The Forgotten Hanja

Before, Korea mixed both Hanguel (Korean alphabetical letters) with Hanja (Chinese Characters).  Later the Korean government removed Hanja from usage for various, probably nationalistic bent, reasons.  I always chose to learn the Hanja, as it helps me learn extra meaning to the words, and how it relates to both Japanese and Chinese.

Where I live, I signed a contract with the elderly owner, and I was so excited that he did the contract in traditional old style true Korean culture, with mix-script (that is both Hanja and Hanguel).  This is the contract he wrote out.

Learn Korean From Spanish?

Most languages books are in English. For Korean language books, you also get Chinese and Japanese due to the popularity of Korean in those countries, and even in Russian due to popularity of Korean in Russia. But seldom you see other languages like French and Spanish, but this series has all of those languages. The Spanish in this book, First Step in Korean for Spanish (ISBN: 89-387-011-9) is a bit formalized, like book Spanish, but it is still useful to see the Spanish to Korean connection, especially in order to get a deeper meaning to the words and their usage.  Many English words can be vague or ambiguous, at least with most Korean-English dictionaries.

I like the overall organization of the book, it is well put together, and is a great initial overview of the Korean language, and great for conversation.

Grammar Snippet: Negative Copula 아니다

A while back, wrote out this lesson from the Yonsei Level 1 text book (Lesson 1.3) and filed it away.  The purpose of this is to make something negative, which is English it would mean something is not equal or equivalent to something, e.g. Her name is not Cindy.

The format in Korean when conjugated is this:
  (subject) 이 or 가 아닙니다.
And the format in Japanese is this:
  (subject)  じゃありません。

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Here's the Korean in mixed script with particles highlighted:

저는 日本사람이 아닙니다.

jeoneun ilbon-sarami animnida. 

I am not Japanese.

존슨 씨는 醫師가 아닙니다.

jonseun-sshineun euisaga animnida.

Johnson is not a doctor.

린다 씨는 先生님이 아닙니다.

rinda-sshineun seonsaengnimi animnida.

Linda is not a teacher.

우리어머니는 한국사람이 아닙니다.

Uri eomeonineun hanguk-sarami animnida.

Our mother is not Koeran.

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And the same in Japanese with the particles highlighted:

私は日本人じゃありません。

Watashi wa nihonjin ja arimasen. 

I am not Japanese.

ジョンソンさんは医者じゃありません。
Jonson-san wa isha ja arimasen.

Johnson is not a doctor.

リンダさんは先生じゃありません。

rinda-san wa sensei ja arimasen.

Linda is not a teacher.

私達の母は韓国人じゃありません。

Watashi-tachi no haha wa kankoku-jin ja arimasen.

Our mother is not Koeran.

Grammar Snippet: 하고 Particle

Here's a little snippet of the Korean particle HAGO, which is the same as the particle TO in Japanese, and means "and" in English.  This material is derived from Yonsei Level 1 textbook (Chapter 1.4).

It's fascinating how some words are similar, like kutsu vs. kudu, kaban vs. kabang, and ban vs. bbang in the samples.

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Here's the Korean in mixed script with particles highlighted:

冊하고空冊이 있습니다.

chaek hago gongchaegi itseumnida.

There's a book and notebook.

빵하고김밥을 먹습니다.

bbang hago kimbabeul meokseumnida.

I eat bread and kimbap.

아버지하고 아머니가 계십니다.

abeoji hago ameoniga kyeshimnida.

Father and Mother are there.

가방하고 구두를 삽니다.

kabang hago kudureul samnida.

I buy a bag and shoes.

韓國말하고 日本말을 工夫합니다.

hangukmal hago ilbonmareul gonbu hamnida.
I study Korean and Japanese.

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And the same in Japanese with the particles highlighted:

本とノートがあります。
hon to nooto ga arimasu.
There is a book and notebook.

パンとのり巻きをたべます。
ban to nori-maki o tabemasu.
I eat bread and sushi-roll.

父と母がいます。
chichi to haha ga imasu.
Father and Mother are there.

かばんと靴をかいます。
kaban to kutsu o kaimasu.
I buy a bag and shoes.

韓国語と日本語を勉強します。
kankokugo to nihongo o benkyoo shimasu.
I study Korean and Japanese.

Yonsei KLI Experience Part III: A Second Look

I went back to Yonsei KLI and talked to some of the instructors.  Some of them are really nice people.  I then realized probably why this program has problems or struggles.  The program is very popular, and so they have numerous teachers and students, so the challenge, for the program, is class and student management, rather than focusing on the quality of the instruction and development of the program.  They can be the worst program in Korea, but nevertheless they get tons of students.  Maybe this is due to the popularity of the Yonsei name itself, being one of the top three universities in Korea.

Probably another challenge, is that many of the instructors are very limited in English.  The emphasis of the program is immersion, so there's no importance on knowing English, even though majority of their students speak this language.  If there are questions or confusions, and the students cannot ask in Korean, they need to seek help unfortunately outside the program.  If there are any criticisms to the program, the instructors are unable to understand, because of communication problems. The instructors cannot adapt or tailor the program to maximize the quality, because there's lack of feedback, and also with so many students, they focus on the status quo, just staying afloat managing the classes and sheer number of students.

Thus maybe Yonsei KLI is a victim of their success?

In general though, as a consumer, I want to choose the higher quality program, so this will be either with Sogang or a small school that uses either Yonsei's or Sogang's text books, and I'll look toward TOPIK in order measure my success or failure with the language.  I think Sogang's program is really aggressive and geared to your ability to seriously speak the language.  Yonsei's text books are perhaps really solid for grammar usage, and so their program also reflects this.

Personally, I prefer speaking and conversing even if I am light on grammar, because this generates enthusiasm and excitement for the language, which gives me energy to learn more and become more diligent in my studies, and of course to learn the grammar.  Thus a speaking oriented course (Sogang) will be a better choice for me than a grammar oriented course (Yonsei).

Yonsei TextBook

I might not have enjoyed the Yonsei KLI experience, but the text books I have to admit have greatly improved.  The layout and graphics are really excellent, and the content is reasonably well organized.  There's still some potential problems or criticisms I have, such as lack of sample sentences to discern word usage, and limited dialogs, and poor explanations in English.  For the Japanese version of the book, there were some mistakes in Japanese, which are typical of beginning learners of that language.  Well, so maybe the book is an unpolished gem, has a lot of flaws, but beyond that it is good.

Personally, I use this book as a supplement toward other material I have, such as books from Sogang University.  This helps identify material I am missing at beginning levels and reinforces material I know already.  I am also less surprised at material presented in TOPIK sample tests between both Yonsei and Sogang text books.

Another book on TOPIK

In any language, I think it is a good idea to look at the national standard and also certifications for documenting your skill in any given language.  A college degree in a language doesn't really matter because if  you truly cannot read, write, and converse in the language then it doesn't really matter what degree you hold.  These certification exams in any given language, is to certify a level of competency in the language.  Thus, studying and targeting a certification program will help you specify exactly what your strengths and weakness as well as any material you might be missing.

For Korea, the most documented standard is TOPIK.  There are other certification programs, but I just don't see much material for it. Even in TOPIK alone, the documentation is in Korean, so for certification on lower levels, this might be hard.

I came across one book that is a rough guide for TOPIK called Complete Guide to the TOPIK: Basic (ISBN 978-89-5995-810-8) and costs 16,000 weon (about $14).  The book looks pretty good with good layout, graphics, and English explanations. Between this book and sample practice exams, you should be able to assess your skill and competency in Korea.

Studying Korean: TOPIK

Regardless of how you learn Korean, one way to pull it together to see what you know or missed is some sort of certification, and TOPIK seems to be the most widely used.  What's great about studying for these types of exams is that it really pools all your efforts toward one single goal and refines your knowledge.  It's a way to leverage yourself and certify your strengths.

As a beginner, I am looking at cho-geup, or beginning level, so I grabbed this book on S-TOPIK (ISBN 978-89-414-5743-5) for 13,000 weon (about $10) and I going through the practice test questions.

Studying Abroad through Cal State

In California, for the four year universities there are two public systems: UC (University of California) and CSU (California State University).  The CSU system has a very good international program called CSU IP.  Every student who attends a Calfiornia State University can apply to the program and take courses in another country and have this count toward toward courses within the CSU system.

The information and support for the program varies from college to college.  I think SFSU (San Francisco State University) has the best support with their OIP.  In additional to the availability of CSU IP program, SFSU not has a rich home grown study abroad program themselves.  They have a system that allows you to meet your GE (General Education) requirements (Segment III) abroad, where other universities, this could be somewhat of a mess and not well discernible if this is possible.

In Japan, you can go to the top prestigious private school Wasaeda, and for Taiwan you can go to NTU (National Taiwan University).   I don't know about their language programs, but the for NTU the books look well developed.  And for Korea you get to go to the top university there, Yonsei, whose motto claims they are the "First and the Best".

If you are considering Korean language studies, note that currently there are no programs in any Cal State University that offers Korean according to the 2010-2011 undergraduate majors matrix.  The last time I looked, Korean is even limited in the UC system with only UCLA and UC Berkeley offering Korean language courses.  In contrast, according to that same matrix, of the 24 CalState universities, 3 offer Chinese (San Diego, LA, and SFSU) and 6 offer Japanese.

Studying Abroad Through Yonsei

I did a one year study abroad at Yonsei, and as a requirement from Yonsei, you need to take some Korean instruction.  However, to meet this requirement, they allowed me to take a 0-unit credit/no-credit course through their graduate program called GSIS, which was just great.  I couldn't imagine throwing away 6 units to the Yonsei KLI, and instead devoted those units to things like Marketing and Organizational Behavior.

The GSIS Korean course wasn't bad; it was a self-study fast paced course, and the instructor actually spoke English, so some instruction was in English, but mostly it was in Korean.  It was very aggressive pace, which I loved because with some Japanese language background, the grammar is easy to understand.  I can piece together quickly what I needed to learn to speak and what I could revisit later.

Though, unfortunately in the end, I found myself devoting more toward business courses than language studies.  I really needed a private tutor and some serious time to keep up with the course, but then it's zero units and doesn't go on my transcript.  I enjoyed it.

Yonsei KLI Experience Part II: Avoidence

Later when I came back in 2008 for a study-abroad in Korea, I attended Yonsei KLI.  I noticed that the program had new books with pretty pictures, but the course instruction style was pretty much unchanged.  In all these years, little has evolved in developing the class instruction.

This time, as most of the students were native English speakers, the instructors had to hold up placards in English, such as "Listen and Repeat",  in order to couch the students into doing the proper thing and  follow along in the class.  These same teachers from years ago that I met before still haven't learned any English.  I wondered about the relative competence of an instructor who is incapable of learning a foreign language. Should those that cannot learn a foreign language be teaching a foreign language?

The placement for beginning levels had numerous problems.  They had to shuffle students around  more than four times, and still some students were so extremely angry as they were in a course that was too easy or too hard.  In the class, students would have to read small simple phrases.  Everyone in the class would have to say the phrase, so while one student is speaking the phrase, others waited idly.  Students that were confused as to what to do were skipped and dismissed eventually.  The overall quality of the course was just rather lacking.  I cannot believe anyone would pay for this.  A friend of mine told me that this style was suited for instructing small children, but not for grown adults.

For my study abroad, I was able to opt out of taking Yonsei KLI courses and focus more on courses more related to my major.  I felt a loss of opportunity, to study abroad in Korea and not embrace language instruction of reasonable quality and competence.

Yonsei KLI Experience Part I: Boredom

I came here long ago in 2001 to do a intensive Summer program at Yonsei KLI, and I was bored to tears.  There were no instructions in English about the grammar or what to do in class.  The majority of students, Jaemi-Gyopo (Korean Americans), were fine with the program as most of them understood Korean., and they assisted the teachers by translating to English for other students.

I understood the grammar easily enough without English instruction because the grammar is similar to Japanese.  Still though, I wasn't really learning what I felt was anything useful.  They required using only polite formal verb form, i.e. -sumnida (습니다) and -sumnigga? (습니까?) forms.  These forms are useful in talking to strangers that are of high status, such as president of Korea.  I wanted to learn how to speak with people, make appointments, etc. and I was just not getting it, and speaking this polite formal form is really awkward.  I became utterly bored and impatient with the course.  Thus mentally, I dropped out of the program, showing up, but not mentally present in the course.  I never really developed a strong desire to study the language in earnest afterward.  Yonsei KLI killed it for me.

The Adventure Begins

Curious about Asian cultures, I took a smattering of courses in languages throughout the years as I worked in technology. I decided to pursue this to the next level and look towards certification and more diligently pursue language studies as a daily ritual.

Now I am in Korea, finishing up at Sogang University KLEC program (only Level 1) and the course is awesome. I have studied at Yonsei KLI, and well, to be polite, the program wasn't for me. Many people have some more harsh words for their program.

Anyhow, enough rambling. I'll post stuff I come across in CJK (Chinese-Japanese-Korean) language adventures, places to studies, tips from myself, and others that have explored studying in California and Asia.