Reflect on your learning experiences this semester.
(a) What insights have you gained about yourself as a language learner and cultural explorer? What did you find difficult? What have you enjoyed? How will you continue your learning?
I have learned a few things about myself and my learning style over this past semester. One thing I learned is that I work better when I have a textbook or complete language learning resource. Using an online service was often too little for me and left me having questions and wishing I could cross-reference things but that is often not possible online. Furthermore, using online resources can be distracting due to the ease of accessing a different website and just procrastinating. Also, I can retain information much better when I make time daily to study Korean, however, my schedule this semester has rarely permitted that so I have found that to be frustrating. In the future, I would set aside 30-1 hour a day to just focus on studying. However, I’m not sure how possible that will be once entering the workforce. I would say that this time restrain was the most difficult part of my learning process because I would often have to spend a lot of time refreshing the last lesson before moving forward with a new element. Also, I have felt my speaking get much worse since leaving Korea simply because I don’t use it as often as I used to. In Korea, I would have to practice speaking prompts often so that I could prepare myself for ordering food, asking for something at a store, etc. In terms of culture, this semester I spent a lot of time listening to Korean news and reading Korean cultural articles. I think that this has really helped me understanding Korean life better because these topics simply aren’t discussed in English. I listen to the daily Korean news every evening while doing homework so it has been nice to see the daily progress of new events and be able to discuss these events with my Korean friends. I hope to continue studying this so that I can understand Korean daily life and culture better.
I will continue my learning by continuing with the books I ordered and reading articles in Korean. I often use the app HelloTalk to find new people to practice Korean with, especially people whose English is not so good. It’s nice to speak with a range of people and get exposure to different style of Korean texting and casual speech. Since, I have accepted a job in Korea recently, I hope that will further push me to learn more and I hope to take some night classes while living in Korea.
(b) Which readings and learning activities did you find most useful? What would you like to learn more about?
I found the cultural presentations the most interesting just because they push us to fully flesh out our interests but also because you can learn about things you didn’t consider before. For example, I never really considered the lower school system in Korea but it was nice to learn about it. These types of projects are nice because it is nice to learn about other people’s interests. Furthermore, I enjoyed the readings about dying languages and how to save them. I have never really considered the concept of language preservation and what that entails.
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