Korean Job Discussion Forums

[ghost]

When ghost taught in Taiwan in 2005-2006, it spent 4 months studying Mandarin at one of the local Universities for 2-3 hours per day.....but the rest of the time, when not at University, spent just 30-45 minutes per day studying Mandarin (through books, listening to cd's) and the progress made through the self taught method was much more compared with the "taught method" sitting in a class with other foreigners, most of whom had terrible Mandarin pronunciation (bless their souls!) and frankly most of the classes were simply spent transcribing Chinese characters and being tested on them....not an efficient way to learn Mandarin, at least not for ghost.

After about 4 months on the Island (Taiwan), ghost had enough Mandarin to get by in most daily situations - ordering food in restaurants, knowing all the numbers, asking for directions and making small conversation on mundane every day topics (who we are, what we are doing here, what country we are from). In fact, within that limited register, Taiwanese thought ghost was fluent in Mandarin, perhaps forgetting that ghost was only fluent in the limited range it knew, albeit enough to get by in most daily situations, including making hotel reservations on the phone in Taichung.

How about for people in Korea, how much time do you spend, on average, studying the language per day?

It seems that studying small doses of language almost every day pays much bigger dividends than studying in large chunks with breaks in between or studying twice a week for 2 hours at a time. Ghost enjoys studying languages 30-45 minutes per day...but focused study, no dilly dallying! just like exercise - a little many times a week, better than one or two massive sessions once or twice a week....

When ghost went back to Montreal to take a Mandarin course at McGill, it was head and shoulders above the others (in conversation) compared with those who had just learned Chinese characters but had trouble stringing a sentence together. But the teacher thought ghost was a maverick, because ghost had devoted time in Taiwan to learning just conversation with Pinyin (chinese romanized script). Chinese teacher at McGill felt threatened by ghost, because it was defying the 'normal' way to learn Mandarin - bottom up, starting with Chinese characters. But ghost is a firm believer that it is best first to learn a language like a child (oral) before learning the writing.

One concedes that learning the Korean alphabet is probably a lot easier compared with learning thousands of Chinese characters.

Thanks for any input on the situation in Korea.

Ghost, ESL/FSL specialist, Montreal French school board

[gang ah jee]

Why do you italicise 'McGill'?

[Ginormousaurus]

I spend 3 hours a day at school and usually one hour out of school.

[cruisemonkey]

Zero.

[SuperHero]

Not enough.

Just finished a 4 hour/day program at Sogang, but now that I'm teaching again, I'll be lucky to get in 3-4 hours a week.

[Qinella]

About an hour, sometimes more, sometimes less, depending.. what I need to focus on really is hanja, because I'm really back and forth with that.

[Ginormousaurus]

[Qinella]

[chris_J2]

Not as much as I'd like to. I have to prioritise lesson plans @ # 1. Hangul comes in at about number 10 on the list. Maybe I'll take a course when I return to Australia? I've picked up some Hangul just from living in Korea for 10 months but not as much as I'd like to.

[Fresh Prince]

Ghost, The Korean alphabet aka Hangul, is super easy to learn. If you haven't learned it yet, then buy a cheap book for $10 and memorize it on the plane. Almost everyone I've met has been able to learn it in less than two hours.

OK, I understand that some people are good at some things and bad at others. Maybe it's tough for some people to learn alphabets. Once you get to Korea, you can go to any college and take a beginning Korean course. They will teach you the alphabet and how to say basic stuff for around $400 or less.

[ghost]