As I reflect on my experience with learning Korean throughout this semester, I have come to the conclusion that learning a language is incredibly difficult, especially a language like Korean. As I mentioned in my mid-semester reflection, my biggest challenge to overcome was finding the time to sit down and study only Korean for a couple hours. I need a lot of time to study Korean because it takes me forever to memorize new vocabulary and to make sure I can pronounce what i'm trying to say clearly. I mentioned before how there are almost no connections or patterns I can make that can help me memorize words more easily. With the inclusion of grammar in my studies, this has only become more difficult. Sentence structure is also very confusing because it's almost reversed compared to English. I have to completely rethink how I want to say something so that it makes sense in Korean.
Although I had a lot of difficulty learning Korean this semester, I definitely think I've improved overall. I can formulate basic sentences, but I'm still trying to improve on my speaking and accent. I think my writing has improved to a point where I'm rather satisfied with but obviously still needs a lot more improvement. Also my reading has slightly improved but not to a point where I'm satisfied with. I'm still a very slow reader but I can definitely see the improvement in my speed.
I enjoyed making and listening to the presentations we had to make for class. I was able to learn a lot more about Korean culture that I only had a little knowledge on before. I can't say what other things I want to learn about. It was usually the topics that were unique that grabbed my attention the most. However, I'm confident that over the summer I'll have enough free time to learn Korean and reach the goals I planned at the beginning of the semester.
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