I thought it might be a good feature for any language with an alphabet different to the learner’s native language to have a separate ‘learn alphabet’ feature.
Because of isolation I started Russian101 & Korean101. I’m starting as an absolute beginner. I really like learning something new, but I sort of wish there was a separate ‘learn alphabet’ (in addition to the current ‘learn new words’ and ‘learn grammar’) option. That way I could choose to try learn Cyrillic/Hangul before moving on to whole words. It’s just really hard to feel I’m progressing when I basically have to guess or go by pattern recognition of words, because I can’t read most of the word. Currently, to access more letters of the alphabets I have to learn a heap of new whole words that I may only know one or two letters of. I don’t think is the best way to learn.
I know everyone learns differently, but I just thought I’d suggest it.
EDIT: As of recent update names have changed to ‘Korean 1’, and ‘Russian 1’
There are actually tons of courses teaching alphabets!
For instance, here’s a search restricted to Russian and Korean alphabets (found by clicking Courses, then selecting (source and) target language, then entering “alphabet” into the search textbox near the top right:
Yes. I don’t want to be rude, but obviously I realise this. I am giving a suggestion specifically for the 101 courses, as in their current form they are not very user friendly. I think they could be a great one-stop deck for casual learners like myself if we could learn the alphabet before being expected to learn words and phrases in this alphabet.
My main language is Japanese, and I already have many targeted decks for that, so I don’t want to add a bunch of new decks. I’m not aiming to become fluent or anything in Russian or Korean, I just want to pick up some basics. The 101 courses actually seem really good apart from this issue that they don’t let you learn the alphabet before learning phrases & words.
EDIT: As of recent update names have changed from ‘[language]101’ to ‘[language] 1’
You could try and tag the courses’ authors here (provided they have a forum account).
Apart from that I don’t really understand as to what specifically you might be after - there’s courses teaching alphabets and courses teaching vocabulary, phrases and what-not. Regarding very basic (or introductory) courses specifically regarding languages with their own (possibly extensive) alphabet I agree that it would help to start with a few letters and then combine these with vocabulary.
Such courses do exist though. For instance, I learned this course here which starts out by teaching parts of the alphabet, then applies them, then goes on to the next set:
Hence, if the course you’re learning doesn’t really teach what you’re after, it’s (IMHO) best to just try and find a better match.
As I said, the courses actually do teach exactly what I want, and do so very well. I really like the videos, and the individual cards. I’m not tagging any one particular course because I think it’s probably something that is common to all the 101 courses that use alphabets that are not the same as the learner’s native language.
I’m simply suggesting that in these 101 courses we learn (or have the option to selectively learn) the alphabet before learning words and phrases. That way for casual learners like myself (who these decks seemed aimed squarely at) we can have just one deck for these languages.
I don’t know why you keep suggesting other decks. Obviously I know there are other decks out there. I use a lot of them (hence why I don’t want to have a separate one for each aspect of languages I’m just casually learning when the 101 decks include everything in one deck). I’m suggesting a specific improvement to the 101 decks.
EDIT: As of recent update names have changed from ‘[language]101’ to ‘[language] 1’
It might be just me, but I do get the feeling that you don’t seem to grasp that I’m only trying to help. I’m just another user and not affiliated with Memrise. I do not have any obligation whatsoever to do what I do (or the attempts to help out others) here. If you’re not interested in my advice then that’s fine - just tell me so and I’ll leave it up to other folks to take care of your issues.
As to what you wrote - there’s no such thing as “101 courses” with respect to Memrise (even though I know about the general classification system).
And in case you think that Memrise has influence on what courses are being provided and how their contents is structured: they don’t, at least not with respect to community created courses (as opposed to the “official Memrise courses”). That is, the courses that you seem to be learning are all - except for Russian 1 - community courses, i. e. they are provided by people who either create content voluntarily or simply publish courses that they created for themselves or their students. It’s absolutely OK to criticize their content, to point out errors or to make suggestions, but these should be geared at the respective course creator, something that you can do by tagging them, as I wrote earlier.
Consequently, nobody except the person who originally created the course has (much) influence on how a course is structured or the content it provides. There is course contributors (such as me) who tend to (other authors’) courses, but they may not change the courses’ general structure (I won’t provide further details here).
It might help you to skim over this forum’s postings a bit in order to bet a better impression of how Memrise works apart from the general systematics.
As I said in the first post, I really don’t want to be rude, but you don’t seem to grasp what I am asking for, despite repeating myself over and over. You keep suggesting things that I keep telling you I am not looking for. I really am trying not to be rude, but it was a bit annoying after the first post. I’m not a complete idiot. I know other decks exist. I have been using Memrise for over five years now. I do not want to use other decks because (apart from this suggestion) the line of deck I am talking about are actually very good. I am suggesting an improvement to a current line of decks.
As a side note, I actually came back today because (as of an update overnight for my version of Memrise) the courses that were previously ‘Korean101’, ‘Russian101’ have just been updated to now be simply ‘Korean 1’ and ‘Russian 1’. I am going to make an edit above now to avoid confusion. I hope that clears that side of things up.
I don’t know if you have tried these courses, but they are actually really good courses for a beginner. They include videos of a group of native speakers saying individual components of the alphabet, individual words, phrases, and have a separate grammar learning part. The standard is very high, and really contain everything someone who is casually learning the language needs to know. Also, as I said, the videos/pronunciation are a really great feature for me. I have absolutely no issues with the German101 (now German 1) course I am also learning.
To explain for the fourth time now, for the ‘[language]101’ (now ‘[language] 1’) courses that have an alphabet different to the native alphabet, they lump all the alphabet, words, and phrases together as you learn. What I am trying to suggest for this line of decks is that they either have the alphabet as a separate option (currently there are two: ‘words and phrases’ and ‘grammar’, with the alphabet included in ‘words and phrases’), or they front load learning the alphabet before starting on complete words and phrases.
I’ve never seen any of them carrying 101 in their title, but you seem to be talking about Memrise’s official courses then. These have features that community courses don’t (like the grammar bot) and that you seem be referring to.
In that case, search the forum for “[course forum] name of the course” to find the threads where your suggestion is better placed. Memrise’s participate in those threads.
Well I can’t explain that, but previously they were all [language] 101 for me.
As I have said multiple times now, it is an issue that would affect any language with a different script, hence making a general suggestion for all of these courses, not going to each [language] 1 course individually.
The forum threads for Memrise courses always cover the whole course, i. e. parts 1-7. Some threads are even for different base languages, depending on their popularity, I suppose.
That has no connection to my suggestion. Look, again, I’m sorry to be rude, but I’m tired of arguing in circles with you. Please stop replying to this thread from now. I’m sure you had good intentions, however we are obviously having communication issues that are not constructive or helpful for this suggestion thread.