My MOST effective time was making friends with a Japanese classmate whilst studying in Korea. Korean was our only mutual language so it really pushed us to use everything we were learning and because we were a similar level it never got overwhelming. Most of my Korean friends were learning English so it was harder than I thought to find someone to speak exclusively in Korean with, as we'd usually default back to English the moment it got difficult to communicate.
The most helpful for me has been having multiple sources of input because then I can more likely see the same words and phrases multiple times. I start the day with 5 minutes of vocab flashcards which doesn't necessarily teach me the word, but it gives me an exposure to it. Then it often comes up that day or in the next couple days and I think, "Oh, I've seen this." And enough times and in different contexts I can begin to understand the meaning. So I like to listen to youtube videos, read short stories, and and listen to short podcasts with transcripts. It all mixes together to getting lots of exposure :)
@@faithbwire9164 Check out Spongemind youtube channel. You can send an email and he will share a folder full of transcripts and translations :) And also on a podcast app also.
@@TheVioletSpectre I don't have a great site atm. I bought a book with short stories. Olly Richards (another youtuber). Also I write different things and then do a class with an italki tutor who corrects it so then I end up with a nice little story from my own life that I can study with the native speaker corrections. If anyone else sees this comment and knows free places for short stories that'd be great :)
@@Learninglotsoflanguages Gotcha! Well I'll have to take a look at the Olly Richards book. Might as well. It'll give me something to read as I progress in my learning. Thanks so much, I really appreciate it! The tutoring sounds like fun, btw. I hope it helps with your writing. Sounds like it does for sure!
My husband is Korean, born and raised. He's useless to help me lol every time I speak to him in Korean, he replies in English. His parents will be more help for sure lol
The biggest tip for me was reviewing things like Kdramas multiple times. Ive been a rewatching a Kdrama for the 4th time with Korean subtitles and I was doing it passively since I know the story so well, having watched it multiple times. But I will be more intentional with my rewatch, jotting down notes, practising familiar phrases based on how they're written in Hangul, etc. Was a little bummed to hear that Andy's been studying Korean for a decade and wasnt as fluent as his time spent should indicate. But after 7 months, I am determined to keep at it. Thanks Billy (and Andy)!
don't be bummed! there are various different factors that can impact that, for ex. taking long breaks from studying, being a student, and just life in general. i've been studying since 2018, but i am still only at a beginner-intermediate level because of all of the above. but i won't give up too! you sound very dedicated and the methods you're using are effective so i have faith you will succeed. 공부를 열심이 하면 꼭 유창해질 것입니다. best of luck!!!
Yeah, I've been studying German for 5 years and I think I'll need to live there to even get close to truly "fluent" (i.e. easy, spontaneous conversations on high level or specialty topics like politics or something I would study in University). Atm I can have normal day to day conversations pretty well and I can follow tv shows (even the more difficult dramas) without subtitles and I can read novels. But, that said, German is much closer to English than Korean is, so I imagine it'll be 10 years to get to that point in Korean. 🤷 I think the most important things to remember are: a) how difficult English is to learn for other people b) that language learning is fun c) you've probably only ever tried to be helpful to people who are still learning English, so you can expect the same experience while you're learning
I don't have korean friends plus I'm pretty shy so I have somewhat of an unusual approach I think. Number one helpful thing for me is to be very aware that there is no shortcut or fastest way, it's just doing the work and the hours. So besides studying with books and other resources I do my best to be surrounded with the language all day every day in some type of way. It might be media like variety shows to hear people talk to eachother, or radio stations or audio books as background noise or even switching games I know really well into Korean so that I can comfortably play with language exposure. I watch some shows without subtitles to challenge my brain to really pay attention to words, tone, body language, etc to get used to the entirety of the communication but I so far only do so with topics I already know so well that the vocab isn't too crazy even when words are new. It's within my geek realm. I have plans to buy some books too and squeeze myself into reading so that I can become faster at reading subtitles but overall I'm just trying to go through those symbolic 10.000 hours at a good pace. I know that when the brain sees information as essential to your environment it remembers it better so I'm turning Korean into my everyday environment. I'm terrible at speaking and spelling yet but my listening comprehension is really coming along. I'm not feeling a rush to speak either but to practice the making of the sounds I'm learning song lyrics and singing because it helped my English a ton back in the day.
what's been most helpful for me is watching korean youtubers/youtube videos in korean, specifically in subjects that interest me, like talking about college, future goals, anime, studying, drawing, grwm-type small talk and the like. that way i can curate my own concentrated vocabulary lists, but i always make sure to record the entire sentence so i understand the word in context. i parrot after the speaker as well, and copy their tone and intonation out loud. when among us was booming i studied up on vocab related to the game and then would play in korean servers and push myself to communicate even with my limited korean. do note that texting korean will not look like textbook korean, so there were lots of slang and typos i had to work my way through lol. but online gaming is a great and fun way to interact with korean speakers. lastly, i always speak out loud to myself and try to make sentences with anything i had just learned. i spent so much time writing and reading korean i realized my speaking and listening were extremely far behind. so no matter how long it takes me to string together a sentence on the spot, i do it. it's become increasingly easier the more i've practiced this. using these forms of input (along with podcasts and vlives) i take note of different natural patterns in speech to avoid sounding overly textbook, write them down with context and implement them into my practice :)
My daughter did the same, playing “among us” with Koreans, she made a whole cheat sheet of phrases that she could use, and she thought it was really funny when they started suspecting that there was a foreigner “among them”.
Like some of the other people who have commented I also find exposure to be the key to learning. No silver bullet. You just have to put in the hours. 😬 I’ve been “studying” for 2 years and 3 months solidly for about 2 hrs per day (started end of September 2019) and lived in Korea as an English teacher from 2015 - 2018 but my Korean was absolute shit. I tried learning enough to control a classroom but couldn’t understand my colleagues. I spoke in short sentences. Just enough to tell students to pay attention and shut up. Lol. After I returned for a year, a former Korean colleague visited my hometown in the USA during the summer. After he left I decided to study Korean again and be more serious about it. Honestly living in Korea wasn’t as much help as one would think… at least if your occupation is to teach English. Most people expect you to just speak English and the expat community means you don’t need Korean friends to socialize. I find being in the USA far better for my Korean because it helps me “escape” life in the USA, whereas when I was in Korea my time off was spent connecting with English speakers and escaping Korea. Lol. Homesickness is real. Anyway, what has helped me the most after 2 years and 3 months and counting of seriously studying Korean has been watching Korean RUclips channels that I like and listening and repeating TTMIK books and using Go Billy Korean and Korean Grammar In Use and How To Study Korean. Most Korean RUclips shows have Korean subtitles already built into the shows similar to Korean Variety Shows and they are short (around 10 min). When I watch my RUclips shows I pause the video every time I come across a word I don’t know and look it up in Naver Dictionary. Read the definition in both Korean and English and then read several example sentences and guess their meanings. Usually there are VLIVE sample sentences as well and I’ll sometimes click in the videos associated with those sample sentences to hear/see them in context. I have to repeat this process with the same word maybe 5-20 times? Lol. Idk. I read somewhere that we humans have to be exposed to something 5-20 times before we understand or internalize something. I hate flash cards. But Grammar books are good for me. I find after going over a grammar point, I begin noticing it in the shows I watch. But for me it’s about enjoying the experience and to keep putting in the hours. I’ve really focused on my listening and then reading. My handwriting looks good and I can touch type in Korean but I don’t practice my speaking or writing. I do listen and repeat, and I repeat lines and imitate characters from Korean RUclips shows. I think listening and reading is more important than speaking and writing because Koreans hardly speak to strangers and don’t talk freely like Americans. It’s okay to be silent. At least that’s what I personally observed around Korean speakers. After all most of them met their bf/gf or husband/wife through arranged blind dates. But not being able to understand what my colleagues were saying and not being able to read sucked! I felt so out of place. For example, a colleague would crack a joke during a company dinner and everyone would laugh except for me. So yeah, right now I’m just focusing on the receptive skills: listening and reading. 😎 Btw here are some Korean RUclips channels I watch: 급식왕 탁주 TV 캐리TV 장난감친구들 딩굴딩굴 오늘비와 급식쌤들 급식걸즈 크집사 멸치형 햄찌월드 사랑아놀자 헤이지나 Most of those channels are for K-9 age group which might seem weird since I’m a 31M but whatever. I taught elementary school in Korea and am a big kid at heart I guess. Maybe someday I’ll watch what I watch in English in Korean (photography/photoshop tutorials, astronomy, podcasts) I’ve gone maybe overboard with my comment, but I really like where I am currently at with my studying/skill level. 😃 I ALSO recommend studying Korean history. Knowing more about Korean history and culture has helped me to understand Korea/Koreans better (e.g. why they do what they do) 🤓 You can also learn about Korean culture through reading Korean traditional folk tales. 한국언니 Korean Unnie and TTMIK both have good reading material on Korean traditional folk tales although TTMIK doesn’t let you purchase the PDF/eBook version anymore which is lame ( I bought the PDF several years back before they made the switch to their new membership style website). You can still access the reading material through their premium lessons though. RM from BTS claims he learned English from watching Friends. Everybody’s different but for me, active listening to Korean programs I like has really helped in conjunction with textbooks from multiple sources. Anyway, just have fun. Life’s too short, live it up! 🤪 I don’t have my comment notifications turned on for RUclips but I hope someone out there found this useful! 화이팅! 🙌🏻 ❤️
I think started learning Korean around June 2021, but I started putting more hours into it last year. I read better than I write, and listening is a struggle for me . I feel like I should be further along my Korean journey and have trouble remembering grammar rules and my vocab is trash, but I try telling myself that forgetting is also a part of learning. I'll check out those Korean channels you mention. 감사합니다 (°∀°).
@@bunnypep7364 Hope some of those channels I recommended are helpful in your journey. 🙂 I think listening is one of the hardest skills to master despite being the most basic. I have a friend who graduated with a degree in Japanese and discovered he couldn’t understand what people were saying. University didn’t prepare him for the “real world”. I’m planning on traveling to Korea for about 1 month in October to take pictures for work and to revisit where I used to live as an ESL teacher. Hopefully all this exposure to my favorite Korean RUclips channels will pay off when I visit! 😃 Best of luck in your continued journey with the Korean language. ❤
@@b.a.p.4718 감사합니다(^ｰ^) I hopefully your friend will overcome his challenge with listening in Japanese, Japanese is already a challenge with kanji and its different grammar system. I also hope that your trip to Korea in October goes well. You'll get to experience Korean Halloween, how fun! Best luck to us both (σ≧▽≦)σ.
I've been learning Korean for 5 years without any friends to constantly practice with, and have never been to the country... 😅 Thankfully I've had tutors and at one point a language exchange partner, so I've been able to learn a ton of vocabulary and become more comfortable speaking. I can understand Webtoons, certain books, and videos in Korean, but I still feel that if I go to Korea my skills would definitely improve a lot :)
I definitely think listening to Korean while reading Korean subtitles or transcripts at the same time is one thing that has helped me a lot, especially my listening skills. For a long time I could hardly understand anything being said, but after I started doing this every day I got so much better. I recommend TTMIK's Iyagi series for this, they're awesome!
I got their 1st 3 books and they're very well made. I still cannot read captions as fast as they display, but I need to try this more. Sadly a lot of streaming platforms in America that have Korean language movies or shows only offer English captions :/
@@BASEDinMaine At first I couldn't read fast enough either, I would be pausing constantly. But I've gotten to the point now where I can keep up fairly well :)
Yes. Surround yourself with the language. I am a HUGE drama fan and i do use the tip mentioned about watching dramas multiple times with English/ Korean subtitles. It definitely helps with learning new vocab and getting a feel of language.
Reading out loud following the text/audio of a book or a drama. It has helped with pronunciation, listening and comprehension. Also, learning about pronunciation from the Darakwon book (Korean Pronunciation Guide).
I'm trying the "immerse yourself in Korean" while still in America" method, which Billy described in another video. I traveled over an hour to the nearest H-Mart to practice ordering bulgogi. And I do language apps on the train. But I really like to hear what works well for others and try it their way. Will I marry a Korean? Perhaps. This video's so good! The "mouth muscles" comment was insightful. The 300 dollar phone bill made me face palm cuz I've done that too back in the day.
I visited Korea for a few weeks last month and went to a language school. The school was ok but being surrounded by this language was motivating in a way that I just haven’t felt in the US. But I’m back in the states on my own doing my best. I think if you’re serious about learning then going to the country is the best thing.
the tired mouth muscles thing, yeah, I know that one too. After a pronunciation lesson, I'm left almost drooling and I'm a tad disappointed that we didn't get to hear Andy speak in Korean.
Korean friends really help! And also Korean study groups, it's nice to chat in Korean with people at my level who are also learning the language, very good to practice what I've learned and exchange knowledge
I live in Australia and I don’t have any Korean friends, so for me having a native Korean tutor is the most important thing. I also try to watch something in Korean and write in my diary everyday. But without speaking and listening practice I know it’s going to be a long process. I’m just enjoying the journey.
Most helpful for me is watching children interviewing idols, with both English and Korean subtitles. Sometimes the topic is history, or family, or being ill, etc. What I really like is that I focus on what they have to say, not on the grammar.
I'm in Korea now and I think that really pushes me to try new words when going to eat or shopping. Like you said having Korean friends help out alot. My coworker is Korean and I feel like a burden sometimes because of all the questions I ask.
Reading Tinder profiles while I was in SK taught me a lot of hobbies and slang 😆 And actually texting people in real time made me learn how to read and remember vocab a little faster 😬
For me the most helpful thing is having it in your everyday life. Which is easy to do even if you don't live in Korea. What i do is following a lot of Korean people on Twitter (ofc if they only tweet in korean) and just watching things in korean (movies, videos etc.). Combining this with learning from a book, it helps a lot.
For me, the biggest thing is what I would call immersion, what I mean by this is setting things around you in life to be Korean standard, so for example if you're in the states, set your phone to Korean, set Siri to Korean, take notes and write your schedules for daily life in Korean, when using websites if they give you language options set it to Korean if the option is available, watch tv and read books in Korean or with Korean subtitles for English shows if possible, and last but most important for my learning personally...living in Korea or even being there for a short time.
I've been studying for 4 years and the most helpful thing for me is just really talking to my friends everyday, if my friends aren't available then I go to language exchange apps or even play games and talk to strangers. It was really intimidating at first having to fire up papago and naver dictionary while talking to someone, but I got used to it and I noticed that I only need naver dict for most of the time since I lack vocabs.
Spending MONEY and TIME on learning Korean is what really helped me. Moving to Korea and talking with Koreans friends/coworkers/students/strangers doesn’t really help *much*. Until I bought some textbooks and began studying regularly, I was stuck at A1 level. Months later, I’m now at A2!
I guess the most helpful thing is to be exposed to the language a lot. It's interesting how learning a language by yourself (and because you're interested in it) is so different from learning it in school. When I learned English and French for example I had no clue how the language was used in daily life, we just learned new grammar rules and vocabulary in each class. But with Korean it's different because I listen to the language every day and already figure out grammar rules and vocabulary without studying it, just because I hear and read a lot of Korean. And then when I'm actually motivated enough to study more Korean and see this grammar rule that I already kinda know and understand the purpose of, it's way easier to learn. Also meeting Korean friends online and sending kkt messages every day also helps a lot (although my Korean could be way better at this point). I'm actually really considering to go to Korea for a few months after graduating to learn the language a bit more, so Billy's words of just going for it felt so fitting and definitely motivate me even more to just do it~~
For me friends often didnt told me when something is wrong. But when i started in a korean company that was the time which changed my korean a lot. Also my coworkers never act like they understand everything and ignoring what they couldnt understood. So now i got sometimes "i didnt understand what you mean". I work in a technical field 😅 so i have to explain what i think and solution with technical (uncommon in daily life) words. And to the customers in very polite way 😶.
For me personally going to a Korean school here in my own country really helps. I do not really have Korean friends, however that environment is the closest thing possible. The Korean community is not big here but it feels like a tiny little village where all Koreans know the school and the school knows all the Koreans. Plus.. studying with a group really helps me studying with staying motivated and disciplined.
Really good interview. Lol. Andy sounds German lol. At least that’s what I licked up because I speak German as well. I am just starting to learn Korean now.
10 years for Andy and 16 years for Billy learning Korean. I guess that's also similar to my journey with English as my second language, although we used it as the medium for learning in school. Not bad. I'm just on my 10th month learning Korean, with least one episode of kdrama per day exposure, together with Coursera, Duolingo, and Memrise. It's been fun! But I would say Coursera and Duolingo are the most helpful for me.
Duolingo? I finished the whole course and didn’rt learn a thing with it. Now, 2 years later, I occasionally use it when I’m waiting for a bus, but still, there could be more useful Korean things I could spend that time on.
@@_filifjonkan4290 That may be your experience but I would say I am learning a lot from Duolingo especially vocabularies and sentence patterns. Almost 10 months on and I'm still around 65% of the tree. I make sure I have mastery of the vocabularies before moving further as it can be overwhelming to take in everything. I take notes of new vocabs which I review everyday. Coursera courses have been also very helpful in the grammar aspect. Finished 5 courses already, though, I had to repeat each video lessons 3-5 times to really grasp the lessons. For me, the two have been great pair of resources. You may have found other resources that work well with you. That's great also.
Having a girlfriend from S Korea and able to practice and be corrected. I also live in Queens and most of my neighbors are Asian/Korean. There is that thing she does in correcting me and saying the lesson is not good and to say it her way, lololol.
삘리 선생님! 질문이 하나 있는데요! 한국에 사는 친구랑 실제로 대화하는게보다 통화 할때 다른 사람이 무슨 말인지 확실하게 듣는것이 더 힘들다고 생각해요? 저는 전화로만 이야기한 적이 있는데 그때 듣기가 까금 힘들수 있으니까 삘리 선생님의 경험에 대해 궁금했구만. 실제로 만나면 이해하기가 더 쉴까요?
I can't find Korean subtitles anywhere for dramas ..they are only available in with english subtitles..can someone tell me where can I find Korean subtitles 😭😭😭😭
100% the drinking! Not that I'm even shy, but "loosening up" DOES help. Only drawback is you for some reason think you are super good at it... when you still aren't. LMAO.
Inputs!!! Contextualize the words I just saw... Pronunciation training. I avoid translating by all means. If I need to make a sentence in my mother tongue (french) before doing it on a foreign language (or the opposite), then it's not good.
My MOST effective time was making friends with a Japanese classmate whilst studying in Korea. Korean was our only mutual language so it really pushed us to use everything we were learning and because we were a similar level it never got overwhelming. Most of my Korean friends were learning English so it was harder than I thought to find someone to speak exclusively in Korean with, as we'd usually default back to English the moment it got difficult to communicate.
Very cool
The most helpful for me has been having multiple sources of input because then I can more likely see the same words and phrases multiple times. I start the day with 5 minutes of vocab flashcards which doesn't necessarily teach me the word, but it gives me an exposure to it. Then it often comes up that day or in the next couple days and I think, "Oh, I've seen this." And enough times and in different contexts I can begin to understand the meaning. So I like to listen to youtube videos, read short stories, and and listen to short podcasts with transcripts. It all mixes together to getting lots of exposure :)
Hey please share podcasts with transcripts please???
@@faithbwire9164 Check out Spongemind youtube channel. You can send an email and he will share a folder full of transcripts and translations :) And also on a podcast app also.
Would you be able to recommend a good site for short stories? That intrigues me quite a bit. Thanks in advance!
@@TheVioletSpectre I don't have a great site atm. I bought a book with short stories. Olly Richards (another youtuber). Also I write different things and then do a class with an italki tutor who corrects it so then I end up with a nice little story from my own life that I can study with the native speaker corrections. If anyone else sees this comment and knows free places for short stories that'd be great :)
@@Learninglotsoflanguages Gotcha! Well I'll have to take a look at the Olly Richards book. Might as well. It'll give me something to read as I progress in my learning. Thanks so much, I really appreciate it! The tutoring sounds like fun, btw. I hope it helps with your writing. Sounds like it does for sure!
My husband is Korean, born and raised. He's useless to help me lol every time I speak to him in Korean, he replies in English. His parents will be more help for sure lol
Writing in Korean really helps me learn how sentences are built and the differences between a lot of similar words.
The biggest tip for me was reviewing things like Kdramas multiple times. Ive been a rewatching a Kdrama for the 4th time with Korean subtitles and I was doing it passively since I know the story so well, having watched it multiple times.
But I will be more intentional with my rewatch, jotting down notes, practising familiar phrases based on how they're written in Hangul, etc.
Was a little bummed to hear that Andy's been studying Korean for a decade and wasnt as fluent as his time spent should indicate.
But after 7 months, I am determined to keep at it.
Thanks Billy (and Andy)!
don't be bummed! there are various different factors that can impact that, for ex. taking long breaks from studying, being a student, and just life in general. i've been studying since 2018, but i am still only at a beginner-intermediate level because of all of the above. but i won't give up too! you sound very dedicated and the methods you're using are effective so i have faith you will succeed. 공부를 열심이 하면 꼭 유창해질 것입니다. best of luck!!!
Yeah, I've been studying German for 5 years and I think I'll need to live there to even get close to truly "fluent" (i.e. easy, spontaneous conversations on high level or specialty topics like politics or something I would study in University). Atm I can have normal day to day conversations pretty well and I can follow tv shows (even the more difficult dramas) without subtitles and I can read novels.
But, that said, German is much closer to English than Korean is, so I imagine it'll be 10 years to get to that point in Korean. 🤷 I think the most important things to remember are:
a) how difficult English is to learn for other people
b) that language learning is fun
c) you've probably only ever tried to be helpful to people who are still learning English, so you can expect the same experience while you're learning
I don't have korean friends plus I'm pretty shy so I have somewhat of an unusual approach I think. Number one helpful thing for me is to be very aware that there is no shortcut or fastest way, it's just doing the work and the hours. So besides studying with books and other resources I do my best to be surrounded with the language all day every day in some type of way. It might be media like variety shows to hear people talk to eachother, or radio stations or audio books as background noise or even switching games I know really well into Korean so that I can comfortably play with language exposure. I watch some shows without subtitles to challenge my brain to really pay attention to words, tone, body language, etc to get used to the entirety of the communication but I so far only do so with topics I already know so well that the vocab isn't too crazy even when words are new. It's within my geek realm. I have plans to buy some books too and squeeze myself into reading so that I can become faster at reading subtitles but overall I'm just trying to go through those symbolic 10.000 hours at a good pace. I know that when the brain sees information as essential to your environment it remembers it better so I'm turning Korean into my everyday environment. I'm terrible at speaking and spelling yet but my listening comprehension is really coming along. I'm not feeling a rush to speak either but to practice the making of the sounds I'm learning song lyrics and singing because it helped my English a ton back in the day.
what's been most helpful for me is watching korean youtubers/youtube videos in korean, specifically in subjects that interest me, like talking about college, future goals, anime, studying, drawing, grwm-type small talk and the like. that way i can curate my own concentrated vocabulary lists, but i always make sure to record the entire sentence so i understand the word in context. i parrot after the speaker as well, and copy their tone and intonation out loud.
when among us was booming i studied up on vocab related to the game and then would play in korean servers and push myself to communicate even with my limited korean. do note that texting korean will not look like textbook korean, so there were lots of slang and typos i had to work my way through lol. but online gaming is a great and fun way to interact with korean speakers.
lastly, i always speak out loud to myself and try to make sentences with anything i had just learned. i spent so much time writing and reading korean i realized my speaking and listening were extremely far behind. so no matter how long it takes me to string together a sentence on the spot, i do it. it's become increasingly easier the more i've practiced this. using these forms of input (along with podcasts and vlives) i take note of different natural patterns in speech to avoid sounding overly textbook, write them down with context and implement them into my practice :)
My daughter did the same, playing “among us” with Koreans, she made a whole cheat sheet of phrases that she could use, and she thought it was really funny when they started suspecting that there was a foreigner “among them”.
Like some of the other people who have commented I also find exposure to be the key to learning. No silver bullet. You just have to put in the hours. 😬
I’ve been “studying” for 2 years and 3 months solidly for about 2 hrs per day (started end of September 2019) and lived in Korea as an English teacher from 2015 - 2018 but my Korean was absolute shit. I tried learning enough to control a classroom but couldn’t understand my colleagues. I spoke in short sentences. Just enough to tell students to pay attention and shut up. Lol.
After I returned for a year, a former Korean colleague visited my hometown in the USA during the summer. After he left I decided to study Korean again and be more serious about it.
Honestly living in Korea wasn’t as much help as one would think… at least if your occupation is to teach English. Most people expect you to just speak English and the expat community means you don’t need Korean friends to socialize.
I find being in the USA far better for my Korean because it helps me “escape” life in the USA, whereas when I was in Korea my time off was spent connecting with English speakers and escaping Korea. Lol. Homesickness is real.
Anyway, what has helped me the most after 2 years and 3 months and counting of seriously studying Korean has been watching Korean RUclips channels that I like and listening and repeating TTMIK books and using Go Billy Korean and Korean Grammar In Use and How To Study Korean.
Most Korean RUclips shows have Korean subtitles already built into the shows similar to Korean Variety Shows and they are short (around 10 min).
When I watch my RUclips shows I pause the video every time I come across a word I don’t know and look it up in Naver Dictionary. Read the definition in both Korean and English and then read several example sentences and guess their meanings. Usually there are VLIVE sample sentences as well and I’ll sometimes click in the videos associated with those sample sentences to hear/see them in context. I have to repeat this process with the same word maybe 5-20 times? Lol. Idk. I read somewhere that we humans have to be exposed to something 5-20 times before we understand or internalize something.
I hate flash cards. But Grammar books are good for me. I find after going over a grammar point, I begin noticing it in the shows I watch.
But for me it’s about enjoying the experience and to keep putting in the hours. I’ve really focused on my listening and then reading. My handwriting looks good and I can touch type in Korean but I don’t practice my speaking or writing. I do listen and repeat, and I repeat lines and imitate characters from Korean RUclips shows.
I think listening and reading is more important than speaking and writing because Koreans hardly speak to strangers and don’t talk freely like Americans. It’s okay to be silent. At least that’s what I personally observed around Korean speakers. After all most of them met their bf/gf or husband/wife through arranged blind dates.
But not being able to understand what my colleagues were saying and not being able to read sucked! I felt so out of place. For example, a colleague would crack a joke during a company dinner and everyone would laugh except for me. So yeah, right now I’m just focusing on the receptive skills: listening and reading. 😎
Btw here are some Korean RUclips channels I watch:
급식왕
탁주 TV
캐리TV 장난감친구들
딩굴딩굴
오늘비와
급식쌤들
급식걸즈
크집사
멸치형
햄찌월드
사랑아놀자
헤이지나
Most of those channels are for K-9 age group which might seem weird since I’m a 31M but whatever. I taught elementary school in Korea and am a big kid at heart I guess. Maybe someday I’ll watch what I watch in English in Korean (photography/photoshop tutorials, astronomy, podcasts)
I’ve gone maybe overboard with my comment, but I really like where I am currently at with my studying/skill level. 😃
I ALSO recommend studying Korean history. Knowing more about Korean history and culture has helped me to understand Korea/Koreans better (e.g. why they do what they do) 🤓
You can also learn about Korean culture through reading Korean traditional folk tales. 한국언니 Korean Unnie and TTMIK both have good reading material on Korean traditional folk tales although TTMIK doesn’t let you purchase the PDF/eBook version anymore which is lame ( I bought the PDF several years back before they made the switch to their new membership style website). You can still access the reading material through their premium lessons though.
RM from BTS claims he learned English from watching Friends. Everybody’s different but for me, active listening to Korean programs I like has really helped in conjunction with textbooks from multiple sources.
Anyway, just have fun. Life’s too short, live it up! 🤪
I don’t have my comment notifications turned on for RUclips but I hope someone out there found this useful! 화이팅! 🙌🏻 ❤️
I think started learning Korean around June 2021, but I started putting more hours into it last year. I read better than I write, and listening is a struggle for me . I feel like I should be further along my Korean journey and have trouble remembering grammar rules and my vocab is trash, but I try telling myself that forgetting is also a part of learning. I'll check out those Korean channels you mention. 감사합니다 (°∀°).
@@bunnypep7364 Hope some of those channels I recommended are helpful in your journey. 🙂
I think listening is one of the hardest skills to master despite being the most basic.
I have a friend who graduated with a degree in Japanese and discovered he couldn’t understand what people were saying. University didn’t prepare him for the “real world”.
I’m planning on traveling to Korea for about 1 month in October to take pictures for work and to revisit where I used to live as an ESL teacher. Hopefully all this exposure to my favorite Korean RUclips channels will pay off when I visit! 😃
Best of luck in your continued journey with the Korean language. ❤
@@b.a.p.4718 감사합니다(^ｰ^) I hopefully your friend will overcome his challenge with listening in Japanese, Japanese is already a challenge with kanji and its different grammar system. I also hope that your trip to Korea in October goes well. You'll get to experience Korean Halloween, how fun! Best luck to us both (σ≧▽≦)σ.
THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!!!
I've been learning Korean for 5 years without any friends to constantly practice with, and have never been to the country... 😅 Thankfully I've had tutors and at one point a language exchange partner, so I've been able to learn a ton of vocabulary and become more comfortable speaking. I can understand Webtoons, certain books, and videos in Korean, but I still feel that if I go to Korea my skills would definitely improve a lot :)
Wow a fellow Kiwi who has worked hard and become fluent in Korean, that gives me hope! Great video, thanks!
I definitely think listening to Korean while reading Korean subtitles or transcripts at the same time is one thing that has helped me a lot, especially my listening skills. For a long time I could hardly understand anything being said, but after I started doing this every day I got so much better. I recommend TTMIK's Iyagi series for this, they're awesome!
I got their 1st 3 books and they're very well made. I still cannot read captions as fast as they display, but I need to try this more. Sadly a lot of streaming platforms in America that have Korean language movies or shows only offer English captions :/
@@BASEDinMaine At first I couldn't read fast enough either, I would be pausing constantly. But I've gotten to the point now where I can keep up fairly well :)
Yes. Surround yourself with the language. I am a HUGE drama fan and i do use the tip mentioned about watching dramas multiple times with English/ Korean subtitles. It definitely helps with learning new vocab and getting a feel of language.
Reading out loud following the text/audio of a book or a drama. It has helped with pronunciation, listening and comprehension. Also, learning about pronunciation from the Darakwon book (Korean Pronunciation Guide).
I'm trying the "immerse yourself in Korean" while still in America" method, which Billy described in another video. I traveled over an hour to the nearest H-Mart to practice ordering bulgogi. And I do language apps on the train. But I really like to hear what works well for others and try it their way. Will I marry a Korean? Perhaps.
This video's so good! The "mouth muscles" comment was insightful. The 300 dollar phone bill made me face palm cuz I've done that too back in the day.
Loving these tips!
I visited Korea for a few weeks last month and went to a language school. The school was ok but being surrounded by this language was motivating in a way that I just haven’t felt in the US. But I’m back in the states on my own doing my best. I think if you’re serious about learning then going to the country is the best thing.
What useful insight. Thank you guys so much.
the tired mouth muscles thing, yeah, I know that one too. After a pronunciation lesson, I'm left almost drooling
and I'm a tad disappointed that we didn't get to hear Andy speak in Korean.
Korean friends really help!
And also Korean study groups, it's nice to chat in Korean with people at my level who are also learning the language, very good to practice what I've learned and exchange knowledge
Super helpful thanks!
I live in Australia and I don’t have any Korean friends, so for me having a native Korean tutor is the most important thing. I also try to watch something in Korean and write in my diary everyday. But without speaking and listening practice I know it’s going to be a long process. I’m just enjoying the journey.
it gets expensive tho :(
Most helpful for me is watching children interviewing idols, with both English and Korean subtitles. Sometimes the topic is history, or family, or being ill, etc. What I really like is that I focus on what they have to say, not on the grammar.
This channel to motivate me.
I'm in Korea now and I think that really pushes me to try new words when going to eat or shopping. Like you said having Korean friends help out alot. My coworker is Korean and I feel like a burden sometimes because of all the questions I ask.
Reading Tinder profiles while I was in SK taught me a lot of hobbies and slang 😆 And actually texting people in real time made me learn how to read and remember vocab a little faster 😬
For me the most helpful thing is having it in your everyday life. Which is easy to do even if you don't live in Korea. What i do is following a lot of Korean people on Twitter (ofc if they only tweet in korean) and just watching things in korean (movies, videos etc.). Combining this with learning from a book, it helps a lot.
For me, the biggest thing is what I would call immersion, what I mean by this is setting things around you in life to be Korean standard, so for example if you're in the states, set your phone to Korean, set Siri to Korean, take notes and write your schedules for daily life in Korean, when using websites if they give you language options set it to Korean if the option is available, watch tv and read books in Korean or with Korean subtitles for English shows if possible, and last but most important for my learning personally...living in Korea or even being there for a short time.
I've been studying for 4 years and the most helpful thing for me is just really talking to my friends everyday, if my friends aren't available then I go to language exchange apps or even play games and talk to strangers. It was really intimidating at first having to fire up papago and naver dictionary while talking to someone, but I got used to it and I noticed that I only need naver dict for most of the time since I lack vocabs.
Spending MONEY and TIME on learning Korean is what really helped me. Moving to Korea and talking with Koreans friends/coworkers/students/strangers doesn’t really help *much*. Until I bought some textbooks and began studying regularly, I was stuck at A1 level. Months later, I’m now at A2!
I guess the most helpful thing is to be exposed to the language a lot. It's interesting how learning a language by yourself (and because you're interested in it) is so different from learning it in school. When I learned English and French for example I had no clue how the language was used in daily life, we just learned new grammar rules and vocabulary in each class. But with Korean it's different because I listen to the language every day and already figure out grammar rules and vocabulary without studying it, just because I hear and read a lot of Korean. And then when I'm actually motivated enough to study more Korean and see this grammar rule that I already kinda know and understand the purpose of, it's way easier to learn.
Also meeting Korean friends online and sending kkt messages every day also helps a lot (although my Korean could be way better at this point).
I'm actually really considering to go to Korea for a few months after graduating to learn the language a bit more, so Billy's words of just going for it felt so fitting and definitely motivate me even more to just do it~~
For me friends often didnt told me when something is wrong. But when i started in a korean company that was the time which changed my korean a lot. Also my coworkers never act like they understand everything and ignoring what they couldnt understood. So now i got sometimes "i didnt understand what you mean". I work in a technical field 😅 so i have to explain what i think and solution with technical (uncommon in daily life) words. And to the customers in very polite way 😶.
For me personally going to a Korean school here in my own country really helps. I do not really have Korean friends, however that environment is the closest thing possible. The Korean community is not big here but it feels like a tiny little village where all Koreans know the school and the school knows all the Koreans. Plus.. studying with a group really helps me studying with staying motivated and disciplined.
엥??? 동탄 호수 공원에 오셨었군요 ^^
여기 가끔 놀러 가는데 괜히 반갑네요 ㅎㅎ
Really good interview. Lol. Andy sounds German lol. At least that’s what I licked up because I speak German as well. I am just starting to learn Korean now.
Wooow.. dongtan! I am currently in Dongtan. Hehe.. But as what I know Dongtan is part of Hwaseong. Anyways, thanks for this video.
10 years for Andy and 16 years for Billy learning Korean. I guess that's also similar to my journey with English as my second language, although we used it as the medium for learning in school. Not bad. I'm just on my 10th month learning Korean, with least one episode of kdrama per day exposure, together with Coursera, Duolingo, and Memrise. It's been fun! But I would say Coursera and Duolingo are the most helpful for me.
Duolingo? I finished the whole course and didn’rt learn a thing with it. Now, 2 years later, I occasionally use it when I’m waiting for a bus, but still, there could be more useful Korean things I could spend that time on.
@@_filifjonkan4290 That may be your experience but I would say I am learning a lot from Duolingo especially vocabularies and sentence patterns. Almost 10 months on and I'm still around 65% of the tree. I make sure I have mastery of the vocabularies before moving further as it can be overwhelming to take in everything. I take notes of new vocabs which I review everyday. Coursera courses have been also very helpful in the grammar aspect. Finished 5 courses already, though, I had to repeat each video lessons 3-5 times to really grasp the lessons. For me, the two have been great pair of resources. You may have found other resources that work well with you. That's great also.
I feel like I’m in a learning plateau. 저는 노력하면 할수록 I feel like I took 5 steps back. Also I’m too shy to call 😂😂
Having a girlfriend from S Korea and able to practice and be corrected. I also live in Queens and most of my neighbors are Asian/Korean. There is that thing she does in correcting me and saying the lesson is not good and to say it her way, lololol.
삘리 선생님! 질문이 하나 있는데요! 한국에 사는 친구랑 실제로 대화하는게보다 통화 할때 다른 사람이 무슨 말인지 확실하게 듣는것이 더 힘들다고 생각해요? 저는 전화로만 이야기한 적이 있는데 그때 듣기가 까금 힘들수 있으니까 삘리 선생님의 경험에 대해 궁금했구만. 실제로 만나면 이해하기가 더 쉴까요?
I can't find Korean subtitles anywhere for dramas ..they are only available in with english subtitles..can someone tell me where can I find Korean subtitles 😭😭😭😭
100% the drinking! Not that I'm even shy, but "loosening up" DOES help. Only drawback is you for some reason think you are super good at it... when you still aren't. LMAO.
Inputs!!! Contextualize the words I just saw... Pronunciation training.
I avoid translating by all means. If I need to make a sentence in my mother tongue (french) before doing it on a foreign language (or the opposite), then it's not good.
the fastest way to learn korean is to having koreann friends
I agree, without practice is really difficult to learn every language.
Does your book series cover verb conjugations? Thanks for video!
Yes, definitely :)
Awesome, ty!
I love korean language so much and I also talk korean language ❤️💜
역시 원어민이 옆에 있는게 .......내 원어민은 afn !!!
getting drunk and speaking gibberish korean, thanks!
What helped me most to speak this language is pushing my lips to the front
How did you get John Oliver on your show?
Are you referring to Henry Cavill?
@@GoBillyKorean Oh I see you digitally removed his mustache.
The greatest tip : get a girl/boy friend 🤣
Second
Do you like Korean learning
I am the first 🥇