Built by a tutor and a learner
Mishka exists because we couldn't find a Russian learning app that actually worked past the beginner level. So we built one.
The team
Mishka was built by two people: Lera (Valeriia), a certified Russian language tutor, and James, an intermediate Russian learner and developer.
Lera creates every lesson. She holds a teaching certificate in Russian as a foreign language and a bachelor's degree from Moscow State Linguistic University, plus a master's in educational sciences from the University of Vienna. She has taught Russian to students of all levels and knows exactly where intermediate learners get stuck.
James tests everything from a learner's perspective. As someone actively working through intermediate Russian, he makes sure the lessons are clear, the difficulty progression feels right, and nothing is confusing for the wrong reasons.
You can find Lera's independent tutoring work at learnwithvaleriia.com, on Instagram, and on TikTok.
Why we built Mishka
Every Russian learning app on the market does a decent job getting you through the alphabet and basic phrases. But once you finish those beginner lessons, you're on your own. The content runs out. The grammar gets harder. And nobody seems to be building for you anymore.
Lera saw this with her own students. They would show up to tutoring sessions having "finished" Duolingo but unable to follow a real conversation. The gap between what apps teach and what intermediate learners need is enormous.
So we decided to fill it. Mishka covers A1 through C1, but it's built specifically for the A2-and-above learner who's ready for real content: stories with recurring characters, grammar that builds on itself, AI conversation practice, and writing exercises with actual feedback.
How lessons are made
Every lesson in Mishka goes through the same process:
- Lera writes the lesson based on what she knows works from years of one-on-one tutoring
- James works through it as a learner and flags anything unclear or too easy or too hard
- The lesson gets tested with additional intermediate learners for feedback
- Lera revises based on what the testers found confusing or unhelpful
This is how you end up with 231+ stories, 181 grammar lessons, and 122+ conversation missions that actually work, not auto-generated content or repurposed beginner material.
What we believe
Your study time is valuable. We don't pad lessons with filler to make the app feel bigger. Every story, every grammar exercise, and every conversation mission exists because it teaches something specific that intermediate learners need.
Grammar should be taught in context, not in isolation. You learn cases by seeing them in stories and practicing them in exercises, not by memorizing charts.
An app should keep going as you get better. Mishka has content from A1 to C1 because learning Russian doesn't stop at B1.