Tag Archives: How To Study Korean

[E-Book] How to self study Korean Version #1

4 March, 2013 8:22 PM \ 60 Comments \

Screen Shot 2013-03-02 at 2.55.09 PM

I’ve decided that if I don’t release the e-book in parts, I’ll never get to the end of writing it. hahaha.

I need some drive and motivation to write on and also, I’ll like to hear some feedback and comments! ^^

Also, I’ve been getting many queries on learning Korean these days, especially from beginners. I’ve covered many relevant topics in this version, so hopefully it will be helpful.

Okay there are so many ideas floating around my brain right now, it’s hard to be coherent.

First, the book.

The book idea is simple. I just want to share my experience of self study Korean and also to offer some tips and methods to help everyone self study Korean more effectively.

VERSION 1 covers topics from the very beginning to the beginner stage. The final work will definitely be much more than this and will cover from beginner to advanced stage. 

As I’m writing this book, I came to realize that writing is not easy and it’s hard to put everything in coherent and chronological writing. Very different from blog writing. I didn’t want this book to be an authoritative kind of HOW TO book, and I struggle very hard with trying to put that across in my writing – but failing badly. I tend to slip into that kind of writing style, with the authoritative tone. YOU SHOULD DO THIS. YOU SHOULD AVOID THAT. That is not my intention, and I definitely think that language learning is a fun process that you should explore and try out and find a learning style that is suitable for you. My method is not the only method but I just want to share my experiences to help everyone find their learning style. I can’t emphasize that more.

Writing this brings back many memories but sometimes I struggle to find back that original feeling. I try my best, but sometimes I tend to forget how it was like as a beginner and that sense of loss, uncertainty and the problems I faced back that. Looking at past entries helped, but sometimes it feels like I’m writing from the point of view as an advanced learner, and thus may have missed quite a number of important issues beginners faced.

I try to write from someone who have walked the path (hahaha), yet remember how it was like back then. ^^

In any case, I hope everyone will find this a good read and I will really appreciate comments / ideas on how to make this better.

  • my writing style (and my terrible grammar)
  • organization
  • sections to include
  • issues you want me to talk about (in the beginner section)
  • issues you want me to explore next time (for beginner / intermediate / advanced etc)
  • sharing your experience
  • general comments etc

Everything will be much appreciated.

NOTE: Please do not re-upload this to anywhere else. Always point people back to the original download link here. Also, please don’t steal my work -____- unfinished work doesn’t mean you can take the idea and claim that it’s yours.

NOTE: Photos are also MINE. I’m so scared to use any photos / logos because I’m not sure if that’s allowed or not. ><;; sorry for the lack of visuals!

—————

I’m not sure how the final product will be (or if it will see the daylight lol). But I am hoping this book can be a project that you guys can have a part in, not just solely my work. I want to have fun with this, and hopefully inspire more people to take up foreign language learning and to see that self studying Korean is not impossible!

Being an incredibly unpragmatic person, money making is not my priority, but I really hope to see it published (physical) next time :P Seeing my work in the bookstore is something that I really really want. Any publisher contacts, help etc will be super appreciated!

Let’s make this work ^^

DOWNLOAD THE E-BOOK VERSION 1 HERE (Scribd)

Alternatively, download it from Google Drive (file -> save)

ABSOLUTELY FREE since all that went into it is my time and effort ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ (and this is a draft)

p.s. giving myself a panic attack checking through all distribution restrictions / copyrights etc. I SCARED.

Posted in: Korean learning journey (:, Others / General \ Tagged: , , ,

Pens for my language notebooks

16 October, 2012 12:05 PM \ 17 Comments \

I can’t believe I’m blogging about this ^^; And perhaps you can’t believe why you are reading this too.

In case you are wondering why I’m doing this, I do get a lot of requests asking me what pens I use for my notebooks! :D And I’m secretly pleased, because I’m extremely particular about my stationery and over the years, I grew to have my favorites! So today I’ll be sharing and spreading the love for my fav stationery!!

In case you have not seen the video, check it out :D

And tada~! My pens!! :D

If you have been following the blog, you would know that I change colors and pens at times. But one neverchanging pen is the dark blue pen in the photo!

BLUE

I swear by the SARASA CLIP series by ZEBRA. And I love the 0.4 series. Seriously, I have been using it for years and I think I’ll seriously have a breakdown if they stop producing them. I love its unique dark blue ink and it writes really smoothly, with no smudges. Water doesn’t do much to it either. ^^ In fact, it’s THE fav pen for me and I’ll never use anything else, for ink blue pens!

As you can see from the photo, I have the 0.5 series in 2 other colors. Because the bookstore I happened to go to didn’t have the 0.4 series. D: D: I’m a fan of thin tips, so that took some time to get used to

Retails for $1.75 at Kinokuniya Singapore and $1.80 in Popular bookstores. If you have the Popular card, I guess it’s cheaper?

(I can’t believe that I’m advertising for pens on the blog -.-, but since I’m talking about it, I might as well share everything 0.o)

RED

Another series that I really love is the 0.28 uni-ball Signo DX series by Mitsubishi Pencil and it’s made in Japan. The set of 3 was given to me by a close friend for my birthday last year in Korea!! :D :D I’ve been using them faithfully!  I especially love the red one~ The pens, even though thin tipped, is very smooth and no scratchy feeling on the paper. If you get what I mean. Not very suitable for those who tends to write with force, since you might either break the tip or something. Be careful with these, might spoil if you dropped them.

BLACK

I LOST MY BLACK PEN. -.- And I’m too lazy to replace it and perhaps too broke. I still have other pens at home, so I’m making do with those. I have no photo, but it’s the Pilot Precise P-500 / P-700 series! I don’t have a picture, so here’s the site!! I love the P-500 series, since it’s a much thinner tip! It’s a really smooth pen too~! I used to be fond of the blue one too, but too bad I have a new fav :P

Be careful with them too, the tip can be quite fragile if you drop them too often!

Have you seen this video? It features my notebook too!

There~ I hope you enjoyed this!

All in all, I can’t believe I wrote such a long blog post on PENS. Blog identity crisis.

 

 

Posted in: Japanese learning journey (:, Korean learning journey (:, Others / General \ Tagged: , , , ,

[Special Series - Korean Learners] #5 Poh Xing Wei

23 February, 2012 10:00 AM \ 2 Comments \

This is part of an ongoing special series when 1-2 Korean learners/bloggers each week are invited to share their Korean learning journey! It will be nice if you can leave a comment after reading! ^^ To participate in the series, check out this post. Check out previous entries HERE.

About the Author:

The author is born the same year as Shanna so we’re friends! The author is currently studying in SIM RMIT and is actively learning Wei Qi as a hobby. Wei Qi is a popular game in Korea so that is his link to Korea other than Kpop
I was first exposed to the Hallryu wave in secondary school, with the advent of Stairway to Heaven, BoA. However, they had always been there, just a side note in my life.

As I had a spare time during army, I decided to watch Korean dramas to pass time. Also, I was introduced to Girls’ Generation by chance. As most people could conclude,

Army boys + Girls’ Generation = Chaos.

Yea, so I was crazy about them for awhile. Then I had a dream, I had a date with all of them. (Bear with me, I know that sounds crazy) All I could do in my dream was smile and converse with Jessica and Tiffany who were native English speakers. What about the rest of them? I liked them as much, but I could not speak, I could only smile and stare. It was a serious handicap.

Waking up with such a strong feeling of handicap, I decided to embark on a Korean language journey.

“I can do anything if I want to badly enough”

Phase 1: Practice hard and use a workbook.

I went down to Kinokuniya to purchase a textbook for self-studying. (At that point, I had not discovered TTMIK, so it was kind of a downer when I found out about it later). I had a strong ability to comprehend materials so I’m quite confident when reading. But the most important about part about studying isn’t the reading, it is the application.

“Are you able to apply what you have learnt?” I thought it was most important that I had a workbook, so I bought one and started working on it, like crazy.

I learnt grammar structures and tried to fit different words in them. First with simple words, then complicated ones and then try to twist the sentence structure to see if it made sense in any other way. I spent many hours playing with that and soon it became imprinted. Then I tried out more, practice makes perfect.

Phase 2: Visit to Korea

What better way to expose yourself to Korean culture than going to Korea?

My first trip to Korea was with my family. I had a lot of fun, experiencing Korea on a guided tour and trying to read the hangul on the streets. It definitely helped when I could converse a little with the tour guide and knew the basic phrases of how to get around.

If you’ve been to Korea, you’ll probably encounter this phenomenon, which is the Koreans have a tendency to over-react when they learn that you are trying to learn Korean. I mean, I swear, the look on their face! It just fuels your passion to study harder.

Phase 3: I have a Korean friend

I have the luxury of having a close Korean friend. I turn to her when I have questions about Korea, the language and the culture. She is my main source of learning and vice versa as she tries to understand more about Singapore through me. We are quite close but it always turns out awkward when I try to squeeze Korean phrases into the conversation. She’ll correct me and teach me more. That’s great for learning.

Then there’ll be some stuff that she cannot explain as it is more innate, and then I’ll just accept it. Half of the fun of learning a new language is accepting things that I did not understand, nothing it perfect! Slowly, I built my image of Korea into a fairytale and as I conversed more, I added more colour to this city in the clouds.

Phase 4: Start studying everyday phrases

It came to the point where I thought I knew a substantial amount of Korean, but then I knew nothing at all.

Try saying this in Korean:

A:Let’s watch a movie.

B: Sure! What do you like? Comedy? Romance? Action?

A: Of course “Action”. I don’t want to fall asleep in the theatre.

B: Oh my god? Do you snore?

A: I don’t think I want to watch a movie with you anymore.

B: Hey come on! I was just joking!

I always got stuck moving beyond the factual statements. The playfulness, the nuances were all lost when I tried to translate it to Korean. I needed help.

I drew up similar conversations in English and tried to get their Korean equivalents.  At this point, listening to Korean songs and watching Korean drama helped a great deal. Having Shanna and Korean friends helped too!

———————– 끝 ———————–

So… so far I’ve been to Korea 3 times. I’ve made a lot of friends and keep in touch with them through Kakao Talk almost every other day. It is really useful that they are either trying to learn Mandarin or English so there is some common ground. It allows you to have room for error and experimentation. We have a lot of fun together!

I hope you do well in your Korean studies!

Posted in: Korean Learners, Special Series \ Tagged: , , , ,

[VIDEO] How to Study Korean~!

18 May, 2011 4:14 PM \ 9 Comments \

yay! my first attempt at video editing. I’m pretty satisfied with how it turned out :D It’s not a very serious ‘how-to’ video, but it does show the general method of how I study Korean! Enjoy (: And comments will be much appreciated!

Posted in: Korean learning journey (:, Videos - Learning Korean \ Tagged: ,