KoreanClass101.com Blog

What I noticed about the fashion in Korea was that most of the women wore high heeled shoes. The students, however, wore tennis shoes, preferably some ridiculously expensive brand name such as Le Coque, Adidas, Nike, or puma. I never saw a student wearing high heeled shoes. Also the students uniforms are usually altered. The girls that I lived (중삼) with told me that they gave their skirts to the launderer and asked them to shorten them, because only losers wear their skirts long, according to them. As for the boy's fashion, there was one boy who had one pant-leg shortened and rolled up partway, but when I asked about it, I was told it was just his own fashion. Boys in Korea are also more conscious of how they look, one other foreigner... Show more

UPDATE: The migration is complete. Thanks for your patience and support. Should you come cross any issues, please report them here. It's time for scheduled maintenance at KoreanClass101.com. On Sunday, July 13th at 9am EST, KoreanClass101.com will go down for several hours. When it returns, there may be a few small quirks which will be ironed out ASAP. What can you expect when the sites go live again? Well, most of the changes are "under the hood" so you probably won't be able to appreciate them fully right away (you will soon). What you will get right away is: 1. A new and improved vocabulary flashcards with audio that are more intuitive and easy to use. 2. A new sample sentence expansion section with audio in the Learning... Show more

If you tried to follow along at home and translate the letter I shared, great!  If not, then file it away in your "come back to sometime" folder and take another crack at it! Today I read it to my 6th grade students.  It was a little emotional the first time, but I manged to get though the other readings without too much trouble.  Then we played Twister! Anyway, here is the English translation of my letter: Dear 6th grade students, It is almost summer vacation. You are really looking forward to it, aren’t you? Today is our last class together. I have some things I want to say, so I wrote this letter. I came to Korean in August of 2006 when you were in the 4th grade. Before that I had never lived in a foreign country so my... Show more

Korean alphabet. Man, we didn't exactly put our best foot forward in creating the English alphabet, did we? I know firsthand what it's like to try to teach a child the English alphabet. "Okay, this little guy is called an "E" and he says a lot of different things. Sometimes he says his name /ee/, sometimes he changes a preceding vowel from short to long so long as the word is relatively small, and his friends "C" and "I" don't get along so he has to stand in between them so they don't fight, but if "C" isn't there, "I" likes to be in front of "E" because "I" is bossy. And please note that when "E" is next to "R", he is controlled by "R" because "R" is even more pushy than "I". Oh, and sometimes "E" says nothing at all. Come to... Show more

Sorry that I've been absent from the blog in recent weeks...but I am returning this week with a 2-part post for your translation pleasure.  My contract is finishing in less than 7 weeks, and I am leaving Korea.  Here is the text from the letter I wrote to half of my students.  The other half got slightly different, and simpler letters. It was a really interesting experience.  As I was thinking about doing it, I was a little daunted by the Korean I would have to use.  I wasn't sure I was up to the task.  I couldn't decide if I should start in English because then I could get the right emotions out, and look for translation help, or if I should just try to write from scratch in Korean....I decided to give it a go starting in Korean.  I... Show more