Korean study thread

This is gonna be my study thread where I share my own journey with self-studying the language... Pardon me if this is gonna be messy as I'm just going with what I can think of first haha

First off: this is not a thread where I tell you how to study Korean, I'll just be sharing what worked for me (and what didn't!) so please keep in mind that everyone has different needs, circumstances, and learning styles and paces. Some prefer self-study, classroom environment,-

-one on one tutor, or immersion, all of those are valid and okay! Feel free to experiment until you find what works for you. There is no one method that fits everyone. In my case I chose to self-study because classes are expensive and none of them my work schedule anyway. I've-

-always been comfy with self studying eevn back when I was a student too.

I started last February only so I'm not yet very advanced I'm making progress but I'm lagging behind so much on vocabulary, I'd say I'm about at upper beginner level at this point...

Anyway, here's a Drive link to all the pdf files of books and other resources I'll be talking about in this thread:

https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=14N0EDPOvLnKPvVxMVMm3qSVSu1kV_OE2

Let me know if it gets taken down or stops working!

Grammar:
I first started seriously studying with http://talktomeinkorean.com . There are tons of other resources and books to choose from, but I highly recommend this for total beginners who just wanna dip their toes in first. The way they explain things is very simple yet complete,-

-and all 9 levels (I think they're adding lvl10 soon?) are free on the website. Lvl 1 has 25 lessons while 3 onwards have 30 lessons each. They have a podcast on Spotify too, there's one podcast episode per lesson, if you like hearing someone explain things to you while you read.

I'm only on level 6 right now haha I have a long way to go still!
Pdf of all 9 levels is in the Drive link.

One important thing to note though is once you have a grasp of the basics, please don't only stick to one resource as your be-all and end-all of your grammar resources.

There are topics one resource might cover earlier than another, explain in a different way, or just skip altogether. It's always good to see things explained in a different perspective. Korean grammar is very nuance based (idk if I'm using right terms here) after all.

Another book I'm using as a grammar reference is this book:

Korean Grammar for International Learners

This has a workbook version too but I don't have it. I got it from this shopee store:
https://shopee.ph/product/198230302/4815152912?smtt=0.306904736-1601117407.9

Pdf copy is in the Drive link.

Please don't directly study from this book, it's more a reference than a textbook. This is where I turn to when I need something explained more in-depth. Their explanations aren't very lengthy and complicated too! Lots of sample sentences as well.

Ah, I forgot to say this earlier. Please familiarize yourself with grammar terms first before starting to learn another language.. You'll have a hard time if you encounter lessons with things like auxiliary verbs or adverbial phrases, etc.. No need to get so deep, basics will do!

Okay, now to the part where I struggle a lot: VOCABULARY.

I'm just not someone who remembers words easily via rote memorization. It's easier for me to learn via context, and I learned that the hard way.

I started studying vocabulary using a flashcard/spaced repetition app-

-call Anki (Web, android). How it works is you set a number of new "cards" (or words, in this case) per day, then every day you rate those cards depending on difficulty and that decides how often that card pops up every time you study.

It was OK at first. I could recall more and

-more words easily, but then I realised: am I actually learning these words or am I just getting better at recognizing them? Because when I actually need to use that word, I have a hard time recalling it. Also, doing the Anki decks started feeling like a chore. That's when I-

-realized spaced repetition isn't for me. It's still a very popular way to learn vocab though, so I would still recommend it, see if it's a style that works for you. If you're on iOS or if you just want a cuter looking app, Quizlet is pretty much the same concept. Flashcards are-

-also good for cramming words for exams and quizzes.

I am extreeeemely behind on vocabulary now, to the point where I'm approaching intermediate in grammar but my vocab is... idk... Very low beginner

Like I can tell you how to construct sentences with direct quotations in-

-Korean but I can't tell you what a table is

Please don't be like me, study your vocabulary early

I'm trying to catch up now! I found these lists of beginner and low Intermediate words divided into 10-20 words per day and that's what I study from mainly.
(pdf is in Drive)

I copy the words into a notebook, and make sentences out of them using grammar points I learned previously. That way I can make the words stick in my brain using context, plus I get to practice building sentences too!

That, and this thing called "comprehensible input". It's-

-pretty much immersion? Listening and watching content in Korean with no translations, not minding how much I understand, but trying to pick up words and grammar patterns based on context.

JYP group stans, take advantage of this, their subs are mostly late HAHAHAHA

Here's a video explaining comprehensible input more clearly! This helped me a lot:



Remember, language learning isn't always just sitting down at a desk and studying from books, most of it comes from INPUT. Keep reading, watching, listening!

Immersion is slow but very valuable, don't expect fast comprehension improvement because it doesn't work that way. I guess immersion isn't much of a problem for us kpop stans tho haha we even have so much content we can barely keep up at times, use that to your advantage.

On reading and writing:

The key here is still constant practice. Stop relying on romanizations as soon as you learn how to write in Hangul. Just keep writing and reading it, really, you'll get faster and faster as you go!

On speaking:

Idk what to tell you because tbh this is where I'm most lacking at. I'm just bad ar talking, in any language, even if my job involves talking on the phone please, please, jjust talk to people, to yourself, to your cat, anyone... Don't be like me

Ok I'm sleepy now, I'm gonna continue this thread later, part 2 will be mostly how I take notes + planning hehe

Part 2: how I take notes!

Everyone's note taking style is obviously different so I can't tell you how to do things, but here's how I do mine...

Here's a flipthrough of my grammar notebook!

I don't like doing ~aesthetic~ notes lol I'm too lazy for that, I just want my notes to be clean and readable because I do refer to these often. I also don't copy things word for word, I just summarize them into bullet points so it's easier to look for things. Just one main pen,-

-another pen for annotations, and whatever highlighter I feel like using (I don't color-code). I also don't do the folding pages in half thing I do with grammar notes because I need that margin space for annotations and extra notes.

I do, however, do that on my vocab notes! What I do here is I just take my vocab list (pdf in Drive) and write down at least 20+ words I'm not familiar with then that's what I study for the day. I don't have sample sentences today though I forgot to do them haha sorry

Current favorite tools:

-Pilot Kakuno fountain pen F nib + Pilot black ink
-Pilot Frixion Point 0.5
-Pilot G-tec Maica 0.4
-Titus pastel highlighters
-Narita document push clips
-Tombow Mono correction tape
-Tombow Air eraser
-Uni Kuru Toga mechanical pencils 0.5

Does anyone here use study planners? I made this diy planner with a layout based on a planner by MOTEMOTE (more on that later) and I find it very helpful because I can look back on how many hours I spent studying and what exactly I studied

(sorry for the tilted vid)

Here's how the og MOTEMOTE 10-minute planner looks, I wanted to buy it but it's not available here so I tried recreating the layout... I'll link the printable file in the Drive!

Try going through YouTube for setup vids of this planner and it's like falling into a blackhole haha

The way I've been using the pages has changed since I first used it but this is pretty much how I use it now... It's pretty straightforward, really