How have you started writing in the target language? Do you prefer to type or write free hand? Have you started to see patterns emerge in the structures between words, clauses, and sentences? What is the relationship between simple and complex sentences? How does your knowledge of parts of speech, government, and agreement affect your ability to communicate in written contexts? Provide a sample of several short meaningful writing exercises from your target language.
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I've started writing short sentences, but nothing beyond that. I've found it really challenging to write longer words and phrases as they tend to be compounded together. As well as this, I still have a limited vocabulary, so as most written Hebrew omits vowels, it's easy to mistake different words for each other, and then whatever I'm writing makes little sense. Luckily, Hebrew tends to follow the same general writing structure as English, so I don't have to completely reprocess how I understand a sentence. Though as I said, this is primarily for simple sentences; I look forward to learning more!
In terms of learning things more generally, I've found that I remember words or phrases much easier if I write them out, as simply writing lines can help my brain remember the form of the words so it's easier for me to write or read. Taking this step to start writing with simple sentences has helped a lot for every day terms and phrases.
Writing was one of the first aspects of the Korean language I acquired as reading and understanding Hangul is an extremely necessary first step. Typing requires a completely new understanding of a standard keyboard, so even with Korean character stickers on the keys, I still much, much more prefer writing even though my penmanship leaves a lot to be desired. Forming sentences as simple as they may be, has allowed a very basic knowledge of Korean sentence structure. Where an English sentence typically requires a subject, verb, and object in that order, Korean uses the SVO often omitting the subject altogether. It’s not “I eat the apple” it’s simply “eat apple” it’s not “I’m here” but “here”. Writing has taught me that Korean is a very action driven language, a verb goes a long way when correlating meaning.
As for complex sentences, I am still not fully in tune. Sentences aren’t quite formed in the same ways as they are in English, per my understanding. I have trouble grasping when, where and why punctuation is used, specifically in the case of periods. Sometimes it seems that sentences can go on for as long as the author wants it to. At other times sentences seem as if they are more comparable to poetry stanzas in English. Regardless of how much I have to clarify and learn as far as writing goes, the act of simply forming and trying to imitate sentences helps a great deal with my interpersonal communication.
I started writing in Korean by learning how to write the individual hangul letters freehand. Even though I started out with handwriting, I am now more comfortable with typing in Korean because I only ever write in Korean when I am texting on my phone. That being said, I am not able to type Korean on my laptop yet because I don't have the Korean characters indicated on my keyboard. When I am texting in Korean, I also find myself relying on auto-correct to fix my spelling or spacing. I find that I have the most difficulty when I am trying to spell words that have ambiguous sounds. For example, 계획, which means "plan" is tricky to spell because the pronunciation itself is difficult. It sounds like 'gye-hoeg' . The 계 (gye) in this word sounds similar to 개 (ge) in 개인 (ge-in). But replacing one with the other would be completely wrong.
I also just type Korean on my phone, I have had no reason to physically write it. I think the suggested words that show up on the phone keyboard definitely helps, and without it I probably would have made a lot of errors. Its the same for me for computer keyboards, lots of times I just end up copy pasting since writing out Korean on the keyboard is tedious as I don't know where the characters are
I have started writing (typing) in my target language but sort of gave up on putting focus into it as it felt a bit too out of reach. I definitely prefer to type Korean as I don't have to worry about my handwriting or smushing characters together. I especially hate using ㄹ because it really messes up my handwriting, especially when writing it as the bottom consonant. There is also a proper stroking pattern for Korean which makes it even more annoying to write free hand. Not having Korean keycaps was one of the reasons I also decided to lay off on learning to type in Korean. Jannette and I decided to instead focus more on texting daily to sort of gradually build muscle memory. One pattern that is pretty obvious is the repetition of certain words/phrases when speaking in different levels of formality or politeness. 요 for example is basically at the end of every sentence when speaking in a polite tone. For example, when saying I'm glad I met you
Formal and polite: 만나서 반갑습니다
Formal and casual: 만나서 반갑다
Informal and polite: 만나서 반가워요
Informal and casual: 만나서 반가워
습니다 is another common ending that often replaces 요 as a formal + polite tone. You may also notice that when you are not speaking politely you don't add these endings.
I do have a good general sense of parts of speech, government, and agreement but I do have trouble like most non-fluent Koreans with spacing out my writing. It's honestly so confusing and I don't ever remember a set rule in spacing out words/phrases.
I haven't really done many writing exercises as that hasn't been my main focus. But I do try my best to interact with Jannette using Korean text. Like I would type 우리 언제 만나 which means when are we meeting. My vocab learning has mostly been through quizlet so I don't believe that counts as writing exercises. Now that I think about it, I should probably put some emphasis on practicing my writing.
I think typing Korean is also a really important skill to have. When I was in Korea, I had to type in a lot of places and directions in Korean using the Korean keyboard and I remember how frustrated I was to have to look for every character and not knowing where each one is. But after some forced practice, I realized that I got faster at typing. In addition to typing, I'd really like to learn cursive, although that may be more for advanced learners.
Hi Benjamin,
You should definitely check out the Korean resources in the Global Studios for addition help in vocal, writing, topics, etc. I am the same way when writing ㄹ! However, I did improve over time compared to when I first started. As a beginner in Korean, I did find it difficult to type Korean on a keyboard because there was no relationship between the key "S" to the "S" sound in Korean. I do know that there are silicone keyboard skins that contain Korean letters on them, so that could be helpful if you would like to practice more on typing.
I don’t normally write in my target language, but I can if needed. What I’ve noticed is that my writing proficiency is far behind any of my other skills, and this is probably due to the lack of need to write in Korean. The only time I need to write in Korean is through text, and autofill is a lifesaver. What I have problems with, and I’m sure many others do at first too, is ㅔ and ㅐ. In ipa transcription, these are /e/ and /ε/ accordingly. In common speech, these are pronounced very similarly, and the difference is actually becoming less distinct. There are grammatical differences, but because of the way Korean words come together, it's hard sometimes to differentiate which of the two to use.
If I can’t find the word I’m trying to use, or can’t seem to write out a certain phrase without certainty, I try to use a different phrase/word. I also struggle with spacing in writing - when speaking, it comes naturally and usually correctly, but that doesn’t necessarily translate correctly in writing. Thankfully, I think I have a decent enough grasp of it all to formulate the right words.
Because I want to focus solely on comprehension/communication, I don’t do writing exercises, although I really should. I suppose the first step would be to be more mindful when reading, and see how the words are formed when writing. Constant reading and writing practice would definitely improve my writing skills. Like most languages though, formal writing and casual writing, especially in the form of communication, vary, so my writing may come off as very traditional or formal.
Yeah, the autofill is definitely a lifesaver for me too. Sometimes I also prefer to just use speech-to-text or just send a voice message over.
I also struggle a lot more with writing Korean than I do with reading, listening, and speaking. I agree that the spacing of the words is tricky and I often have to rely on autocorrect when I am texting in Korean. I also get confused withㅔ andㅐall the time since they sound similar.
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