Back in 2007, when Apple released the first iPhone, few people would have imagined what a game changing device the smartphone would eventually become. In less than ten years since, the phone moved from being a cumbersome contraption to call family and friends and snapping rudimentary pictures to become an indispensable personal assistant that helps us in almost all aspects of our life. We now have hundreds of thousands of apps designed to help with every possible activity (or the lack of any). Students, as a group in particular have benefited immensely from the arrival of the smartphone. We can now access collections from the world’s best libraries and connect with leading researchers from every field with our discreet handhelds and it was only a matter of time before the app revolution had its impact on the linguistic skills improvement front as well.

A simple search on any major appstore yields hundreds of apps that claim to aid language skills and many of them have excellent course material and a fun interface to make the experience interesting and hopefully, rewarding. Duoling, Fluenz, Babbel and Rocket Languages are some of the most famous apps out there and are used by millions of people to brush up on language skills. However, can apps really offer a credible alternative to classroom based study? The short answer is of course no, not in the foreseeable future at least, but they can be tremendously helpful aids and must be explored by every serious language student.

Over time, app design has improved by leaps and bounds. Gone are the days when students would have to repeatedly tap an arrow key to painstakingly move the cursor near the right answer to see an apple and a star appear on the monitor as the reward. Developers now take great pains to make their apps engaging, interactive and effective. Many language apps feature interesting technology like speech recognition and natural language processing techniques to make exercises comprehensive and to more effectively simulate a classroom atmosphere. Apart from all this, apps also offer unparalleled convenience – one can take up exercises as and when convenient, in the U-Bahn, waiting for the bus, before falling asleep (although many sleep therapists discourage phone usage before nap time).

I have personally found that apps are a great way to practice and cement vocabulary training. However, that said, I strongly feel that current language apps lack the level of direct interaction that an average student needs to pick up many basic and advanced linguistic skills that can easily be taught in the classroom.

For example, the app may help you remember the correct article for mannlich nouns when used with ‘besuchen’ or ‘brauchen’, but they don’t necessarily do a good job teaching you about when the accusative case kicks in and what effect it can have on the sentence formation. The problem only compounds when other complications get added to the mix, such as the impact of prepositions and subtleties linked to subject/object focus. Current apps, in general have not figured out a way to clear the many doubts and questions that crop up in a student’s head and just expect the user to go through exercises and mentally note what’s correct and what’s not.

The lack of a troubleshooting ‘Guru’, who can explain fundamentals, simplify, aid and warn against pitfalls is the real drawback with many of these apps and that’s why I think they cannot effectively substitute a classroom course. So, while students may use these apps as aids, they should definitely take up structured courses if they are serious about learning a new language.

To sum up, language apps are fun and help you practice and perfect many skills that are needed to speak good Deutsche, but they are no match for a real life teacher and colleague environment. It’s much the same way that we all find Siri amusing and useful, but we don’t necessarily ditch our friends to spend more time talking to her.