I've been learning Chinese for about four years. I use apps, but only to drill and help me improve my reading + vocabulary outside of the in-person classes.
There's nothing like an in-person tutor. (OK, so mine is online, but it's almost the same.) My teacher knows my strong and weak points, and when I get stuck with a certain word or grammar pattern, she makes sure to test it before we move on.
That said, I only have one hour of class per day, and that's not enough to really progress. So I use the apps to jog my memory, learn new words (since everyone will stress different ones), and internalize the grammar.
Besides, a language is a very dynamic and living thing: When you speak it with natives, you'll sometimes be able to rely on sentences you've learned in class. But the real test is whether you can take their new-to-you question, and respond with a new-to-you answer. And that only comes with time and repetition with real instructors -- and with repeated practice with native speakers. And there's no better teacher than a puzzled look on a native's face, telling you that your pronunciation is totally off.
I often say, half jokingly, that my trips to China (where I go 3-5 times a year to teach Python + data science courses) are my end-of-semester exam, when we see if my Chinese has really improved. Without fail, interactions with natives help me to improve.
None of this would happen with just the apps. Yeah, they're great -- but they are far from sufficient.
Seems crazy to me (and a bit depressing) that doing anything for 1 hour per day would not lead to good progress! We only have so few truly free hours in a day to spend on things like this.
Oh, it has led to great progress -- when I go to China, everything I do before and after class is in Chinese. I chat with locals, order at restaurants, read street signs, and the like. That said, there's still a long way to go before fluency.
It's also known that Chinese takes a long time for non-native speakers to learn. For someone like me (48 years old, self-employed, married with three kids), I'm delighted with my progress and feel a great sense of a accomplishment. Moreover, I often meet up with foreigners who have living in China for years, and it turns out that my Chinese is better than theirs. So it's not depressing at all!
There's nothing like an in-person tutor. (OK, so mine is online, but it's almost the same.) My teacher knows my strong and weak points, and when I get stuck with a certain word or grammar pattern, she makes sure to test it before we move on.
That said, I only have one hour of class per day, and that's not enough to really progress. So I use the apps to jog my memory, learn new words (since everyone will stress different ones), and internalize the grammar.
Besides, a language is a very dynamic and living thing: When you speak it with natives, you'll sometimes be able to rely on sentences you've learned in class. But the real test is whether you can take their new-to-you question, and respond with a new-to-you answer. And that only comes with time and repetition with real instructors -- and with repeated practice with native speakers. And there's no better teacher than a puzzled look on a native's face, telling you that your pronunciation is totally off.
I often say, half jokingly, that my trips to China (where I go 3-5 times a year to teach Python + data science courses) are my end-of-semester exam, when we see if my Chinese has really improved. Without fail, interactions with natives help me to improve.
None of this would happen with just the apps. Yeah, they're great -- but they are far from sufficient.