Language Journal # 5 BTS Books
After what seemed forever my "LEARN KOREAN WITH BTS" books finally arrive at my dorm! There is a total of 4 books, all for level one, while my understanding of Korean may not entirely be at level one- the books were actually very helpful. It was a good place to begin to review and brush up on my basics as well as writing since there is a lot of fill-in-the-blank. The book comes with a notepad and a reading pen that when presses certain parts of the book reads and translates the writing. The reading pen was one of the greatest selling points since it can easily switch from Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Spanish, and English. Another major selling point was all the additional online content that comes along with the book, from concert videos to fun skits the book ties into these examples with a BTS video. It is very useful since it allows you to see that phrase or word in various different scenarios and the different ways a native speaker would say certain things. I often find that language textbooks feel so forced or fake and the actual language they are teaching does not coincide with how it is represented in the book.
Book 1 starts off with an intro to the Korean alphabet and a simple explanation of batchim 받침, which I thought was very helpful. 받침which is basically when the final consonant sound is different from the actual pronunciation so ㄱㅋㄲ all have a ㄱ sound at the bottom of a character. I think 받침 is a very important aspect of hangul you have to learn since it can affect your reading, pronunciation, and dictation. The ironic aspect of 받침 is that it is a great example since the ㄷ at the bottom would then make a ㅌ or T sound along with the ㅈㅅㅌㅆㅊ consonants.
Book 1 then goes into introducing yourself:안녕하세요 저는 ___ it then goes into the basic I am an American person 미국사감 introduction. They include fun quizzes and an interactive what-if situation where you reply to a BTS member. The chapter moves onto a very very brief introduction on topic particles that would be very challenging for someone who is starting to learn Korean. They also include a culture point of how to respectfully great others especially the differences from introducing yourself to an older person versus a younger one. This is another one of the books selling points is each chapter having a very in-depth but simple cultural point.
The second chapter deals with transportation and asking others is they have subway card 교통카드가 있어요? As the book continues to follow our main character Bora 보라 she travels through Korea and has accidentally lost her subway card. The Learn Korean with BTS Book does a good job of continuing that narrative of Bora and her adventures, overall I would say this book would be a very good supplemental reason that would do a much better job as a compliment to another textbook.
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