I began learning German ab-initio Duolingo and found the sequencing of content, repetition of vocabulary, and its gamification made for a language-learning platform that was both effective and fun to use. I started using Duolingo’s mobile application in October 2019, and quickly realised its potential for use with students of MFL. Furthermore, due to the implications of language learning on social mobility, addressing low student motivation in MFL in disadvantaged areas can be considered essential in addressing social inequality and ‘challenging the gap’. Its consequences are low student numbers at GCSE, and subsequently at A Level and university, leading to a deficit in able linguists in Britain (Coleman et al., 2007 Parrish and Lanvers, 2018). This study focuses on motivation since low student motivation is arguably one of the greatest challenges currently facing MFL teaching. Located in a coastal town in South West England, the school’s catchment area ranked as the most deprived local authority in 2019 (Smith, 2019) and 32.88% of the entire school population are Pupil Premium. Notably there are few MFL students at Key Stage 4 (GCSE), and none at Key Stage 5 (A Level). This research was conducted in a bilateral, mixed community school where students appear to have low interest in, and motivation for, foreign language learning. The findings of this study are positive but non-generalisable, and this research should be read as a pilot study whose findings and limitations may inform more thorough and accurate research on this topic in the future. The study was carried out in two phases and was adapted to respond to the difficulties and limitations of the first. The research question it addresses is: Can Duolingo be used to increase student motivation in MFL? It responds through quantitative surveys, qualitative, semi-structured interviews, teacher observation and analysis of online data of students’ activity on Duolingo.

This research project aims to explore the potential of the language-learning platform, Duolingo, for improving student motivation in Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) through the lens of expectancy-value theory.

Don’t Make the Owl Angry: Assessing Duolingo’s Potential for Improving Student Motivation in MFL, The Millennial , Available at: (this page URL). To cite this article: Sturt-Schmidt, James (2020).

Student in spanish duolingo