I Think My Duolingo Routine Is Sticking Around This Time!

 One of my goals this year was to clock over 300 days on Duolingo, particularly in Spanish. Lots of people have done that, so why can't I? I've definitely accomplished a lengthy streak before, but then shortly after accomplishing that goal, my streak usually ends for one reason or another. Now that I know I'm dealing with ADHD now, I've been able to get some insight into why this might be happening. I find that it has to do with novelty. If I manage to accomplish my goal, the novelty of having reached that goal wears off. Or I get bored with the language that I'm learning. Something like that. If it's not novelty, it's motivation failing me. I might be really motivated by having a goal, but once it's accomplished, then I'm over it and it falls by the wayside. 

But this time around, something feels different. I'm feeling more confident that this will stick around even beyond reaching 300 days in a row. Now that I've been reading up more on ADHD and how it functions, I'm more aware of what I might need to make certain habits stick around for a long time! Here's what I've found and why I think it's working:

1. I have tons of reminders. Right now, I am connected with people who are very active on Duolingo, so their progress is also my motivation. The Duolingo notifications are very dramatic and over the top, but instead of getting annoyed, I'm choosing to take this as a cue. If that fails, I have Duolingo set up as a widget on my phone. All of my apps can be found on one screen (so I don't have to scroll through anything) and Duolingo takes up a big chunk of space. 

I also have other apps that I'm active with, like Finch, and I have daily reminders to practice each of the languages. When I do practice, I can check them off the list and I get daily points for practicing those languages :) It feels really good to me that I'm not putting all of my eggs in one basket, so to speak. I think that's one major reason why I'm slipped in the past.

ADHD-Friendly Elements: Multiple reminders throughout the day, keeping the important things in sight, creating urgency

2. Flexible features within the app. Before talking about other reasons why I've been able to stick to my language practice, I want to talk about specific things that are working for me within the app itself. Varied practices even in a single language keep things interesting for me. Take Hindi, for example, since I am learning not only vocabulary, but also an entirely new-to-me alphabet: sometimes I'm translating sentences in Hindi, or "writing" sentences in Hindi characters, practicing writing out the individual characters, reviewing vocabulary, doing listening activities... there's a lot going on! It's not all the same all the time. 

Duolingo is also good about celebrating the milestones you hit. And it's not just limited to the number of days you've practiced. There's acknowledgement when you've done a lot of lessons in a day, when you've hit a certain number of perfect weeks of practice, when you've corrected a certain number of mistakes, when I go up a level in a language... lots of different achievements. That pat on the back feels really great!

When you practice enough and earn enough gems, it's really easy to save yourself if you do lapse in your practice time. As of the time I'm writing this, I have a 167 day streak on Duolingo. Is this a true streak in that I have missed literally no days? No. But I was able to freeze my streak with the gems I've earned and then the streak continued once I picked it back up the next day. It's honoring the practice I've done rather than just the number of days that good practice I've managed to keep up. Real life gets in the way sometimes. There are days I'm so exhausted I fall asleep before I've had the chance to practice. But I've never been punished for those lapses or for life taking a different turn than I've planned.

ADHD-Friendly Elements: Positive acknowledgement of achievements big and small, safety nets without guilt (well, not that I take seriously, anyway), novelty through varied activities.

3. I have multiple languages I'm practicing at once! At the moment, I have five languages that are in heavy rotation on Duolingo. I have a few languages that I have studied previously that I am working to keep up and grow in-- Spanish, French, and Dutch. I have one language that is completely new to me, which is Hindi, and takes more effort for me to practice. I also have a language that is interesting to me and in the same language family as another language I'm studying, which is German. This keeps it interesting to me because it's so varied. 

Practicing multiple languages also means I can do the practice that I have the capacity for that day. If things are going really well, I can do multiple lessons in all five languages I'm practicing. If things have been hectic, I know that I can do a lesson in Dutch (which is in the same language family as English and is therefore simpler for me to grasp over other languages) or in French (which I've had a lot more language instruction in, so it's familiar and I'm comfortable enough with the grammar). 

ADHD-Friendly Elements: Novelty through varied activities, novelty through a variety of languages, activities for a variety of energy levels.

4. I am (tentatively) planning a trip. I have a friend who moved to India with his wife nearly two years ago. India has been on my list of places to travel since my undergraduate years, but I'm usually hesitant to go somewhere where I don't know even basic things in the language spoken there. As a result, I have started learning Hindi! It's been hard to learn this language since I'm unfamiliar with any part of the language and the alphabet is different from what I'm used to, but knowing I'm working towards travel has been very motivating.

ADHD-Friendly Elements: Novelty leading to motivation!

I'm feeling really good that my practice has been relatively consistent this year! I'm proud of the things that I've figured out that have been helping too :) Send good thoughts that I'll make it to 300 days and positive vibes that I'll be able to continue my practice even beyond that goal for 2025!

Goals for 2025 (Setting + Reviewing Goals All at Once!)

I'm entirely too late to the game, but... Happy 2025! It may be June now, but when I originally typed this post, it was late December/early January. I love setting goals for the coming year! The older I've gotten, the less pressure I have felt to accomplish each and every one of my goals, but I like the act of setting intentions that this practice gives me. I find that it helps give me a focus and keeps me working towards the person I want to become. So without further ado, here are the goals that I initially set in the beginning of 2025! I'll mark how each goal is going so far too.

1. Get my nose pierced. This is one thing that I have continuously put off. I would really like it if 2025 would be the last year this goal appears on my list! I haven't accomplished this yet.

2. Get a second tattoo. I found that after getting my first tattoo, the experience wasn't nearly as intense as I thought it would be! And this is coming from someone who has anxiety in medical situations, particularly around needles. It's a very different experience. I have some ideas for what I'd like next, so it's just a matter of making a decision, saving up the money, and scheduling the appointment! I haven't done this yet and I'm not sure if it'll happen this year. I have other savings goals that have come up and that I'd like to prioritize!

3. Decorate for all of our holidays. I would really like this to include putting lights on my house, but I will likely need to emphasize non-light-related decor. I would like decorations to make it to the outside of my house, particularly in the front yard. I've done a little more of this this year!

4. Build a fairy garden. I want to create more points of interest around my yard and I think fairy gardens are so cute. This would be a fun way to get me outside but not create a ton of new responsibility for me at the same time. Maybe it would motivate me to keep my yard in order better. So far, I've gotten as far as putting a lot of things on my Amazon wishlist. This will definitely be a slow growth kind of project! I have just the spot to start this fairy garden.

5. Complete 1/2 started house projects. This is one way my ADHD manifests itself, if I'm being perfectly honest. I'm getting kind of sick of having mini-construction zones scattered about my space and having a garage filled with materials that I have acquired for the purpose of accomplishing these different projects around my house. I have a list of projects I have started but have not yet finished in my Google Keep list and I'd like to finish those projects this year if I possibly can! If I can't finish all of them, I would at least like to finish a majority of them. Finishing updating the electrical in my house is the main task that relies on another person, so I'll be flexible with that project, but I don't necessarily need someone else to help me with everything else on the list. I have what I need to put my back porch in order and I have built a tool storage space in my basement! Progress :)

6. Have regular hobby days each month and keep them sacred. Having crawled my way to winter break this school year and struggling with feeling so drained, I want to make sure I'm making time for hobbies. One way I can make sure that happens is scheduling in that time. I'm resolving to have days I mark on my calendar specifically to sit and do some of my hobbies. I haven't gone as far as to schedule entire days where I'm just focusing on hobbies, but I have definitely been finding ways to bring them to the forefront of my mind each day. Right now this looks like a standing to-do list that appears on each day of my bullet journal. So I'm at least checking in each day about my language practice, whether or not I've made time to read, journal and write my own fan fiction. It's progress :)

7. Take voice lessons and/or find an outlet for singing. My family can probably attest to this, but I have loved singing from a very young age. I was painfully shy about it as a kid if someone commented on my voice but honestly, the older I've gotten and since having a kid, I've become more open to singing in front of other people. So I want to find a way to lean into that discomfort some more and make public singing less scary for myself. I've found a glee club in my neighborhood that has 6-week sessions and I've "discovered" the community education theater that puts on musicals in the summer. Somehow I want to sing with other people and in a public way. It'll be a real challenge for me. I haven't made steps in this area yet, but I also know it's not too late to make steps!

8. Take up piano again. I was one of those weird kids that actually asked to take piano lessons when I was in... I believe high school. The problem is, even though I asked for them, I really hated practicing. I don't necessarily want to sign up for lessons again for fear of the same outcome happening (where I don't practice), but I do want to brush up on what I did learn and maybe even create some kind of regular practice on my own. I have been practicing music on Duolingo, which has been fun and has been good practice reading music again! But ultimately, it's not the same. So I will need to adjust my tactic somewhat.

9. Make writing retreats a regular practice. My cooperating teacher when I was doing my stint of student teaching is an awesome writer and researcher. I really look up to her and one of the things she does is go on writing retreats. Sometimes they're with other people who are also writers and sometimes they're alone, but she always makes a point to get away and just focus on her writing. I want to give this a try and make this something that I do. I already do retreats for scrapbooking, so why not extend this to weekends away to focus on writing? I think it would be good for me as I work to better cultivate this part of myself. I haven't made this a regular practice yet, but I still have half a year to make this happen! Even doing this once would be really nice.

10. Create a teaching portfolio. I have been putting this out into the universe more the longer I've been a teacher: I'm not going to be teaching at my same school forever. At the time of this writing, I have been teaching 9th grade for 8 years (if you include my semester of student teaching) and I've worked at my current school (small community, charter, Title I) for 7 1/2 years. Small communities make it really easy to jump in and work to make a noticeable difference, if you're willing to put in the work, and I pride myself on being as involved as I am in my school community. So I want to pull together the units I have planned as the sole 9th grade language arts teacher and showcase the projects I have brought to my community in the form of a portfolio that can be shared with schools I may approach in the future. That way they can see what I'm all about and show them what I'm like as an educator through the different experiences I've had and cultivated since my initial licensure. I will need to make a post about changing teaching positions at some point this year. I have had to recount a lot of my teaching experience verbally, but I have yet to create a digital space (even adding on to what I created in grad school) where I am sharing student work and things I've created over the years. I definitely want to start this sooner rather than later though. Once summer is over, it'll be harder to make time to do this little project.

11. Visit every small/local coffee shop in my area. I've already made a list and I'm so excited for this :) We moved into our house in 2022 and since then, I really haven't ventured out and around our neighborhood beyond where we get our necessities for the week. So I want to prioritize exploring! I like coffee and coffee shop environments, so why not start here and find my new favorite places? Some progress has been made! But realistically, I would be shocked if I finished this goal in one year.

12. Clock 300+ days on Duolingo (specifically in Spanish). I really fell off the Duolingo train/Spanish practice at the end of last year, but I want to keep learning and growing in this area. I have an opportunity with students who at the moment speak mostly Spanish and are getting used to being educated in English, so they are receiving instruction bilingually. I'm doing really well with this goal! I'll talk about it more in a separate post :)

13. Schedule regular dates with my wife and stick to them! We definitely don't have a routine with this. Dates have been rather far and few between. I think we need to find what works for us. Since the beginning of the year though, she planned and executed a date for us and that was really lovely :)

14. Create a cleaning routine that is manageable on a weekly basis. I have found a tool that makes tracking this easier, but a routine remains elusive so far.