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The ’I Hate Korean’ Thread | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| egill Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5481 days ago 418 posts - 791 votes  Speaks: Mandarin, English* Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 57 of 131 03 July 2011 at 11:27pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
(emphasis mine) Don't you think that's a bit hasty? I think it's folly to tie yourself to one method and one method alone. If a certain method isn't working out, why not try another one instead of giving up (or grinding away painfully)? Maybe for whatever reasons something that worked out with Chinese for you isn't working out with Korean. But maybe there's something out there, which didn't work out with Chinese for you, but may well work on Korean. Hell, why not try several things at once? 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| leosmith Senior Member United States Joined 6335 days ago 2365 posts - 3804 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Tagalog | Message 58 of 131 04 July 2011 at 6:44am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Not at all. We both started out testy, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Heated arguments are why I come to this forum. My first post was evidently too rude, because it was censored. But you’ve shown that you want to fix the problem, so I’ll try to help.
As I said before, I know no Korean. But I don’t believe the problem you’re having is some inherent thing about the language that’s worse than any other language. For one thing, many westerners have learned it to a high level. And even though I don’t speak it, I sat next to a Korean co-worker and could figure out a surprisingly large amount of what he was saying on the phone due to it’s similarity with Japanese. I encourage you to drop the notion that the pronunciation issue is impossible, give yourself a positive attitude adjustment, and focus on your method. I don’t like Katz. Just like Benny, he says that everything should be easy and fun, like it’s some sort of universal truth. He says that textbooks, grammars, teachers and classrooms are worthless. That being said, he has some very good suggestions about creating an immersion environment, and a lot of good general info on his site. Understand that what he calls “the Method”, the sentence mining thing that you’re doing, was designed to help him read Japanese. I think it’s a reasonable method for that, but is inefficient for other languages and even other aspects of Japanese. And even though I say it’s inefficient for Korean, unless you’ve excluded some things, you haven’t even done all the other things that he did when he was using it. For example, I don’t see anything in your plan about conversation. Conversation is extremely helpful with listening. And I strongly agree with the other poster about the Korean girlfriend who is dedicated to your language goals, if that’s a possibility. So since I already mentioned conversation, let me discuss other possible weaknesses I see. If it’s without text, you’re doing too much radio. Radio is good, but it’s much more difficult than a kdrama with subtitles. I recommend 100% of your listening be with things that have transcripts/subtitles. I prefer to listen first, then read, because it leaves some mystery that way, but to each his own. I further recommend that you do a high percentage of video, because that increases comprehension. Finally, English transcripts are really nice if you need them. They are much more efficient than looking things up in a dictionary. Again, if you use them, it’s probably best to use them after initial viewings. I recommend not spending more than 1/3 of your study time doing flashcards. Anki is great for review, but not as good for learning new stuff. Review is necessary, but you need a steady stream of new material to keep your mind fresh. So you have to draw the line. And it’s ok to do stuff without the end result being sentences in Anki. Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I get this general feeling that you are jumping around all over the place without really completing anything. Finish a textbook. Go through a grammar bank. Memorize a dictionary (just kidding). Do some beginner audio programs. Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re still a beginner. Generally speaking, programs like Pimsleur, Michel Thomas, podcasts, assimil, etc provide much of what a beginner needs to get grounded in the language. By themselves they are often inadequate, but with some of the other stuff you have going on they’d make a fine supplement. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| w1n73rmu7e Newbie United States Joined 5725 days ago 31 posts - 46 votes | Message 59 of 131 04 July 2011 at 12:08pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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People probably aren't even talking about the OP's main point anymore, but I'll throw this out there anyway - if you're having trouble with word boundaries, just watch dramas. I've watched a ridiculous amount by now (waay more than I should have) and I have no problem with word boundaries anymore.
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| emkaos Diglot Newbie Germany Joined 5065 days ago 9 posts - 19 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: Korean | Message 60 of 131 04 July 2011 at 2:15pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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@w1n73rmu7e:
Do you watch them with subtitles or while looking at the scripts? For practicing listening I can recommend drama or movie scripts. I would prefer korean subtitles but these are really rare and usually only made for movies. There are some sources for scripts of Korean dramas or sitcoms. *20woo.com* is a Korean forum for film and drama scripts. *dramabeans.com* has some scripts, mostly for older dramas. And if you google for 대본 + the title, sometimes you're lucky. A lot of Koreans seem to want to become actors and use these for practicing, or something like that. Sometimes I watch Korean dubbed anime and download Korean fansub subtitles for the japanese version. They are in no way exact, but they give you a hint. Then, most news broadcasts have news videos with exact transcripts on their homepages. I also recommend to listen to the 이야기 podcasts on talktomeinkorean.com They are intermediate natural speech with pdf transcripts. Shows like "we got married" or "infinity challenge" subtitle the majority of what is said. I guess even Koreans don't understand all of it without subtitles. If you have an iSomething you can buy Korean audiobook apps. The 엄마를 부탁해 audiobook app let's you listen to it and read it at the same time. The Lite version is free and gives you the first chapter or so. I think the same publisher has more audiobooks like that. The app 소리잡기 2 gives you a small text every day with a recording of a natural speaker. I think the these are meant to be inspirational short stories hehe. Korean listening comprehension is really no joke. 90% of my studying involves audio, because I have found that if I learn it just from reading I will no be able to indentify it when it's spoken or I will pronounce it in a way that makes Koreans understand nothing. I remember a sentence from a Korean sitcom: 그 걸 내 입으로 말해? keu geol nae ibeuro malhae That's how it's written and would be officially pronounced. It was written that way in the script. But what the person ended up saying was: 글래이브로 마래? keulleybeuro marae? It was an older woman and probably the person in whole sitcom who was the easiest to understand. She omitted nothing, just made the words melt together like all Koreans do all the time. Btw, I find the news to be one of the easiest things to understand, apart from the occasional rare vocabulary. I have accepted the fact that it will take far longer than I expected. Now after 3 years of intense study I'm far from understanding everything, but I know that I get the most important points and if I really want to exactly understand something I'll find way. Often repeating a scene over and over is enough. Edited by emkaos on 04 July 2011 at 3:14pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5551 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 61 of 131 04 July 2011 at 4:40pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
This, my dear, is a formal declaration of respect. =) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5551 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 62 of 131 04 July 2011 at 7:16pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Maybe it's a matter of instruction, I have no idea. Those of my friends who actually study Mandarin at university/interpretation school tend to say it was relatively easy for them in the beginning and then got continuously harder, and that the main difficulty for them is advanced grammar, characters and idioms. I personally find it easier to remember the sound of Mandarin words or sentences, because it seems to me that the individual sounds don't change as much depending on the surrounding sounds as they do in Korean. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| w1n73rmu7e Newbie United States Joined 5725 days ago 31 posts - 46 votes | Message 63 of 131 04 July 2011 at 7:33pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Edited by w1n73rmu7e on 04 July 2011 at 7:34pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| emkaos Diglot Newbie Germany Joined 5065 days ago 9 posts - 19 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: Korean | Message 64 of 131 04 July 2011 at 8:44pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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훗 훗 Bao ㅋㅋ
@w1n73rmu7e So you used English subtitles? I too, like Kitchen.Sink, tried it with the AJATT 10.000 hours/sentences method. And he recommends only to use target language subtitles or none at all. But looking back I wonder if he's right. While it may be true that for speech you know subtitles in another language may hinder you, but on the other hand if you don't know what's going on I don't feel like I'm learning something. And I find it hard to enjoy a drama when I have no idea what's going on. Maybe, if I only would appreciate Korean boys more hehe Concerning the comprehensible input method generally I tried it for more than 2 years and I have mixed feelings about it. The good part it that it led me to spend a lot of time doing something Korean. I read hundreds of Korean Manga and watched lot's of Korean TV. But looking back I get the feeling that if I would have focused more on less material, I would have made faster progress. Just absorbing it didn't help my speaking at all. About two month ago I struggled so much while trying to speak Korean (though text chatting was ok) that I often avoided it. I wanted it and I didn't want it hehe. Then some things changed and now I'm speaking it nearly daily. So much changed in only two. Now I speak comfortable about every day stuff and somehow manage to fight my way through more complicated topics. That said, it did help me, because when I started speaking I understood enough so that the other person didn't need to make an effort to speak in an extra comprehensible way or repeat it over and over. And I had a lot of hidden vocabulary that maybe was even below passive proficiency, but relearning it in conversation was really easy. And my problem with Korean grammar is not how to construct a sentence or how to change the verb, but rather what form to use when. There are so many similar forms that mean nearly the same. For example: -니까, -니, -기 때문에, -므로, -느라, -기에, -길래, -어서, -라서 … 등, they all mean something like 'because' but all have different connotations and give different feelings. I don't think this can be learned from grammatical explanations. Hearing them over and over in situations where they are used builds up your feeling for when to use them. This is something that in my opinion can be done with the ajatt method. And Korean is full of these "nearly the same but not completely interchangeable" patterns. Same goes for the politeness levels. Learning how to construct them is easy, but when to use which is hard. They are often mixed so you can hear 3 or 4 politness levels from one speaker speaking to the same person, changing them to emphasize, create distance or intimacy, be nice or coy and so on. Still they are not randomly used and you can easily make mistakes using them wrong. But if you stick to the grammar explanations you sound like a robot. Learning to use them correctly is something that needs huge amounts of exposure, I think. What probably helped me a lot with listening comprehension was putting audio in my anki. Whenever I encountered an interesting sentence in a sitcom or something I recorded the audio, but it on the question side in Anki and then the transcript with vocabulary on the answer side. First it was bothersome, but now it became a habit and takes under 10 seconds for a new card. Somebody mentioned buying keyboard stickers or using a graphical input method. I wouldn't do that. I just started typing sentenced into my anki and my typing got better and better. Not having stickers prevents you from looking at the keyboard. That way I learned to type without looking and now I type Korean faster than English. The Korean keyboard layout is great and a pleasure to type in. For vocabulary I highly recommend learning hanja. I refused it, at the beginning, because you don't see them, so why learn them. But it helps a lot especially with rare vocabulary. I don't think I would ever learn a lot of the words in the news without knowing that each syllable means. They just occur too seldom. But if you know the hanja they made up of, often one or two occurences are enough to put them into your passive vocabulary. 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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