Learning to read and write in Korean has definitely been challenging. I attribute the challenge to the grammar itself. Often in Korean, you have to read, write, and think backwards (from English). Since sentence structure is SOV, I can go through an entire chain of modifying verbs and adjectives before ever reaching the object of the sentence. One of the activities I've been focusing on with my language partner has been reading texts about 1-2 levels above my current ability to challenge myself. While reading, I look up unfamiliar words and grammar patterns and then discuss my "translation" or my comprehension with my language partner. From this, I've learning new reading techniques where I group words by grammatical function in order to streamline the comprehension process.
Writing and speaking are the two biggest components of my twice weekly Korean group lessons. However, the same issues with reading arise. Often I will write down a few words that I want to use and then rearrange them so they can fit in the grammatical structure correctly. In some cases I can write the sentence down correctly the first time but the rearrangement method is useful when using new grammar points where a reference is not available. Overall, it has been difficult to learn to read and write in Korean because it requires me to do some mental acrobatics. However, I do feel a great improvement compared to my ability at the beginning of the semester.
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