When I landed in Korea in July, we finally began.
That month of Korean study was intense, but I improved a lot. Every day we studied Korean in the classroom for five hours, and then I went home and studied Korean even more, using flashcards and pictures and wordlists. While studying was hard, I was really motivated to do well, and had a lot of free time to really work on improving. I finished the month with one of the highest grades in my class, and I felt excited by how much I had improved! I was determined to keep on studying.
In August, I moved to Hwacheon and started living with a host family and teaching. At first, I was excited by how much Korean I was able to use. But after a few weeks, I started to feel frustrated. I felt sad when students tried to talk to me in Korean and tell me about difficult problems they were having, because I didn't understand enough to help them. I felt stressed out because I couldn't always explain things to my host family. Most of all, I also realized that with a full-time job and having to get to know my host family, I had very little time and energy left at the end of the day to study Korean at all.
So, I gave myself a little bit of time to adjust. For the next month, I focused on building stronger relationships with my students, host family and co-teachers. I made sure to give myself time to rest and re-energize after long days. I focused on getting better and speaking more naturally with the Korean that I did know.
Once I grew more comfortable, I started to figure out ways to study more Korean during the day. If I finished lesson-planning early, I started taking Korean notes. I found helpful online resources for learning Korean.
