At the beginning of the semester I was extremely excited about this class because Korean was a language I have always wanted to learn. However, the lack of a class which taught Korean was always a problem. Therefore I was overjoyed when I learned about this class from Gargi. However, I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about the learning experience.
The last day that I met with Sun, we made a list of the things that we have learned during the semester. Comparing the list with the learning plan that I created at the beginning of the semester, I realized only half of my goals have been accomplished. At this point, I can safely say that I can recognize all the letters of the alphabet but I still have problems remembering the different combinations of vowels. Although I will be able to write the letters and write down words, I do not have the confidence to say that they will be totally correct. The same goes for reading. I know the pronunciation of the consonants and vowels but when I encounter a word which uses a double consonants or a combination of vowels, I get stuck.
This is because most of the books and online resources that I have used include the romanization of the Korean words right beside their Korean counterparts. Hence I would always tend to read the romanization whenever I got stuck reading the Korean characters. As a result, I had hardly challenged myself with reading difficult Korean words.
Apart from that, I have learned how introduce myself and ask questions like name, age, nationality, greet people, order food at a restaurant and tell the Sino-Korean numbers from 1 to 10. Among the things that was not able to accomplish this semester but which I mentioned in my Learning Plan are telling time, shopping, ask for directions and describe people. Moreover, I had mentioned that I would like to know the gist of a short conversation, even if I do not understand what they are talking about in great detail and to hold a small exchange with a person in Korean.
As far as understanding the core of a conversation in Korean, I think I have developed a sufficiently big list of Korean words which are used on a daily basis from watching Korean dramas to have a basic idea of what is going on in conversation. I have also developed a list of expressions and fillers that can be used to keep a small conversation going with minimal contribution from my part. However, I am still very weak at reading a short text and understanding its overall idea.
The reason for my failure to meet all of my goals can be attributed to the fact that I was not aware of the risks of autonomous learning. Since learning Korean mostly depended on my drive to learn the language and my ability to dedicate some time to Korean on a daily basis, I often found myself pushing it back to the end of my list of priorities. Also, I was confused for some time by the language itself. The several different ways of saying one single thing was a major hindrance as I would try to learn all the different forms. Thus, at first, my focus was perfection and details. However, I took me a while to realize that perfection can only be aspired at the intermediate stage of language learning. As a beginner, I should only focus on the basics.
I definitely plan on continuing to self-teach myself Korean over the summer, as I would have more to dedicate towards it. However, I have learned the techniques of self-directed learning which I will be able to apply in my future studies.
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