#WEEK 5/Eda/ "Ethics & Technologies in Education."

"Hi! My name is Eda. For the task of this week, I chose Duolingo as an E-Learning Tool to evaluate. "

If I talk about why I chose this platform, I always use it for learning and practicing other languages. It is very practical to use. I wanted to learn if It is appropriate to use this platform with my future students. That's why I chose it. After I explored the tool in the commonsense.org page, to carry out this evaluation, I received help from a rubric "Rubric for eLearning Tool Evaluation by Lauren M. Anstey & Gavan P.L. Watson".

Duolingo is a language learning application which everyone can use easily. It is suitable for both children and adults.

Source obtained from https://es.duolingo.com/

CRITERIA BASED ON THE RUBRIC FOR E-LEARNING TOOL EVALUATION

FUNCTIONALITY

The tool is very easy to use for instructions and students. It is divided into the categories and levels that progress from easy to difficult. In the beginning, it always guides the users about what they should do. The tool provides the users technical support and helps them in troubleshooting forums. There is no private message on the tool. You can click on someone's name, go to his profile and post a message there. It is limited to textual communication.

ACCESIBILITY

Duolingo has limited capacity to meet accessibility guidelines. It is not successful in meeting the needs of diverse users. For example, when you can just hear when you click on the words, which is time-consuming and not suitable for blind people. Also, the interface wants the user to type the words all the time, which is also very challenging for the blind people. The users only need to have internet connection and microphone which is available on all Android phones to use the app. The tool has limited aspects that can be used for free like just full access to lessons. The users must pay for ad-free, offline and error-free access to lessons. Also, they can monitor their progress if they have a plus account.

TECHNICAL

The users can utilize the tool by just downloading the app or with any standard browser and operating system without needing to download extra software.

MOBILE DESIGN

It is possible to access the tool with both android and ios application or desktop version without any difference. However, the tool requires the users to have a "plus account" which they must pay in order to have offline access to the tool.

PRIVACY, DATA PROTECTION AND RIGHTS

Both the instructions and the learners must sign up and sign in to utilize the tool, which means providing information to a third party while creating an account. While the tool allows the users to retain ownership of their data, it can also share the data for research and product improvement but not with third-party service providers. There are some limitations in saving and exporting the data. For example, it is available for the school, parents or students to delete data but not available to download user data.

SOCIAL PRESENCE

Duolingo is an example of an asynchronous tool which gives opportunities for communication and interaction between users. However, there is no technical solution to control learner anonymity or actions of users.It is a very well-known and popular language learning tool which has easy-to-use features not only for the learners but also instructors.

TEACHING PRESENCE

The teachers can see everything in detail like the time students practice, how long they practice and the points students earn. Moreover, from the duolingo for schools dashboard, they can invite other duolingo learners to attend their classrooms.

COGNITIVE PRESENCE

The tool does not give the learners very complex tasks but gives them the opportunity for receiving feedback and tracking their performance.