Duolingo Korean club

September 7, 2017 5:50 PM

Duolingo's Korean course was just released for Android and iOS! There was a fair bit of enthusiasm for the Japanese course when nightrecordings made a MeTa about it; can we get a decent showing of MeFi Korean learners?

The code to join the "MeFi Korean Club" I set up is PRNPPJ.

I've been studying Korean at university level since January 2016, but I'm still pretty shocking at it! Hopefully Duolingo will help me do the daily study that I really need to be doing. And if there are MeFites to learn with, so much the better!

It would be great to hear about your experiences with the language too. Or even your experiences with learning on Duolingo in general!

posted by Panthalassa to MetaFilter-Related at 5:50 PM (21 comments total)

I typed the word Duolingo so many times during this post and now I feel like a spambot
posted by Panthalassa at 5:53 PM on September 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

This is the first I've heard of Duolingo adding a Korean course. Very relevant to my interests. Hmm.
posted by ardgedee at 6:01 PM on September 7, 2017

⸘Learn High Valyrian wtf‽
posted by ardgedee at 6:03 PM on September 7, 2017

Meeeeeeeeee

Goma woyo!!!!!
posted by Hermione Granger at 6:41 PM on September 7, 2017

Wait is it only online? I can't find Korean as an option in the app yet
posted by Hermione Granger at 6:42 PM on September 7, 2017

Just kidding there's an app update for it

So excitedddddddddd
posted by Hermione Granger at 6:43 PM on September 7, 2017

Oh yeah, I should point out that the course is in public beta and at this stage seems to work best if you already have some basic knowledge of Korean.
posted by Panthalassa at 7:07 PM on September 7, 2017

I just signed up, so yay! I also just signed up for a Korean class at work, and am trying to practice more, but I just don't have a lot of opportunities these days.
posted by Literaryhero at 8:50 PM on September 7, 2017

I got this one.
posted by Literaryhero at 9:51 PM on September 7, 2017 [4 favorites]

Mm, so far I think I prefer Memrise's approach regarding learning the alphabet. I keep getting tripped up on the way Duolingo is doing the romanization (?) of certain sounds. I must just be too much of a beginner still to adapt. But I do like how quickly Duolingo starts showing you how some consonants and vowels make up words on their own.
posted by Hermione Granger at 12:05 AM on September 8, 2017

I'm not far into the course yet but so far it appears they're using the current Revised Romanization. That Wikipedia link has a good explanation for why it might conflict with how you're used to seeing Korean's names spelled.
posted by ardgedee at 12:56 AM on September 8, 2017

On one sentence I put the place in front of the subject and was told it was wrong (I disagree, but whatever), so the next time I put the subject first and was marked wrong. Ahhhh! If you are going to be prescriptivist, you have to at least be consistent, no?
posted by Literaryhero at 1:05 AM on September 8, 2017

Flag the sentence/s next time Literaryhero! It's a public beta so I'm sure the developers would be grateful
posted by Panthalassa at 2:29 AM on September 8, 2017

Ignignokt and I are interested! We might try to get the kid into it too, so he can impress 할머니 and 할아버지.
posted by Metroid Baby at 7:31 AM on September 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

Not my screenshot.
posted by tickingclock at 8:39 AM on September 8, 2017 [1 favorite]

사과 means "to apologize" (사과하다) and "apple", so it's a legit way to try to trick you
posted by hleehowon at 8:12 AM on September 9, 2017 [2 favorites]

Generated voices are actually awful, tbh.
posted by hleehowon at 8:13 AM on September 9, 2017 [1 favorite]

Literaryhero: 공 is never actually used as slang for testicles: 불알 is it
posted by hleehowon at 8:14 AM on September 9, 2017 [1 favorite]

Huzzah! I've joined the club, thanks! My (barely existent) Korean skills come from using Google Translate to decipher the signs in my neighborhood and the occasional Talk to Me in Korean video, so having more structure and some peers will help.

I've been happy with the Japanese courses on Duolingo so far. I can definitely see where I've forgotten certain sentence structures and parts of speech, so it's helped me strengthen those muscles, so to speak.
posted by Recliner of Rage at 3:53 PM on September 9, 2017

I will be trying when it shows up in the computer version.
posted by xarnop at 5:39 AM on September 10, 2017

On one sentence I put the place in front of the subject and was told it was wrong (I disagree, but whatever)

Yeah, for Japanese at least it expects a certain order which is not really correct (I mean, the order they expect is fine, but you could rearrange the sentence and have it still be fine). That said, what they are looking for is relatively easy to guess, so it's not a gigantic flaw, and I'm mostly just using it to increase my speed / get another source of practice.
posted by thefoxgod at 6:52 PM on September 12, 2017