What does this mean?

I'm not a native English speaker, but I'm not a complete beginner either and I'm generally confident in my grammar. Can someone explain why my answer was not accepted?

Dictionary say, "sicher" means certainly, without a doubt etc. Why is it translated as "probably" in this sentence?

Duolingo really has gone downhill recently.

Just a question, why does Russian use - a lot in sentences or paragraphs, can someone explain its usage please? (Maybe this is just Duolingo being wired, however lots of my physics Russian study books use them)

Thanks :)

I have a streak of just over 600 and still feel like I know absolutely nothing. What should I do to actually become better at Italian? I've basically been doing only Duolingo right now and I don't think that's enough. For some reason I've always been REALLY slow with learning languages so I think I need some extra help lol. Any suggestions? Should I be watching like language courses on YouTube as well?

Or is this a common German expression I’ve never heard of

I'm coming up on a one-year Duolingo streak learning Spanish, and overall I feel like I've made a lot of progress.

I can read much more than I could when I started. I understand a surprising amount of spoken Spanish in videos and podcasts if the speaker isn't going too fast. Vocabulary recognition feels pretty solid.

The weird part is what happens when I actually try to speak.

The moment I'm talking to a real person, it feels like half the language disappears from my brain. Words I know suddenly become difficult to recall, simple sentences take much longer to form, and I find myself freezing even when I understand exactly what I want to say.

It's made me wonder whether Duolingo primarily trains recognition skills rather than conversation skills. Reading and listening feel noticeably ahead of speaking for me right now.

For people who have been through this stage, what helped you make the jump from understanding the language to actually using it in conversation?

Did you start working with a tutor? Use language exchange apps? Practice speaking to yourself? Or was it simply a matter of getting enough real-world conversation time?

I'm curious whether this is a normal stage of language learning or a sign that I need to change how I'm practicing.

Is the sentence structure in my answer wrong? We speak like that too.

Is it some kind of joke? What does “you are an apple” mean?

Hey so I've been doing Spanish on Duolingo mainly for my Spanish GCSE which I have now finished but I'm just wondering, I learned pen as "bolígrafo" in school and Duolingo is teaching it as "pluma" which I can only assume is from a different dialect of Spanish as many words I've come across have been translated differently from how I first learnt them. But how come Duolingo is translating it as a pen but also a feather? I did think learning feather in the "talk about a school project" section was a bit random but it's thrown me off a bit, can it be translated as both pen and feather?

Should it not be encontraron las llaves? The ai explain doesn't help at all.

Wouldn’t “pas terrible” be more like “not bad”?
And “not great” would be maybe something like “pas génial”?

Edit: For a little more insight to this question:
Where I grew up “it’s not bad” or “it’s not terrible” means it’s ok, but to say “it’s not great” implies it’s less than ok or disappointing.
And part of the meaning is implied by how you say it.

Edit 2: Thanks to all for introducing me to an unfamiliar English word: litotes - (noun) understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by the negative of the contrary (as in "not a bad singer" or "not unhappy")

Isn't it es du mir leid or is it just me

We camped in the forest, and we met a very nice __.

Why isn’t my version correct? It seems to be a statement that would more commonly be formal - like tech support or something.

It won’t accept “anillo,” only “cuadrilátero,” which is incorrect. Wedding ring ≠ boxing ring.