Preface about the Korean language

Korean language, the first thing that clicks the mind is the song “Gangnam Style”(the album was released on July 15, 2012). Secondly, the tech giant “Samsung”, Automotive manufacturer Hyundai”, if counted there are so many inline.

The Korean language is correlative to Tamil. Certainly, they appear to be Homegrown.

The Korean language is important on the world stage because of South Korea’s powerful economy, geopolitical importance, and growing presence in Asian pop culture.

Hangul, where “Han” means “Korean”, and “gul” means “letter”.It is the formal writing system in South Korea and North Korea. It is also known as “Chosŏn muntcha” by locals. Hangul is made up of 10 vowels and 14 consonants, in a total of 24 letters. All the letters are spelled phonetic.

How to learn the Korean language

Come let us explore some of the tricks and tips for it.

There are many ways to learn yourself online. We can start with little now.

Let us talk about one of the topmost online coaching institutes “Henry Harvin” to learn the Korean language.

Henry Harvin is the top leading institute to learn the Korean language online. The institute has designed the Korean language course to understand the language topics clearly and upgrade the skills. Henry Harvin provides assistance to speak in the Korean language.

The institute has different levels of Korean language test

The TOPIK Korean Proficiency Test is a written test with an aim to measure the skills of native speakers. The test is to know your proficiency level in reading, writing, and listening to the Korean language Course.

There are three levels of test:

  • Beginners level (1 & 2) – This level has two sections for reading and listening to basic Korean vocabulary and grammar.
  • Intermediate level (3 & 4) – This level is the combination of three sections – reading, writing and listening.
  • Advanced level (5 & 6) – This level is the added level to the above levels with the skills of reading, writing, listening to the sentence formation and structure along with the vocabulary.

9 in 1 Course

  • Instructor-led- training: Below are the timing details for two way live online interactive sessions for the respective levels –

Level 1 ,2, 3, 4  – 56 +  hours,

Level 5 and 6 – 66 +  hours 

  • Projects: Real-time projects in the Korean language along with the implementation, and many more
  • Internship: An internship program is available to acquire practical knowledge of the Korean language
  • Certification: Certification of the Korean Language Training Course from Henry Harvin (Recognized by the Government of India and award-winning institute)
  • Placement support: 100% placement support assistance for 1-Year post successful completion
  • E-learning: Access to multiple tools and techniques, video content, assessment, and many more for e-learning
  • Bootcamps: Regular Bootcamp session is available post completion of the course for 12 months
  • Hackathons: Free access  to #AskHenry hackathons and contests are provided
  • Membership: One year of gold membership is available from the Henry Harvin Language Academy for the Korean language Training Course

Faculty details at Henry Harvin

  • The best-known trainers in the industry  with over a decade of professional experience
  • About 120+ hours of the Korean language course 
  • Domain experts with around more than 250+ lectures

Benefits of Gold Membership

  • 1 year of Henry Harvin Language Academy Gold Membership including e-learning access through recorded videos, games, projects, and so on
  • Free Bootcamp sessions for 1 year are available
  • Become one of the reputed alumni and can earn the prestigious Henry Harvin Alumni status
  • Job offers are provided every week
  • Discover projects in the real-time sector during training

Why choose Henry Harvin for learning the Korean language 

  • Increase your intellectual skills by learning Korean as a second language
  • Clearly express your views among the Korean crowd
  • Basic learning of the sentence structure
  • Basic learning of the word building
  • Get a degree or certificate in the Korean language course and improve your business prospects
  • Improved communication skills
  • Get familiar with cultural knowledge and advance your cross-cultural skills
  • Active reading and writing of the Korean alphabet develops organizational skills

Why select Henry Harvin for a career growth

  • Better growth opportunities improve career and employment prospects
  • Awesome job opportunities
  • Certification of Korean language course from well recognized- Henry Harvin Education
  • After completion of the Korean language course, you can become an instructor or a translator
  • After the completion of the Korean language training course, you can opt for freelancing or as a full-time professional in the Korean language.
  • Can choose to become a content writer or an editor in any MNC companies
  • Develop professional and technical skills to improve the CV 
  • Get connection with the millions of people worldwide in the Korean language era

Let’s start with the Korean Alphabet

Letters in the Hangul language need to be read from left to right and from top to bottom. Learning every day at least for 20 minutes is always recommendable. Spending time reading simple words like Korean slang or the colors in Korean are the baby steps to start learning.

With frequent practice, you can make language learning easier to speak Korean words and phrases. 

Korean pronunciation

To learn any language, there are always a set of rules. Korean letters are unique with each letter having its sound.

Little tips to master Korean pronunciation

  • Equalize each syllable: Korean is a syllable-timed language, which means equal time is spent pronouncing every syllable. For example, the word 사랑해 (sa-rang-hae).
  • Korean consonants sound evenly at regular intervals. However, no need to notice the sudden pitches as Korean is not a time stress language.
  • When the beginners use the native tongue to speak Korean, they tend to sound unnatural since stress is in the middle or at the beginning of words.
  • Practicing the Korean movie dialogues by just humming along and focusing on how to terminate the sentences can help learn the Korean language quickly.
  • Try to listen first: Hangul characters look differently at first glance. So, you may lose the focus and get busy to memorize how the mass of lines and squares. Better try to listen the Korean language first!
  • Be a baby to speak Korean: It is possible to learn to swim only if we get in the water. So, to start learning the Korean language is to start speaking in Korean(perhaps it may sound terrible at first)
  • Showing the gesture in Korean gives a boost to your practice. 
  • Practice aspirated and unaspirated consonants together: In particular four aspirated consonants -ㅋ,ㅌ,ㅍ, and ㅊ are present. 
  • The aspirated consonant is “ㅋ” whereas its unaspirated consonant is like “ㄱ”. Another aspirated consonant is like “ㅌ” whereas its unaspirated consonant is “ㄷ”.Hence, the aspirated consonants seem to have an extra stroke added to them.
  • Emphasis on the puff of air from your mouth: Korean pronunciation needs exaggeration of the aspirated consonants.
  • Hand over aspirated consonants to higher pitches: Aspirated consonants are slightly higher in pitch to compare with the unaspirated ones. You can sound louder by expelling the air.

Refer to https://www.fluentu.com/blog/korean/korean-pronunciation/ for a better understanding of the Korean language.

Find out how to pronounce double consonants

Take the help of unaspirated consonants to practice double consonants.

The Korean language has mainly five double consonants – ㄲ, ㄸ, ㅃ, ㅆ, and ㅉ.

As the name suggests, here the consonants ㄱ,ㄷ,ㅂ, ㅅ, and ㅈ repeat twice. Therefore, they need a bit extra emphasis whilst as compared to the easy unaspirated consonants.

Emphasis on double consonants with a higher pitch

As the aspirated consonants are a bit louder than non-aspirated ones, the double consonants are also a little higher and louder than both.

As the resulting sound changes a bit. The double consonants are bit more sensitive.

Have a look at the appearance:

“ㄱ” – sounds like “K” whilst “ㄲ” – sounds like  “G”

“ㄷ” – sounds like “T” whilst “ㄸ”  – sounds like a “D” 

“ㅂ” – sounds like “P” whilst “ㅃ”  – sounds like “B” 

“ㅅ” – sounds“S” whilst “ㅆ” – sounds a long “SS” 

“ㅈ” – sounds like “CH” whilst “ㅉ”  – sounds like  “J” 

Learn how to pronounce Batchim

“Batchim” (받침) is the slang of the Korean’s native. Local speakers use this slang in usual life. This makes their lives easier which instinctively change the sound of syllables.

Korean syllables are mainly have of one consonant and a vowel. The “Batchim” position is an additional consonant(or the final consonant) usually found at the bottom of a syllabic block.

As an example, the consonant “ㄹ” (rieul), sounds like the Korean letter “R”. But in the Batchim position(preceding another consonant), the word becomes 한글 (“hangeul”), and the pronunciation changes to the letter “L”.

Learn to read numbers

The Korean language has two different numbering systems. One is China System (Sino-Korean) and the other is Korea System (Native Korean).

Knowing the fundamentals of the Korean language, you can now begin with the unbiased approaches to train yourselves

As already spoken above, Hangul or 한글 is the Korean alphabet. Koreans’ use Hangul since the Joseon Dynasty composing 14 consonants and 10 vowels .

The fundamental of learning the Korean language is to learn to read Korean. In general, the Roman alphabets are easy and quick to learn when compared to the Korean alphabet.

Hangul is a straightforward language – all you need is to memorize the characters and sounds associated with it. Spending time hand-writing a series of symbols and simultaneously pronouncing their sounds would help to learn the Korean language. Try to watch this video to verify your pronunciation.

Make language learning easy and fun by practicing  Korean language level.

  • If you are a fresh beginner, use flashcards and read the words aloud.
  • If you are a beginner or intermediate learner, start spending at least 5 to 10 minutes a day reading the full Korean text loud. You can start by reading children’s books to understand the basic structure of the sentences.
  • If you are an intermediate/advanced level learner, start listening to Korean songs with the following lyrics for better understanding.

Having the right manual is always helpful for learning. Try to take time to incorporate new consent to set up the right foundation.

Few tips to follow

  • Study up! Try to follow the complete curriculum lesson-wise before moving to the next lesson. This is helpful to gain new knowledge to express yourself. In short, to communicate.
  • Be regular! Always try spending a minimum of 20 minutes every day on a new lesson or topic. The devotion to mini-sessions is always fruitful.
  • Keep an habit of reviewing and revising whatever is learned daily.

Use Flashcards to learn, this is always recommended at any stage of learning. This idea burns information into the brain and develops active calls and recalls. Seeing, again and again, the same cards helps to memorize the words instinctively.

Even you can make your flashcards by writing the Korean words in front and meaning in the back . This is the added advantage to learning the Korean language. Play matching the meanings of the Korean words written on top of the cards with the ones written on the back of the cards.

If interested you can pair with some Korean friends and try to create conversational debates or discussions in the Korean language.

Build up the connections in the Korean Language exchange communities

There are many online platforms where people build connections and find the communities as interested. So, try to join some of the Korean Language communities where people from far away connect and converse. 

Spending quality amount on building such connections increases the level of communication with virtual people. You can learn easily by exchanging the idea of language understanding and briefing the structure of the alphabet by clarifying each other’s doubts. There are so many language exchange communities available.

Some of the language exchange communities are 

eXlogue is one of the applications in language exchange communities. This community is entirely free and easy to use. The application helps you find the native partners interested in teaching their language in exchange for you teaching them yours’. The platform helps in fast learning by connecting the people virtually. Keep a practice to share whatever you learn. This is always helpful because, as and when you need , you can get feedback from language learners/experts in return.

Speaky is another ongoing language exchange community. You can browse through Speaky’s community to practice Korean or share your cultural background with other Korean learner. Here you can chat and make free phone calls with the multiple speakers connected online at the same time. Also, this platform lets you find the Korean language partner of your choice based on your selection of preferences.

Interpals is another great path to meet Korean natives and make friends with them. If you are not ready to speak yet, pen pal programs are worth available to check out.

There is a vast library of users to find a match and take yourself to the next level of learning.

Take the time to watch Korean dramas

Visually learning a language is always useful. So watching Korean dramas can be full of fun and entertainment to learn the Korean language. This can be is a play way method to quicken the listening skills and gain familiarity with the Korean culture. Visual cues are the expressions, gestures, and scenery that can clarify the meaning.

So watching more and more movies can be a punch to actively learning the Korean language. Select a few Korean dramas of your interest. Browse the titles you find interesting and head over to them.

Try to turn off the subtitles written at the bottom of the screen while watching the movie. Keep on replaying the videos till you understand. After watching the videos, pop up the subtitles below in the Korean language and watch again. This is the practice to know your level of understanding.

Try to make notes of the words that you do not understand, or any sentence structure that confuse you. Make a list of any expressions, vocabulary, structures, or cultural facts and get perfect in them.

Try to pick up some of your favorite K-Pop artists

By listening to K-Pop, you can place yourself right in the heart of contemporary Korean culture.

Learning language along with music is a popular methodology for the ones who want to enjoy studies while focusing on boosting their vocabulary. The synchronized dance moves, catchy melodies, and bizarre fashion will surely keep you hooked up and learning for the long run.

As a beginner, start by listening and exploring. Do not bother about comprehension but instead focus on finding the music which you can enjoy. 

Improve your vocabulary and confidence with loanwords

Learning any language is never been so easy. So, as a beginner, it is better to start with what you know.

Loanwords are words which are transferred or loaned from one language to another with little or no modifications. There are so many English-Korean loanwords. It is also referred as Korean-style English or Konglish. As a beginner, the primary goal should be to learn simple communication. 

Go to Youtube and listen to native content and with the help of the Korean exchange commutes, you can know any English-Korean loanwords.

Important note 

Ambassador Kim has declared the Korean language one of the Philippines’ second foreign languages. Kim has emphasized that studying a foreign language at schelp build building bridges between nations and societies.

Conclusion

Concluding, the Korean language takes about three months or 90 days to learn the Korean language by yourself or by any other means. Hangul is the formal writing system in Korea ,made up of 10 vowels and 14 consonants, altogether 24 letters. All letters are phonetically spelled. Furthermost, the Korean language can be fun and easy when learned through movie trailers, music videos, news, and inspiring talks.

Recommended Reads

FAQ’s

Q.1  Is the Korean language easy to learn?
 

Ans. It is easy to learn the Korean language.

Q.2 Can I earn by learning the Korean language?
 

Ans. Yes, you can earn as a freelancer or an instructor or opt as a profession in any MNCs.

Q.3 Is learning the Korean language online effective?
 

Ans. Yes, learning online or offline doesn’t matter till the time you are efficient for learning.

Q.4 What are the criteria for learning the Korean language?
 

Ans. There are no criteria for learning any language.

Q.5 Is there an age limit to learning the Korean language?
 

Ans. No, there is no age limit to learn anything.

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