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I already went into introducing myself in my second artifact, so I focused on introducing my family in this post.
제가족에는, 엄마, 아빠, 언니와 동생네명이있어요. 저의 아빠와엄마는 Virginia Beach에 사시고, 아빠는 software engineer이고, 엄마는 life coach이세요. 저의언니Lisa는 23살이에요. Lisa는 Northern Virginia에 살고요, 7월달에 civil engineer으로서 일을시작했어요. 제 동생들중에서, 2명은 여동생들이고, 2명은 남동생이에요. 여동생 이름들은 Angelie (20살)와 Alyssa (18살) 이에요. 남동생 이름들은 David (21살)와 Stephen (16살) 이에요. 여동생 두명은 대학생이고, Angelie는 Boston University에 다니고, Alyssa는 Indiana University에 다녀요. 남동생 David은 독일에서 살고있고, Stephen은 고등학교 3학년이에요.
Translation:
In my family, I have my mom, dad, older sister and 4 younger siblings. My mom and dad lives in Virginia Beach, and my dad is a software engineer and my mom is a life coach. My older sister Lisa is 23 years old. She lives in Northern Virginia, and started work as a civil engineer in July. Out of my younger siblings, two are girls and two are boys. The names of my younger sisters are Angelie (20 years old) and Alyssa (18 years old). My younger brothers' names are David (21 years old) and Stephen (16 years old). My younger sisters are college students, and Angelie goes to Boston University and Alyssa goes to Indiana University. My younger brother David lives in Germany, and Stephen is in 11th grade.
Improving my Korean skills is something I have wanted to do since high school. I never had a lot of exposure to Korean, or had any Korean friends since moving to the US when I was 9, and was frustrated that I seemed to be losing all the Korean knowledge I once had. However, with my class-load in addition to my extra-curricular activities, it was hard to find the motivation to teach myself Korean. Therefore, this semester being enrolled with self-directed learning was a great opportunity for me. With going to my SDLC 105 class and meeting my language partner every week, it was a good opportunity and motivation for me to work on improving my skills. While it was technically an autonomous class, I didn't really feel like it was since I had help from my language partner every week to motivate my learning. However, this class was different in that I got to set my own goals for the semester, and decide how I wanted to reach my goals based on how I know I learn best. Therefore, because I was able to learn more by reading real articles, and talking to my language partner, I feel that my pace of learning was much more effective, since I do have a background in Korean.
Being enrolled in SDLC 105 definitely was more beneficial than I originally expected. Because there were students learning a variety of languages, I was able to learn about a lot of other cultures which was very interesting. We were also able to learn about the "science" of learning a language. It was interesting to learn about whether learning a language makes you smarter, the "best" way to learn a language, as well as the history of different languages. In terms of the culture project, I didn't expect to learn a lot because I was presenting on the lifestyle in Korea, which is something I personally experienced in Korea. However, it was interesting to realize that because I haven't lived in Korea in 13 years, a lot of things have obviously changed. Korea has gotten more competitive as a whole, and schools have gotten even more difficult. When I lived in Korea, while I did spend a lot of time studying, I had time for piano and dance classes. However, it seems that now Korea has come to a place where even elementary school aged children have little time for anything outside of studying.
In terms of moving from the basic linguistic principles to specifics of Korean, I think it was different for me because I have a pretty heavy background in Korean. My goals were different from most of the other students I took 105 with in that I wanted to improve on the skills I already had. One of my goals however, was to learn more of the rules in Korea because my knowledge of Korean grammar is basically "use whatever sounds right." Through working with my language partner, I was able to learn some of the actual Korean grammar rules which is great because now I have background into why the sentences are structured the way they are.
As I suspected in the beginning of the semester, I definitely still feel that I learn languages better by doing hands-on activities like actually speaking in Korean, instead of just reading a textbook. Therefore, by having weekly conversations with my language partner, I definitely have reached my goal of being more comfortable speaking in Korean. It was great because he also gave me more tips on how to improve like giving myself a speech about a specific topic. The most difficult part of the semester was probably measuring my improvement. Because I already had a background in Korean, it was kind of hard to measure my improvement based on how many words I know or if I had learned how to form basic sentences like a beginner would. It was sometimes difficult to be motivated in the middle of the semester because it sometimes felt like while I was working towards improving my skills, it was difficult to measure exactly what I could and couldn't do compared to the beginning of the semester. However, when it came to the end of my semester, it became a lot easier to see my improvements that I had made.
Most of the resources available to me were not as useful because they were geared towards novice learners. Therefore, I mostly went to the internet and watched news clips, variety shows, and read news articles in order to improve my Korean skills. It was definitely useful, and the most helpful this semester besides actually meeting with my language partner for hands-on practice. I feel like reading and watching these resources definitely has improved my understanding of the Korean grammar and also improved my Korean skills.
I haven't decided as to whether I will be enrolling in SDLC 111, as it will depend on whether I have room in my schedule. However, whether I decide to enroll or not, I definitely plan on improving my Korean further. I plan to motivate myself to write something in Korean every week, and maybe catch myself up on current events in Korean instead of English a couple times a week. I think it will be difficult to keep motivating myself especially after graduation especially since I will be working somewhere which requires a lot of time and commitment. However, with the skills I have learned this semester as a self-directed learner, I hope to continue working to become a truly "fluent" korean speaker.
One of the biggest goals I had this semester was to improve on my reading and writing skills. Especially with writing, I have done very little to no writing since I was 9, making it very difficult to write anything without a lot of spelling and grammatical errors. This semester, I definitely worked on improving that skill by practicing writing simple paragraphs and having my learning partner correct it. For reading, it was something I also struggled with, especially if it included more complicated vocabulary. It was also difficult for me to read out loud without stumbling. This semester, I worked to improve my skills by practicing reading out loud, as well as reading more news articles. While doing these exercises have definitely improved my skills, I definitely think that I still have more work to do before I get to my ultimate goals.
After reading the two articles: "Are Bilinguals Really Smarter?" and "Why Bilinguals are Smarter," I definitely see how knowing two languages can work your brain more. Especially in the first few years when I was learning English, I was forced to first think of what I wanted to say in Korean and then translate it into English, which I can see how it would work your brain more on a very constant basis. However, I'm not fully convinced that just because you are bilingual, you are "smarter" where it will significantly benefit you in society. Maybe you'd be able to solve puzzles faster, but I haven't been able to see how it really benefits in society. However, I definitely realize that being bilingual can help you in society in the way that it is another skill you can bring into the workforce and enhances your resume. I did think it was interesting that one of the articles mentioned how people used to believe that teaching a child a new language can delay their development because it can confuse them. This is something that has definitely never crossed my mind, and it's interesting to see how people's opinions on being bilingual have changed over the years.
Final Reflection – SDLAP 105
In the process of my Korean language learning journey, I decided to stop taking the SDLAP 110 course. I decided that the amount of coursework that the class required was a lot more than I had expected and that I probably would not have been able to expend as much energy into the class that was needed. As a result, my progress in learning the language afterwards has been limited to watching Korean reality TV shows, such as The Return of Superman, Korean dramas, such as She Was Pretty, and listening to Korean music such as K-pop and Korean ballads from dramas that I watch/watched. So as a language learner of the SDLAP 105 course, I really enjoyed my time going to class because I got to learn about Korean language and culture from different perspectives by listening to my classmates present on their chosen topics concerning Korean culture during in-class presentations. In addition to having the opportunity to learn about Korean culture in class, I also had the opportunity to learn about different cultural practices in other places of the world, such as in Italy and in Pakistan. In addition to this, I also got to learn a little more about American Sign Language (ASL), a topic I never knew much about prior to being in this class.
About myself as a language learner, I have learned that I really require a lot of time to just focus on learning my target language, by itself, without any distractions by the work that is due for other classes. However, I was also reaffirmed of my interests in wanting to learn about other cultures around the world, and not just Korean culture. Additionally, it was really interesting to hear about other histories in class. Personally, I did not find much difficulty in completing the required coursework for the class after I dropped the SDLAP 110 course. I really liked the independence that the class allotted to students – all work being due at the end of the semester. I found this aspect of the class very appealing because I do not like have set due dates for work every single week.
In the future I hope to continue my study of Korean by studying the language and teaching English (or Elementary Education) abroad. This summer, I am planning on going to Korea for about six weeks to study the language and experience the culture first-hand. I am really looking forward to the opportunity because not only will I be travelling to one of my top destinations, I will be traveling outside of the United States for the very first time. It is all exciting and nerve-wrecking at the same time because I pride myself on being culturally open here in the U.S., and I wonder what my reaction to an environment outside of my comfort zone will be like.
In class, I found the reading about lost and endangered languages the most helpful and intriguing because I am really interested in people’s histories, and the article showed how histories live on through people through their language, and it has inspired me to read further on the topic.
My final learning plan is as follows:
Grammar:
1. Pronouns (formal/informal)
2. Conjugation of verbs in past present and future
3. Adjectives
4. Sentence structure and endings of words
Tasks:
1. Tell time
2. Count objects
3. Read easy texts
4. Write about someone
5. Describe actions and pictures
Since I decided to drop out of the SDLAP 110 course near the beginning of the semester, I never had the time to try to read or right in my target language. Instead, I focused mainly on my listening skills and trying to gain new vocabulary words in that way. Hopefully these skills will be improved on sometime in the future.
I do not particularly agree that being bilingual makes an individual smarter than someone who speaks only one language. However, since the brains of bilinguals are wired to interpret concepts in two languages at all times, bilinguals therefore exercise their brains more than people who speak a single language. Their brains are more readily to readjust the way it understands things by creating new pathways in the brain in a process called neuroplasticity. For example, if a bilingual person had a disease such as Alzheimer’s, it would perhaps take the disease longer to have an effect on the individual since he or she would possess an alternative way to interpret things.
During my time in this class, I have learned several new words in my target language of Korean including jib (집) for ‘house,’ mannaseo bangapseumnida (만나서 반갑습니다) for ‘nice to meet you,’ nabi (나비) for ‘butterfy,’ nalssinhan (날씬한) for ‘slim,’ mulgogi (물고기) for ‘fish,’ and podo (포도) for ‘grapes.’ I have learned many of these words through listening to Korean music like children nursey rhymes and watching Korean dramas and reality TV shows. Some words were also acquired as a result of researching a topic for my in-class presentations and by listening to other students’ presentations on their chosen topics. My goals for acquiring new vocabulary has been through immersing myself in the language my watching and listening to Korean media, and so far I think that I have been gradually picking out new words after hearing them being used and repeated frequently.
(105 & 110) How did you evolve as an autonomous/self-directed language learner? Did you develop your skills as an observer of other cultures? How did the cultural project help you relate the products, practices, and perspectives of a culture? Were you able to move from basic linguistic principles (language families, language structures, etc.) to the specifics of the language you are studying? (110) What was your progress in meeting the goals of your learning plan?
I feel that this semester really challenged me on autonomous/self-directed language learning. In the past, I have tried to teach myself Korean, but through this program, I have learned to be more disciplined with myself. It was easy in the past to just leave it on the side but this semester (I think also due to having a language partner) I was more intentional on being consistent with learning Korean by myself. I am also studying abroad in Korea in the spring, so I think my fear of not being able to communicate has been a real fear that has worked to benefit myself so that I have been on top of all my language goals and practicing everything I am learning.
From my time in SDLC 105 I would say that I did develop some skills as an observer of other cultures. I never thought about language in some ways my other peers had to learn their language so that made me aware of my own native language, English, and Korean even more. I found it really striking to see similarities and differences in all the languages I know compared to the way others were learning their own language. Also, just as an outsider learning the Korean culture was eye-opening. I’ve been immersed in Korean Dramas and Korean music since the 5th grade (from my older sister) and it was still just as eye-opening to be reminded and introduced to aspects of the Korean culture that’s immensely different from the US and Hmong culture.
The cultural project was actually more informational than I thought it would be for myself. Since I have been exposed to all things Korean entertainment for so long, I thought I wouldn’t mostly learn anything new. But I never too notice or questioned all the editing into the making of a variety show. I’m still so astonished and impressed of the different ways they edit variety shows. And most of all, the reflection of the Korean language is so strong in the variety programs in Korea. Most of the things I noticed, trends and stuff, I knew from years of watching variety shows but also just being to see that it has a history of the same trends is amazing. Meaning that those aspects are very valued in the Korean society. Whew, mind-blown with this cultural project.
I feel that I was somewhat successful at moving from the basic linguistic principles to the specifics of the Korean language. I didn’t spend too much time exploring the specific grammar of Korean and what makes it so special. I felt that I definitely learned simple equations that worked for most grammatical structures but it wasn’t an in-depth and rich learning of the Korean language. Just enough learning of Korean to survive speaking in Korean.
The progress in meeting the goals of my learning plan were so on point each week. Suyeon Unnie was also just such a great support, I can’t thank her enough. We finished everything I wanted to learn while also being able to do review twice (once in the middle of the semester and our last week together). I personally need review to make sure that what I’m reiterating to myself is correct and that I am keeping myself on top of all the work I need to do. So it worked out great, our week to week language goals. I also think that if Suyeon Unnie wasn’t my language partner, that I wouldn’t have been so productive. She also provided handouts and videos each week so without her support I’m not sure it would have been so productive if I had to bring everything I wanted to do to her. So I owe many thanks to her!
I am really grateful to this self-directed language program on campus to have the opportunity to learn Korean before going abroad. When I return in Spring 2017, I most definitely want to take another Korean self-directed class. I am excited to see the progress of my Korean when I return back to the States from studying abroad. It will be so interesting to bring back a different perspective of the Korean culture once I am able to live in it. Thank you for a great semester!
The learning activity I created for Korean was the Korean numeric systems. I just counted with my fingers both numeric systems and had everyone in class repeat after me. I also explained the differences in use of each numeric system. There are two systems, I guess you could refer to one as formal and the other informal. Mainly, understanding which number system to use is just something one picks up on so it is complicated for novice learners since there's no rule.
(1) which resources you used
The resources I used for this semester was mainly the textbooks and workbooks found in the Global Studio. In the beginning of the semester, I spent a whole night in the Global Studio going through the textbooks and scanning things pertinent to my novice learning skills. There were a lot of great workbook activities I took (such as letters, vocabulary with pictures, and simple grammar introductions). For me, I really enjoy something tangible when learning a language, so the printed pages were of greater help than online resources. I did use a Korean learning app on my phone that was really useful. I would listen to vocabulary and phrases and speak them when I had time to kill in between my schedule. Also, Suyeon Unnie found a YouTuber who did mini-lessons in Korean which were really authentic Korean and not so much textbook ancient Korean. So I used this YouTuber's videos to help guide me with learning Korean as well, so it was really fun and useful.
(2) how you worked with your language partner
To start off, I had the greatest language partner ever!!! I love Suyeon Unnie so much!!! She's the best!!! Unnie and I spent two days a week together, ranging from one hour to two and a half hours. Sometimes, we'd be so deep into learning that two and a half hours went by. She was so patient with me, I appreciated that a lot. I'm a very auditory learner, so I would repeat after her a lot. As well, Unnie would record the week's worth of learning and I would listen to it and follow it by ear when I studied Korean. She also printed out vocabulary and phrases for me (that followed that week's learning goal) so her resources for the weekly meetings were also great resources for me. Suyeon Unnie and I did more speaking than reading and writing. We got the alphabet down but didn't explore more because my main goal was to be able to have survival language for my time abroad in Korea. I would say that it was a great semester of Korean!!!
Suyeon Unnie, gomawo!!! Saranghae!!! <3
(3) activities you found most/least effective
The activities I found the most effective were the audio activities I did with Korean. I also appreciated the visual aspects of learning Korean too. There's learning blocks in the Global Studio I found really effective to play with when I was in the INTC trying to kill time before class or just in that part of campus. It was especially fun to try and figure out the map. The least effective were the written Korean activities. This makes sense since I stressed speaking more than writing in most of my learning tasks for this semester.
As I looked at the different national holidays the following things stood out:
1. The celebration of Chuseok and Seollal start off with ancestral rites. This shows how much Koreans respect their ancestors. Moreover, they also look up to them for blessings and for the well-being of the family. They also clean the graves regularly and also go through elaborate preparation for the rituals.
2. Food is a big part of such holidays where a wide range of traditional dishes, using natural and fresh ingredients.
3. The preparation for these holidays usually start the day before which shows its significance in Korean culture.
4. The importance of family in Korean culture is also very noticeable as they always tend to get together to celebrate holidays.
5. The Koreans also value their traditions and roots a lot as they tend to play folk games and wear traditional clothes during the holidays.
These are some worksheets I did for introductions. I found them to be very helpful since there were different exercises practicing/going over the same vocabulary, but with different arrangements.
Korean Independence
This holiday is celebrated on August 15th and it commemorates the liberation of Korea from 35 years of Japanese colonization in 1945. In Korean, this day is called Gwangbokjeol. "Gwangbok" means "restoration of light" and "jeol" means "a period of time". This day was officially declared as a public holiday in 1949 and it is one of the few public holidays that is celebrated by both South and North Korea. However, in North Korea it is called "Jogook haebang-ui nal" which means "the liberation day of the motherland".
In South Korea, an official ceremony takes place at the Independence Hall of Korea in Cheonan or at the Sejong Center for the Performing Arts. The South Korean national flag, Taegukki, is displayed in all buildings and homes. Most public museums and places are open free of charge to the descendants of independence activists on this day. They can also travel on public transport and trains for free.
The Korean national anthem is sung at official ceremonies. The government also issues special pardons on the Independence Day.
