Within this past month, I have planned my learning schedule, started my learning journey, and connected with my learning partner. In building my learning plan, I tried to focus more heavily on my current level and struggles in Korean and what resources will not only improve but arouse my interest in learning. The resources I am currently using are YouTube videos (news and shows), films (mostly Netflix), Naver (new articles), and connecting with my partner, Vivian.
I have started a Netflix show called “The Glory” which is about a young woman who is seeking revenge after getting bullied in high school. Although I just started, it seemed like bullying happens quite often in high schools in Korea. Currently, I am starting off with English captions to get used to the flow of the drama. Another activity that I did alone was reading a news article on Naver every day.
During the first meeting with my language partner, we talked about the semester overview and which areas I needed improvement on. We planned our meetings according to the four sections, cultural, reading, writing, and speaking aspects. We have decided to meet every Monday to go over my weekly writings, watch or read the news, and have casual conversations. More specifically, my language partner will help me improve my fluency, grammar, and pronunciation.
Once we were settled with my learning objectives and my learning schedule, we started our learning journey.
During our meetings, we practiced having casual conversations talking about how my week was, and reading news articles. An example of a casual conversation we had was about how my birthday celebration went. I described what I did during the celebration such as eating out, drinking in America for the first time, and hanging out with my friends.
Some terms I learned that are commonly used for birthdays are 생파 and 생축 which are shortened words for the phrases, “birthday party” and “happy birthday.” Vivian and I also talked about the legal age differences in America and Korea. We felt like Korea had more trust in college students with legal activities than in America.
Another activity that we focused on was reading the news coverage together to review the terms, pronunciation, and flow. We read a piece of news on one of our favorite actor, Song Jun Ki, and his new partner and their pregnancy. The vocabulary terms that we went over were 신뢰 (trust), 직종(occupation), 열정(passion), and 덧붙였다(add on). The first three words were definitely more advanced than the words that I would normally use. For example, the word 믿음 is a way I would normally define as “trust.” The last word, 덧붙였다, was a spelling I would have gotten wrong. When we pronunciation it, I would have used the character “ㅊ” instead of “ㅇ” and my partner taught me that “였다" would be the typical ending for formal writing.
I was quite surprised that I was able to understand most of the news, except for the few terms I was unfamiliar with. However, I noticed that I found the pronunciation of complex words difficult. Next time I will focus on repeating the phrases and paragraphs to allow my mouth to accustom to the cutting syllables.
Comments
I have also watched "The Glory" and thought it was a very interesting drama. I also think putting off the english subtitles might be very helpful trying to learn the language. When reading your response I was reminded how many synonyms a Korean word could have and how each word could be represented as formal or informal.
I think it's very smart that you expose yourself to Korean every day. I like how you have a good balance of input and output in your language learning. You are reading a little bit each day and listening to Korean being spoken too. Also, I like how you focused on where you were currently and what you needed to do in order to most importantly keep yourself motivated to learn the language.