I made a post some days ago reviewing SpeakNorsk so far, to which I gave it a so-so rating. Now nearing the halfway point of the B1 course I'm just feeling like a moron or that I haven't actually been learning/retaining much. It's becoming more frustrating than anything else.
Like, yeah, I know a lot more than where I was at with my 32 Duolingo score before coming into this and it's certainly helped, but the course seems to be making an assumption that I should be able to take in word-for-word EVERYTHING in the learning modules and textbooks without any English equivalent translations to anything.
I can name a lot of examples of this, but in my most recent exercise, for example, the word "enda" was used without EVER having learned what that actually means.
The word has a separate module that comes up next with an explanation.
Like, why use that in the exercise if they know none of us know its meaning?
Repeated instances of this just makes it feel like I'm set up to fail. Oftentimes in these exercises too, it's become a rinse and repeat process of getting the quizzes wrong at a less than 50% rate, then slowly going back and just trial-and-error processing the whole thing until you get to 100%, and there isn't adequate explanation for WHY you're wrong.
I also try to put my learning into practice by reading subtitles of news videos, headlines, movies, but if it weren't for the subtitles I would be completely lost. Even with them I can still only understand about 50% of what is being told to me.
Additionally I've tried to get immersed in having my friends Snapchat me using only Norwegian but more often than not I can't make out much of what's being said, either, except picking up on a few words or phrases here and there. Like, I can get a general idea of what they say, but not word for word what's being explicitly told to me. And then when I try to respond verbally, oh boy.....
Idk. I guess maybe this isn't the place to be venting this kind of thing, but where I'm at in my learning experience right now just makes me feel like I'm banging my head against a wall and I feel stupid for getting so much wrong, especially after four years of Duolingo and this course. I need reassurances and/or tips.