Learning Hangul

Quite honestly, I learned Hangul from GenkiKorean’s Hangul Rap. I would try to form my hands to the shape of the letters while singing along to the 40 second video. It matched the sound with my hands shaping the letter and that just stuck in my brain.

See also GenkiKorean’s Alphabet Game.  While I was just playing, “not learning”,  Hangul letters sunk in.

Refer to my earlier post on Korean letters.

You should practice both writing and typing Hangul while learning.  Just like when you learned ABC’s, the act of writing embeds the letters into your brain.

I’ve just started reading “Learning Korean with a Smile: Reading and Writing Hangeul”.  While I can read typed Korean letters, I am pretty inexperienced writing them and figuring out how to read Korean others have hand-written.

I practiced reading Hangul out loud with the book “A Rat’s Tale” that has slang terms and funny little one page skits about the terms in both Hangul and English.  You sort of don’t realize it is learning when the two guys are discussing how one lost his virginity at a love motel.

Professor Oh

Here are other resources for learning Hangul:

• Daily Dose of Hangul blog has a page on Hangul letters.
• There is a site at Indiana EDU where you can see words and hear audio for Korean Alphabet.
• Don’t miss Professor Oh’s funny videos on Hangul.
• John used these videos The Korean writing system-1 and The Korean writing system-2
• Carole MacDonnell likes the Pit-a-Pat Korean videos.  You can find those on the KBS World YouTube.  I’ve seen a few and like them too.
• Here is a page from the Sogang University Learn Korean course for practicing writing Hangul.  Print out and trace letters.
• This is Meyer’s quick online course in Hangul.