite user-friendly. It took no more than say, 2 minutes to learn how to use the product. It is very interface-friendly, and I believe they make it that way on purpose. Thankfully, I did not need support during the time using the app, but I believe there is a way to contact them via email if you have questions. The app has a feedback section in the App Store as well, so that is pretty standard. The app has retained my progress so far, and I have not lost any data yet. If you have any app purchases and somehow lose content, they have a standard "restore purchases" option that is self-explanatory. It seems to be fairly secure, as I don't think it's an easily hackable program (relying on constant internet connectivity).
Overall, I believe that the system has provided me with a great deal of content towards helping me in my goal, but to be honest I wouldn't know if they were lacking any, as I am not very familiar with a lot of language apps that function the way that this one does (game/exercise format blended with text). The functions, such as swiping, typing, speaking, and reading were all done correctly for the most part, except for a few mistakes that I noticed (sometimes the word did not match the pronunciation of the letters). I actually think I used the majority of the functions on the app, other than learning the other languages, so I have a pretty good idea of how the app works. I haven't tried the intermediate or expert lesson tiers available, but I suspect that would happen down the line.
If any improvements were to be made, I think that perhaps they could've included more written text to study certain words or conjugations in bulk. I think they could add some more variety to each section as well, although to be fair they switch the order for each repeated lesson. It would be cool if they introduced other vocab in each section, however. Otherwise, I believe everything was more than sufficient to help me with my task. Make sure to check out Mondly today if you're interested in learning a new language!
Verdict: 8/10
In terms of interface, I am very familiar with technology so I don't think I actually learned any new interfaces, per se. On the main screen, they have little bubbles in which you can activate your lessons. You click on one, and the aforementioned interactive slides show up for your learning pleasure. They use different techniques to help you to learn, which are "swiping" in a direction to select the correct word, typing what you hear (in English and the language you are trying to learn, depending on what comes first), speaking into the microphone to mimic words that were spoken to you, having you match English and the other language's words, and having you select pictures with your finger. There are possibly some other combinations, but these are the main ones. These are standard interfacing techniques available on a touchscreen phone, so I had no issue whatsoever in completing them.
As for the technical aspects of the app, I found it quite user-friendly. It took no more than say, 2 minutes to learn how to use the product. It is very interface-friendly, and I believe they make it that way on purpose. Thankfully, I did not need support during the time using the app, but I believe there is a way to contact them via email if you have questions. The app has a feedback section in the App Store as well, so that is pretty standard. The app has retained my progress so far, and I have not lost any data yet. If you have any app purchases and somehow lose content, they have a standard "restore purchases" option that is self-explanatory. It seems to be fairly secure, as I don't think it's an easily hackable program (relying on constant internet connectivity).
Overall, I believe that the system has provided me with a great deal of content towards helping me in my goal, but to be honest I wouldn't know if they were lacking any, as I am not very familiar with a lot of language apps that function the way that this one does (game/exercise format blended with text). The functions, such as swiping, typing, speaking, and reading were all done correctly for the most part, except for a few mistakes that I noticed (sometimes the word did not match the pronunciation of the letters). I actually think I used the majority of the functions on the app, other than learning the other languages, so I have a pretty good idea of how the app works. I haven't tried the intermediate or expert lesson tiers available, but I suspect that would happen down the line.
If any improvements were to be made, I think that perhaps they could've included more written text to study certain words or conjugations in bulk. I think they could add some more variety to each section as well, although to be fair they switch the order for each repeated lesson. It would be cool if they introduced other vocab in each section, however. Otherwise, I believe everything was more than sufficient to help me with my task. Make sure to check out Mondly today if you're interested in learning a new language!
Verdict: 8/10
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