1000 Days of Duolingo!

Yesterday I hit a big milestone in Duolingo: a 1000-day streak! Since I began relearning Spanish in January 2021, I have not missed a single day. I'm proud of that and am so happy with the progress I'm making. 

Duolingo is constantly introducing new features. One of the newer features is the ability to make your own avatar, Duo-style. This is mine:

You might remember that I drew myself as a Duolingo character around this time last year. I haven't looked at it in 13 months, so I thought it would be fun to compare what I drew from scratch then using Duolingo's illustration guidelines with what I made now with the avatar creator. 

Side by side, there are definitely similarities, but plenty of differences too. Necks are rare in the Duolingo universe - most characters don't have visible necks and, with the exception of Lin, all the necks that exist are covered by clothing (like in the avatar version of me). Open mouths aren't black; I should have used a closed mouth or colored the open mouth differently. Eyes tend to be ovals (or half-ovals), not round. My avatar nose is much smaller and my face much blockier than my scratch-drawn version. 

  

I love everything about Duolingo, including my new avatar. 

Spanish-English Fruits, Vegetables, and Meat/Dairy Vocabulary Cards

I've been relearning Spanish using Duolingo since January 2021 and I have an uninterrupted streak of 770 days. I really enjoy it and am so pleased to have regained so much of the vocabulary I'd lost. I get to apply the Spanish I'm relearning during my twice-monthly shifts doing food distribution at the Food Bank, as many of the recipients speak little or no English. 

I'd been telling my mom for some time that she would enjoy Duolingo. When my parents were in California for Trevor's Eagle Court of Honor, I set Mom up with an account. Sure enough, she loves it and has maintained an uninterrupted streak of 178 days. While I am relearning Spanish, Mom started from ground zero. She spends a lot of time each day practicing and has recently been able to use her rudimentary Spanish at her local Food Bank, where she volunteers several times a week. About a month ago, she mentioned that she wished Duolingo would skip all the vocabulary about travel, clothes, school, and chores for now and just teach her the words she needs to communicate with the Food Bank recipients. I tucked that away in my brain as a gift opportunity. Yesterday, for Mom's birthday, I gave her these:

I made these cards using PicMonkey. Some of the images were ready-made in their Graphics collections; others I had to make. Since vocabulary is not standard amongst the 20 countries whose official language is Spanish, I defaulted to the most common translation when there were differences. In some cases, I used the Mexican vocabulary word, as that's what most commonly used here. I had the cards printed on cardstock and laminated so that Mom can bring them with her to the Food Bank and use them as needed. I hope they're useful. Happy birthday, Mom!

Duo Con Trouble

I've gotten into a routine of doing my daily Duolingo practice on the couch near Trouble's area. (He struggles with mobility now and stays exclusively on the carpeted area, so we're all coming to him rather than him coming to us.) When I first started doing Duolingo there, Trouble's ears would perk up with the various chimes and voices, but he got used to it pretty quickly. In this photo, he is completely zonked. It's not surprising; I'm there around 4:00 pm (just after school pick-up) and that is prime naptime for a crepuscular critter.   

 

Duo Con Trouble (affiliate link)

I think this is the first time I've ever used any Spanish on a layout. The title has the word 'con' (with), while the journaling has an entire sentence of Spanish: 'El conejo está muy cansado en la tarde' (The rabbit is very tired in the afternoon). It's a fun first for me. 

If anyone is interested in giving Duolingo a try, definitely do so! It's free and it's fun and it's effective. You're welcome to use my link to join or, if you're already a member, feel free to friend me. 

Drawing Myself as a Duolingo Character

This week, I hit a 600-day streak learning Spanish on Duolingo. To mark the occasion, I decided to draw myself as a Duolingo character. I found an image of the Duolingo characters and identified their distinctive characteristics: rounded geometric shapes, unrealistic proportions, large eyes, teardrop noses, bright colors, minimal details, and disembodied feet on a white background. 

Then I used those traits to draw myself in the Duolingo style. This was my first draft. 

After making it, I found this interesting article about Duolingo's illustration guidelines. I went through each category to make any necessary changes to my drawing to bring it in line with Duolingo standards. First, all shapes are supposed to be rounded. Mine are, but the feet and eyebrows aren't rounded enough. Second, there should be a variation in shape, avoiding predictable shapes with similar visual weight. I think I'm ok there. 

Second draft: 

The next category is simplicity. They state that 6 shapes is too abstract, 30 shapes is too many, and 15 is just right. Mine has 16 shapes in the head alone: circle head, rectangle neck, rectangle hair, oval bangs, rectangle eyebrows (x2), circle eye (x2) with circle pupil (x2), circle ears (x2) with circle earrings (x2), teardrop nose, and semicircle mouth. However, the rest of the body only adds another 8 shapes, bringing me to 23. I took off the earrings to bring it to 21. 

Third draft: 

The next category says that all Duolingo characters must be designed with a flat perspective. I'm fine there. I didn't use shadows, so that's ok too. Then we get to color. There is a recommended color palette that I didn't follow, along with suggestions to be playful and vibrant while avoiding using too many colors. The final guideline is about floating accents. I only floated the feet, so I'm fine there. As I was looking closer at the characters, I realized my eyes were wrong. So I fixed those and made a bunch of changes to the colors, bringing me to.... 

Fourth (and final) draft: 

I really like my character! I think she needs a rabbit sidekick...

How to Draw Duo, the Duolingo Owl

I started learning Spanish in 7th grade, way back in 1985. I continued with Spanish all the way through 12th grade and did well enough on the Advanced Placement test to end up in an advanced Spanish composition class during my freshman year of college. It was very challenging. Because it was so difficult and I already had more than enough language credits, I never took another Spanish class.

I rarely used my Spanish and my near-fluency disappeared. It was frustrating but not surprising; you can't expect to remain good at something if you don't practice it for 30 years. In January, I decided to relearn Spanish and started using Duolingo. I spend an average of 30 minutes a day, 7 days a week, and it's amazing how much I've regained. It's fun and motivating and I'm excited to keep at it and eventually complete the entire Spanish tree.

Yesterday, I hit a milestone (more on that below) and drew a celebratory Duo (the Duolingo mascot) to mark the occasion. He's easy to draw. Give it a go!

 
   

How to Draw Duo, the Duolingo Owl

Materials:

• paper
• pencil (I used Sharpie for the step-out photos so they're easier to see)
• markers

Steps:

Begin by drawing Duo's shadow at the bottom center of the page. It looks like a worm. This will help you anchor the rest of the drawing. 

Now draw Duo's body. Duo is all curves with no sharp edges, so keep everything rounded.

Duo's feet look like Tic-Tacs and are disconnected from his body. Draw them between his body and the shadow. Then add wings. Keep them rounded!

Duo's beak goes in the center of his face. It consists of a semi-circle on top and a Tic-Tac on the bottom, with a curve for his tongue. Add Tic-Tac eyes on either side of the beak. Leave a circular gap at the top left of the pupils; these are white highlights. 

Now outline Duo's face. The curve starts and ends at the sides of his beak, follows his eyes, and has two feathers over each eye. Add three semi-circles to Duo's belly. 

Now it's time to color! Not counting the white of the paper, you will use 7 colors: leaf green for the body, light green for the face and tummy feathers, black for the pupils, pink for the tongue, orange for the feet and parts of the beak, light orange for the highlight on the upper beak, and dark orange for inside the mouth next to the tongue. 

So what is my Duolingo milestone? Yesterday I celebrated a 100-day streak, with no missed days. 

To be honest, it's been easy. I really enjoy my daily practice. Of course, I imagine it will be much more difficult to maintain my streak when we are eventually traveling again. But I'll deal with that when it comes. In the meantime, I'll be happily practicing from home.