language

Why is it that in almost every Korean language class I’ve taken there is always one guy who’s taken already taken the class once, twice, three or maybe 10 times already and still will not move on? It’s like their sad little attempt to try to be the big man on the continuing-ed campus.

The guy who hangs around, taking the level 1 class again, trying to kiss up to the teacher by demonstrating all the Korean grammar he/she already knows, by shouting out the answers when the other beginner students hesitate when called on.

Who tries to proselytize during class breaks—loudly trying to convince the confirmed atheist sitting next to you that she simply must accept Jesus as her Lord and Savior. (OK, so maybe that’s just this latest guy . . .)

But I’ve taken other classes—though this is the first one that involved a rather significant financial investment—and I’ve seen it before.

I know it would probably seriously cut into the bottom line for a lot of language institutes to get rid of guys like this, so there’s really nothing else to do but suck it up and deal. But I think there should be a limit—you can retake level 1 twice…maybe three times. But at that point you have to either move up or move on. It’s not fair to the rest of the people who’ve paid the tuition to listen to this guy incorrectly correct their Korean grammar and suck up all the class time trying to ask the teacher esoteric questions about the other words he’s learned that mean the same thing as the one she’s trying to teach us.

If you don’t know it after the second nine-week run through, you’re not gonna.

Or, the fastest way to waste the equivalent of $950 you’ll ever see. We’ll know in about eight weeks.

Today, I took my placement test for the Korean Language Program at Lingua Express, the language institute at Sookmyung Women’s University. On Monday, I start daily three-hour Korean classes, Monday through Friday, continuing until mid-March.

I can sum up today’s results by saying that if they’d just paid attention to the line on the application where I said I thought I should be in Beginner 1, it would have saved everyone a lot of time. Even though I took two months of free weekly classes at the Korea Foundation Cultural Center, and have been studying on my own using both the Rosetta Stone Online (Level 1 Korean), and Declan’s Korean Hakgyo software, this test kicked my butt.

It turns out that despite being able to count to 100 in both pure Korean and Sino-Korean numbers, order a bazillion things in a restaurant, shop at Dongdaemun, tell the vendors their price is too high, count change, give taxi driver’s directions to home and office, ask for directions to get somewhere, ask someone what they’re eating, where they’re going, and if it’s OK, Korean two-year-olds still have it all over me when it comes to communicating.

On the rare occasion I understood what the proctor was asking me, I completely lacked the vocabulary to respond. (They don’t really like it when you switch to English, but when asked what I was doing in Korea, I didn’t know the Korean for, “Husband got transferred here and I didn’t want a divorce.”) As for the written part, I could read the questions OK. I just had no idea what 90 percent of the words meant. (”This question asks something about the Korean language and something about attendance, everything else, not sure …The next question wants me to fill in words in a sequqence, but this isn’t days of week, months of the year, or numbers…I’m lost.”)

So, there I’ll be next week, back learning the Korean alphabet and how to introduce myself. Which, as I said before, is where I thought I should be. We’ll see if I’m any better by the spring.

Inspired by Kangmi’s review of Pimsleur Comprehensive Korean, I thought I’d post here asking for more advice on learning the local language.

So far, my experience includes two months of weekly classes taught at the Korea Foundation Cultural Center, plus a month or so of self study with Declan Korean software.

At this point, I can reliably count to 100 in both number systems (the “pure Korean” used for telling time and counting, and the Sino-Korean system used for almost everything else), say “hi” to people in couple different levels of formality, say thanks, get directions to the bathroom, tell my taxi driver how to get home, and ask someone what country he or she originally hails from. All of which is nice, but not particularly useful when striking up your average conversation.
Oh, and, of course, I mastered the all-important survival sentence:

이것이 얼마입니까? (”How much is this?” Short version: 얼마에요?) my first week here.

Thanks to my coworkers, I can now also use the phrase 괜찮아요, which, depending on the context, can mean: “You’re welcome.” “No problem,” “No, thanks. I’m fine,” or, phrased as a question, “Is this OK?” That one word has actually expanded my vocabulary tremendously, but still has its its limits.

This represents the extent of my skills after four months here. And, I want to get better at telling what people are saying. The Declan software is really good (and David swears by it) but I seem to keep forgetting everything I learn when it comes time to actually talk to someone. I whizz through the memorization, writing and listening exercises, but nothing seems to stick with me. It could also be that I’m just not studying enough.

The Rosetta Stone program is supposed to mimic full immersion in that it doesn’t use English at all (from what I’ve read). I just signed up for a month of the online version. I’m going to try adding an hour of that a day, to an hour of Declan and see how that works.

Has anyone else tried any of these programs? Should I just break down and invest in classes at a language institute? Right now, I’ve just been reluctant to invest several hours a day and several hundred dollars in classes, but if that’s the best way, then that’s probably what I’ll end up doing. I’d like to know that it’s worth it.

I don’t want to write a novel in Korean, and I’m not planning on attempting graduate school classes and such in the language, but I would like to do more in social situations (particularly around the families of my husband’s coworkers) than just say “hi,” smile and gesture.