11/28/14 The real one

While I was looking for new phrases to learn, I happened upon a very useful phrase. 그것 한국말로 뭐라고 해요(Kŭ-gŏt han-gung-mal-lo mwŏ-ra-go hae-yo), which means how do you say that in Korean? I assume it is said while pointing to the object that needs to be identified. A little snooping around in the website I linked in the last post showed me a few interesting pieces of information:

• While normally in English one would ask "and you" after responding to someone's question in order to find out their answer, in Korean, the "you" is left out.
• Adjectives always come before nouns in a sentence.
• Titles like Mr. and Mrs. will always follow the person in question's name.

LAte

I missed last week's post, but here it is a week later! I felt like my current progress was a little slow, so I decided to try learning whole phrases. I found a website that I'll link at the end of this post. I looked up phrases that I might use if I found myself wandering around Korea. One of the most useful ones I found was  길을 잃어버렸어요(kil-eul il-uh-buh-ryo-so-yo) or I'm lost. 

I used http://www.linguanaut.com/english_korean.htm to find this phrase.

I have returned

First of all, I would like to apologize for missing last week's blog post.

This week I am working on improving my conversational speech. I found this video series on Youtube that helps with conversational Korean, pronunciation, and nuances in formality and politeness. I will provide a link to the channel in question at the end of this post.

I realized that looking things up is not enough to fully comprehend a language. In Latin, my teacher constantly tells us that participation in class is necessary for us to be able to completely understand the language. Even though Latin is no longer a spoken language, he believes that learning how to speak properly will help us comprehend the non-spoken parts of the language. I think that also applies to Korean, so I have decided to focus on holding a conversation.

Channel mentioned: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsgBUobNGksxIKTagZayKEw

Seeing Other's Progress

This week, my class was asked to take a look at our peer's 20% times. I looked at a couple and it was interesting to see how we all compared to each other progress-wise. Everyone seems to be really into their project and it's interesting to see how many unique projects there are. Looking through everybody's projects got me thinking on how I can improve my project, but I decided that I would rather not change my game plan this late into the assignment. I will just keep doing what I was doing and hope for the best. This is my project so I won't let somebody else make my decisions for me.

As for my project, I decided to make this a light week and stick with practicing the basics and improving my vocabulary a bit. I will follow up next week with(hopefully) a new topic. Personally, I was getting tired of learning verb tenses every week, so I'll try to switch it up for a while.

Thinking About the Final Product Again

As of now, I am sure of what I am going to do during my presentation. I am going to find a famous saying and decipher it. I have found an article on Korean proverbs which I will link at the end of this post. The website provides a basic translation, so I will try to find a deeper meaning within the quotes. By next week I will have decided on a quote and will start thinking about explanations. Despite the preparations, I have still not achieved what this 20% time was supposed to help me with. My grasp on Korean is poor and I do not think I can hold a conversation yet. So in the coming weeks, I will try to speak with my mentor in complete and correct sentences. I will report back on this in  a few weeks since it might be difficult to do.






The link mentioned: http://seoulistic.com/korean-culture/wise-korean-proverbs-to-live-by/

Future tense

This week I focused on future tense. In Korean, there are two types of future tense, probable and intentional. Neither are directly similar to English forms of the future tense, but they are easy enough to get a grasp on.

Probable future tense, as its name implies, tells what is likely to happen. The example given in the website reads, "I will probably eat" and "I will probably go to school tomorrow." It then gives the same phrase in Korean. 난 먹을 거에요. When I got to this point, I was stumped. For the other tenses, I already had a bit of knowledge on the area, but this time, I was in a completely new territory, so I decided to consult my mentor. He told me that this was the formal way of talking in the future tense and that the form that I am probably used to hearing is the informal way of speaking.

The second future tense form is the intentional future tense. In the intentional future tense, you add 겠(gess) to the end of the base verb. Then add 어 or 어요 to the word. This form is more certain than the probable future tense. There are less implications and more intents.

The rest of my time this week was practicing this form and the forms I learned in previous weeks.

Again, the website I am using to help me with verb tenses is http://www.learnkoreanlanguage.com/Verb-Tenses.html.

Preparing for My Final Presentation

Saturday, October 11, 2014.

After much consideration, I have decided on a final presentation that is both within my ability and plausible in the time I have allotted. I have decided to translate and decipher a Korean proverb; although, I have  still not found one. I plan to find the quote within the next couple weeks. I am sure that if I have trouble finding a quote or proverb, my mentor can assist me, so I am not worried about not being able to find one.

The three tenses I have learned in the previous weeks have been helpful in my understanding of the language. I think in addition to present tense, past tense, and infinitive tense, future tense will be the next tense to have a lot of real world use.

I did not want to overload myself the week before I took SAT subject tests so this week was not as accomplishing as I wanted it to be. Hopefully next week will be better since early applications for some colleges will be over by then.

Past tense

Saturday, October 4, 2014

As I did last week, I am learning more verb tenses this week.

The first tense I learned this week is the past tense. To turn a verb into its past tense form, you take the base of the word and add the component 었(pronounced uhs) and then add 어(pronounced uh). For formality, also add 요(pronounced yoh). For example, to make the word 먹다(eat) past tense, take the base 먹(pronounced muhk), add 었, and then add 어요 to make 먹었어요(ate).

Due to the complexity of the past tense and the different conjugation rules surrounding it, I could only work on one tense this week, but I will go over the tenses that I learned last week.

The infinitive form of a verb is formed by adding 다(pronounced da) to the base of a verb. For example, adding 다 to the word for eating, makes 먹다(to eat).

The present form is made by adding 어요 (pronounced uh yo). Again using the word 먹(eat), to create the present form, add 어요 to 먹 to make 먹어요(eating).

 The website I used is the same as last week, but I will link it again.
http://www.learnkoreanlanguage.com/Verb-Tenses.html

Saturday, September 27, 2014.
This week I have decided to start learning verb tenses, starting with infinitives and present tense. The website I used to learn the tenses will be linked below. Infinitives in Korean are made by adding 다(pronounced da) to the end of a verb. So 먹(eat) plus the verb ending 다, as an infinitive is 먹다(to eat).

The second verb tense I learned is present tense. To put a verb in the present tense, add 어요(pronounced uh yo) to the base. So, using the example above again, 먹(eat) will become 먹어요(eating)

I was a bit short on time this week with college admissions, so I was only able to learn those two, but once I finish up I will be able to learn more. So for the following weeks, my goal is to learn the rest of the verb endings and polish up my pronunciation and writing.

 I did not need to consult my mentor this week as the content I learned was fairly straightforward. I suspect that I will need his soon considering that the deadline for our presentations is rapidly approaching.

http://www.learnkoreanlanguage.com/Particles.html

Presentations

This Friday in class, we all showed each other the progress we've made in our 20% time projects. Most of us did so through power point presentations but a few made their presentation out of tri-fold boards. It was interesting to see how far everyone has gotten. While making my power point, I began to worry. I felt as though I might not improve fast enough to be able to exhibit my final presentation. 20% time might be a misnomer. I now think that this project will take a lot more time and effort than I first thought. But I won't give up. My desire to learn is too strong. If I cannot connect to my culture, I would not be able to forgive myself. If we never had to make a presentation showing our progress, I never would have had this realization.

So this week is dedicated to practice. I was not able to get any work done in class this week, so I'll do what I can with the websites I found. http://www.digitaldialects.com/Korean.htm is a website that I found recently. It helps with vocabulary, reading, and speaking with three different activities. One helps with word-object identification. Another is the same except with Korean script. The third helps with listening. I think with this website, practicing will become a lot easier than simply reading and memorizing.

Finding a Mentor

Saturday, September 13, 2014

Three weeks have gone by and I have been mentorless. Not having a mentor at this time is not hurting me at all, but I know that I will need one sooner or later. After short consideration I have decided to make my dad my mentor in language. My main choices for a mentor were my mother, my father, and both of them together. Ultimately I chose my dad because he is proficient in both English and Korean, while I still sometimes have trouble understanding my mother. While on that topic, being able to communicate with members of my family who do not have very good English is another major motivation for this task.

This week, in addition to regular word memorization and stroke order practice, I am working on my pronunciation with some help from my mentor.

The part I am struggling the most with is memorizing the two number systems. One used for counting and the other used for more complex calculations such as math and time. To combat this, I have found a website that will train my memorization.

In the following weeks I expect to learn the complexities of sentence structure since I have already learned word ending for subjects and direct objects as well as the present tense ending for verbs.

Friday, September 5, 2014
At this stage in my learning, the main idea is repetition. Hearing something once is not a very effective way to learn, at least for me. I have to hear things multiple times before I can memorize it, so my attention had been on that. As I was last week, this week I continue to memorize numbers(for both counting and for math), character stroke order, and case modifiers. The reasoning behind learning stroke order is so my writing can be as neat as possible so it can be read. I do not want my poor English handwriting to be reflected in my Korean as well. Practice makes perfect, so until I am satisfied(or at least until my writing is legible) I will continue to practice everything I am learning.

Learning Corean: The Basics of Grammar

Friday, August 29, 2014
Since I grew up around Korean, I already knew a bit of the language; however, my knowledge was, at best, only a few essential words like mother and father. Throughout my life, I never learned how to form a proper sentence, so I have decided to forget what I know and learn Korean from scratch, starting with grammar and sentence structure.

Once I feel that I have a basic grasp on grammar, I will move onto verb tenses. Throughout my journey, I will be learning new words as often as I can.