Learning Korean: Weeks 5 & 6

Week 5 of Korean class was very fun! This week was Korean Thanksgiving or Chuseok. On this day Korean people celebrate the Fall harvest. Korean people also spend time with their families, eat delicious food and give thanks to their ancestors. Kids in Korea play games, have fun and eat candy. I have pictures of kids playing games on my Instagram (pmsblackqueen), Twitter (PMSBlackQueen) and Facebook (deshondat). Some of the kids looked very pretty as they were dressed in traditional Hanbok. We also made Songpyeon in Korean School. Songpyeon is a rice cake that is rolled into a ball and filled with sesame seeds, red beans, chestnuts or other ingredients then they are steamed. They were delicious! I posted pictures of them on my social media and took some home to steam myself. This was a fun time for me in Korean School. I love kids and I really enjoyed seeing all of the kids playing traditional Korean games.

Also on this week we had our first test on the flash cards we made the previous week. We were tested on writing our vocabulary words. So my teacher would say the word and we had to write it.  I did study and  I did OK, but I needed to study harder. I missed a few questions and I don't like to miss a lot on my tests. Next time I will improve.

Week 6 of Korean Class was another test of our vocabulary words. We learned a lot of words and the vocabulary was a bit more challenging, but it was not impossible. The main thing is to learn and get the alphabet and vowels down pat. When you are comfortable with that, then reading and writing comes pretty easy in my opinion. So same format as before, my teacher read the word and we had to write down what she said. We had a test on almost all of the words we learned so far.I must admit I missed a few, and that's OK. I won't beat myself up over it too much, but next time I will study hard and do my best. We learned today more vocabulary words which means more flash cards I will have to make to help me study from. The teacher in me loves flash cards and they really help me as I practice my writing and such. We also learned some Korean phrases during this week as well such as "To The Right", "To The Left", and "I'm Sorry." We learned about greetings and telling time also. I am learning a lot in Korean School and I really enjoy learning about Korean Culture as well. Next week we will learn some conversational Korean I believe and on Halloween we will be taking a field trip to a Korean BBQ restaurant here in my hometown! I am so looking forward to that because Korean food is so delicious! I will make sure to post a lot of picture s of my experience so stay tuned!

Learning Korean: Weeks 3 & 4

Weeks 3 & 4 of learning Korean went very well! We continued to learn about the alphabet. In these weeks we learned the entire alphabet, all of the vowels and the double consonants. Because there are a lot of vowels and consonants in the Hangul, the teacher in me decided to make flash cards to help me study. I must say these help me learn the alphabet along with the pronunciation of each letter sound. As my teacher always says, "Writing is important", I practiced my writing too. I have to practice more of my writing however. I have it down pretty good, but I feel it's not good enough sometimes, and I make some mistakes. Practice makes perfect, so I will continue to work hard on my writing. Sometimes the pronunciation can be a little tricky too, but if I practice that, I am confident I will improve.

Speaking of flash cards, we made flash cards on these weeks of vocabulary words. On one side was the picture and the other side was the Hangul. The cards were two characters long for example butterfly in Korean is "na bi." so on one side of my card was the picture of the butterfly and on the other side was the character for "na" and "bi" It's difficult to explain here, but I think I have pictures of my writing on my Instagram (pmsblackqueen), Twitter (PMS Black Queen) and Facebook (deshondat). I found it really satisfying when I began to put the letters I learned together and began to read, write and understand Korean a little bit! I felt kid of smart because I learned something new. 

On week 3 and 4 we also continued to learn about Korean Culture through Korean Art. We practiced drawing bamboo. As I mentioned before at the end of the semester we will be making a very nice plate or mug with our Korean art on it. Also the elders came to help us and show us how to do the art work properly. I really enjoy the elders who were helping us. I wrote my name on my paper in Korean and they read my name and said it was pretty. I just had a big smile on my face because I actually wrote my name and they understood it and they liked it. I have pictures on my Instagram of my art drawings. So far we were just practicing the strokes with the brush and ink. The brush and ink that are used is really cool too. You have to mix the ink with water and the more you mix it the darker the ink will become.  I need to practice my Korean Art more in the coming weeks. I really want to make something really pretty and show everyone what I have learned and accomplished. 

These weeks were fun for me at Korean School. I really enjoy my classmates and my teacher is very nice, patient, and kind with us. We learn a lot from her every week and she is a very good teacher. I always look forward to coming to class ready to learn. I just need to continue to study hard on my flashcards, and practice my writing and pronunciation.