Well, you should give it a try!
Learning Korean online is much better than dragging yourself across town to a classroom at a time that’s totally inconvenient, to study at a pace that’s too fast or too slow. And you might find your local school doesn’t teach Korean in the first place. Finding your own Korean language software on the internet takes a bit of research, but it allows you to match the program to your own learning style.
But before you begin on learning Korean online, there are a couple of things to keep in mind. First, the Korean language has many levels of politeness, and in Korea, politeness is key. For example, the standard greeting in English is hello, regardless of whether we’re speaking to our neighbor or the President. That’s not the situation in Korea. In Korean, the way you would greet a person is dependent on his social position, age, or his relationship to you. It’s a lot like the difference between “How do you do”, “Hello,” “Hi,” and “Wassup” – only more so! For this reason, when learning Korean online it’s important to find a course that delves into Korean language and culture rather than just the rote pronunciation of words.
There’s another important difference between Korean and most languages familiar to English speakers. Korean is written in a special alphabet called Hangul or Hanguel. This unfamiliar alphabet makes it difficult for English-speaking visual learners, who rely so heavily on reading, to make progress in learning Korean. Luckily, however, Korean can also be transcribed in a Romanized alphabet, and visual learners should look for this feature when choosing a method of learning Korean online.
We hope that by now you’re ready to plunge into learning Korean online, and you’ve chosen a program that works for you – but is there anything you can do to speed up the process? How about finding some friends who speak Korean? Look for an online language program with a student forum where you can share your problems and successes with other students. If your forum is moderated by a native Korean speaker – and most of them are – you’ll be able to get help with specific questions as well. But just being able to bond with other Korean language students is an vital part of your own learning experience, regardless of whether you need extra help or not.
Hopefully, you now feel ready to tackle the job of learning Korean online. Yes, Korean is hard, but it’s not impossible – you can do it!
Do you need help choosing a Korean language course that really works? At http://www.learnkorean-online.info we review and compare different korean language courses so that you don’t have too. Visit our review of Rocket Korean today and discover why it’s our #1 ranked course.