Let's Learn Korean

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Total words: 569

The EFL Geek a.k.a 왕음치 ( 王音癡) described a new KSL class online and I am in the process of giving it a try. Koreanclass101 is growing and currently has ‘newbie lessons’, beginner lessons and a little more (the audioblog seems geared toward stronger Korean ability). The site offers free podcasts and additional paid material. When you sign up, you get a free week of access to the premium material, including transcripts and review.

I am about to game the system. I don’t recommend this, but I will soon sign up with a second email address (doesn’t everyone have a handful of email accounts these days?) for a further week of free access to the full service. My trivial excuses are: 1) I’m doing this for you -helping give you a better account of the services offered, and 2) I was busy that week - it was a bad time to explore the content.

A more serious reason is that I have not yet found my true level in the material offered. Again, I was busy. Perhaps a level test is needed (is ‘level test’ a Konglish term -it rolls naturally off my tongue but I’m not sure). I would even accept a sort of eye test: “Can you read and understand this line?” “How about this line?” There’s not much point in cheating on a level test, after all.

I don’t mind, and probably need, review. I am not a ‘newbie’ but, well, false beginners are always hard to place.

Anyway, the podcasts are clear and stand alone well. The documentation prints out in good format, but I don’t really like PDF files. I would prefer a simple ‘.txt’ file that I could store in my phone’s ebook folder and read while listening on the bus. That would be handier than paper in my situation.

Monday, October 08, 2007

Total words: 81

王音癡

Korean Class 101 is a podcast along the lines of JapanesePod101 and ChinesePod. Over a year ago I started work on a Korean podcast but due to a number of factors it never came to be. This Korean podcast looks to be almost exactly what I wanted to do.

You can see my original post on Korean podcast here and the recent comment that alerted me to a completed, live and running version of the podcast. HOpe it helps someone out.

Posted by 王音癡 on Monday Oct 8, 2007 at 08:06 PM in In the classroom | Podcast | Internet Resources |
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Monday, July 17, 2006

Total words: 241

王音癡

Today I recieved an email asking about how the podcast is progressing and I realized I hadn’t posted anything in a long time. It’s coming along slowly as I’ve been busy teaching summer courses which will end on Thursday. So after that I’ll have much more free time to get everything coded properly. Additionally I’ve been designing a new board game for my classes and watching Lost (curses to my friend who recommended that incredibly addictive show)

Current progress is a basic site design with some changes necessary. Once I get that 100%, then I need to add the Expression Engine code which shouldn’t be too much trouble except for some of the new features I’m planning on trying out. Once I get that done then I’ll need to modify the default forum look to match the site as well as the default wiki appearance. Finally, I will need to work on membership levels and subscription services. I do not foresee myself having much trouble reaching the early September deadline for launch.

The content is going to be produced by Korean teachers. The teachers responsible for coordinating this effort are currently on Vacation and I believe due back this week. They, too, will have plenty of time to get several lessons at multiple levels prepared in Time for September. As more info becomes availble I’ll continue to post.

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Posted by 王音癡 on Monday Jul 17, 2006 at 01:41 PM in Podcast |
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Wednesday, June 14, 2006

Total words: 179

王音癡

About a month ago I posted about starting a Korean podcast for Learners. I recieved several emails from interested people and would like to thank everyone who offered to help out.

The Korean Language Podcast is going to be designed and maintained by myself with language lessons and materials produced by the fully qualified Korean language teachers at the LTRC. Charles found out about this project and talked to his wife who is one of the instructors at the LTRC. She was very interested and talked to the other teachers and administration and everyone was excited about starting the project.

It took a while to meet, due to conflicting schedules, but we finally met today and discussed several aspects of what we would like to do and decided to proceed. Our target launch date is the first week of September when we will have podcasts at multiple levels prepared with supplemental materials. Check back here for updates over the summer or post suggestions in the forums.

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Posted by 王音癡 on Wednesday Jun 14, 2006 at 04:47 PM in META | Podcast |
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Friday, June 02, 2006

Total words: 51

王音癡

The Korean Podcasts for Learners project is definitely underway. I’m meeting with a number of people and am expecting to make a major announcement before the end of the month with details. Unfortunately at this time I cannot provide any information.

Please be patient - this is definitely worth waiting for.

Posted by 王音癡 on Friday Jun 2, 2006 at 06:51 AM in META | Podcast |
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Friday, May 19, 2006

Total words: 336

王音癡

A few weeks ago I wrote about Chinese Pod and lamented that there was no such resource for Korean language learners. Today I saw that Mark found another Chinese podcast. I left a comment to which he responded: EFL Geek, why don’t you and one of your Korean friends start one?

Well I’m nowhere near qualified to start a podcast for learners and unfortunately I don’t have any Korean friends I could call on for this. I am however willing to host the podcast, purchase a domain, design the site as well as provide training to podcasters on how to record their files and upload them to a site. The only thing is I need volunteers to design the podcasts and record them.

Recording is easy enough on your home PC and as mentioned I would be able to show you how to accomplish this if necessary. I’m also sure that once the podcast got off the ground we would have a large audience quickly. I’ve seen many threads on Daves Cafe and other expat boards expressing interest in learning Korean. Anyone willing to help out on the language end?

I have sent emails to several popular bloggers in Korea asking for support and hopefully this project will get off the ground.

update
Second Language Writing posts an article about The Future of Learning talks alot about ChinesePod which largely fits into my vision for this project. There is also a link to an article in the Guardian worth reading about Chinese Pod and Ken Carrol