How did non-Korean K-pop idols like Lisa from BlackPink, Momo from Twice or Minnie from Idle learn Korean so fast? Do they have secret techniques for learning new languages quickly, while other people seem to need much more time to study Korean and still not see results that quickly? Today, let's discuss how foreign K-pop idols achieve Korean fluency in a relatively short period of time and what WE can learn from their experiences to make progress in OUR Korean learning. First off, the first rea
son that they improve so quickly is their significant amount of output. When it comes to language learning, both input and output are crucial, input meaning listening and reading and output meaning speaking and writing. But, here, I'm focusing more on output because normally, self-study learners tend to lean towards input-based learning because, you know, it's easier to hit grammar books and study by yourself compared to finding someone to converse with in Korean. It is especially the case if yo
u don't live in the country where your target language is used. If you have been following us, you might know that Talk To Me In Korean has taught Korean on YouTube for 13 years now. According to our stats, only 7% of views are from Korea, meaning that 93% of our subscribers are learning Korean outside Korea and thus, probably don't have enough chances to use Korean as much as they need. And that might include you. But what about idols? You will already know most of the foreign members of K-pop
groups start to take Korean classes since they were trainees. Lisa from BlackPink once mentioned in an interview that her Korean teacher had her to speak only in Korean during the whole class. And they spend a lot of time with their band members, which gives them enough chances to speak in Korean in a comfortable environment. Now, numerous studies have shown that learners can best practice their speaking skills when their anxiety and stress levels are low. In other words, high levels of anxiety
and stress have a negative impact on language acquisition. That is, you can better practice your Korean when you talk with your close friends in a chill atmosphere rather than when you're being evaluated for every single mistake. In that perspective, they must have benefited a lot from always having Korean members around them to talk to in Korean! For most of our learners who don't have fellow band members or a giant agency to train them, or Korean friends to talk to on a daily basis, I'll intro
duce 2 easy methods that you can practice speaking Korean on your own. Number one is to watch a YouTube video and try summarizing it in your own words. For instance, in this video, I talked about 4 reasons why it seems too hard to make friends in Korea as a foreigner. You can go watch it and summarize the four points verbally in Korean! Actually the content you're going to watch doesn't have to be in Korean, which means you can listen to a podcast in your native language and summarize it in Kore
an. However, if you could, I think it's always better to consume content in Korean, because that way you can pick up some native-like Korean expressions from that video and use them when you summarize it. If this method is too difficult for you for now, an easy way is to think of something fun that recently happened to you and imagine that you're explaining it to your friend in Korean. The second method is reading out loud. Reading out loud is '낭독' in Korean. Reading aloud is a very good way to
improve your reading skills and vocabulary but it also greatly helps your speaking. You might think that it wouldn't be as effective because you are reading what someone else wrote, instead of you forming your own sentences. But muscle memory plays a role in speaking a language, too. In order to naturally and fluidly spit out Korean sentences that you formed in your head, you need to have said them multiple times so it just rolls off your tongue. And reading aloud can definitely help you with th
at. So definitely try it yourself! And the second reason is K-pop idols' strong motive to learn Korean. There are 2 types of motivation when it comes to language learning. One is internal motivation and the other is instrumental motivation. Now, when we asked our learners why they learn Korean, 70% of them said they're learning Korean to understand K-pop or K-drama without subtitles. This is called "internal motivation" which is the kind of motivation to accomplish your goal that comes from with
in you. If you're learning a new language because you like how it sounds or you want to communicate with native speakers, these are all internal motivations. And having internal motivation greatly helps your language learning so keep it up! How about idols? First of all, they will have the same motive as you because they must have made up their mind to study Korean in the first place because they were into Korean songs and music. But they also HAVE TO be at least somewhat fluent in Korean, to fu
lly express their lyrics, and build bonds with their Korean fans. And their Korean should be even more fluent if they want to be in dramas or reality shows! These kinds of motives are called "instrumental motivation" which means a practical or pragmatic reason for language learning. So, foreign idols have strong and various motivations to achieve Korean fluency no matter what. What lessons can we apply to OUR Korean learning from their experiences? It can be a good strategy for you to make more
pragmatic reasons for achieving Korean fluency, other than being able to communicate with Koreans or understanding Korean content without subtitles! To talk about my experience as an example, I'm also a long time language learner myself. When I was job hunting like 6 years ago, I was intentionally looking for a job that required a high proficiency in English. Back then, I didn't know the concepts of different types of motivations, but I had a hunch that it's going to be really difficult to alway
s set aside time for my English unless I HAVE TO do so because of my job. That was one of my reasons why I wanted to work at Talk To Me In Korean. Likewise, try making more powerful reasons to keep you motivated to improve your Korean! Lastly, the third factor for non-Korean idols' fluent Korean is systematic and consistent learning opportunities. 1:1 tutoring, group lessons, books, conversation classes – music labels actively support their artists' Korean learning. And like anything else in the
world, having a systematic curriculum to follow will be a great help to make significant progress. And this part is where you could use the help of experts or Korean learning services because you know, it's way more convenient to use an established curriculum that professional Korean teachers have made rather than to create an entirely new curriculum by yourself, right? And we'd be very happy if you could consider using our service, Talk To Me In Korean! We have the full Korean curriculum of Le
vels 1 to 10 that is proven to be effective by 1.5M users. And we also have dozens of books and courses that cater to your Korean learning purposes, so definitely check them out at TalkToMeInKorean.com. So, today, we talked about how foreign idol members have become fluent in Korean quickly and how we can achieve fluency while we don't have band members to talk to in Korean all the time or music labels to constantly provide Korean classes! But before I wrap up, there's one thing that I'd like to
mention. In fact, when you talk about how fast someone has learned a language, there are many factors, important linguistics factors that are often overlooked. For example one, how close their mother tongue is to Korean two, whether an idol is already an experienced language learner, in other words, if they already know how to acquire foreign languages by experience three: if they were exposed to Korean during their childhood and so forth Comparing your Korean learning progress to a certain ido
l ignoring all these factors is just not fair for you.😭 And I figured most of the foreign idols have significantly improved their Korean AFTER they debuted and they've gotten better and better as time went by, just like any of us! Additionally, many idols publicly stated that they have been struggling with Korean a lot. So, I believe learning a new language is as difficult for them as it is for us. I hope none of you who are watching this video feel bad about yourself because you think your Kor
ean is not improving fast enough. It's natural to take time to learn a language and the key is to not give up and consistently expose yourself to the language and practice. And we, at Talk To Me In Korean, are here to help you learn Korean in the most fun and effective ways possible. So, 파이팅!! ❤️🔥 I hope you enjoyed this video. And if you did, don't forget to subscribe and share this video with your Korean learner friends who are also K-pop fans! 여러분 그럼 다음 시간에 만나요! 안녕~
Comments
Hey, Talk-Talk's! Thank you for watching this video 💖 In our next video, we're going to compare and analyze the Korean of two foreign K-pop idols! Who would you like us to look into? Leave their names in the comments 🤗
I always wondered how did they learn but they are surrounded by the language, so that's also helpful...
I think immersion learning makes the difference. A foreign idol who lives in Korea, surrounded by native Koreans, will learn faster than the (many) foreign learners who are living in another country, with no 24h contact with Korean speakers. Even if you study 2 hours a day, which is already a tremendous amount of time, it is not as much as immersion learning.
The biggest thing for me learning Korean was that already knowing Japanese makes it SOOOOOOOO easy.
I would say that Japanese people, like Momo, Sana, Mina, and many more. Have a little advantage because Japanese grammar is very similar to Korean. Obviously what Lisa said it's key, but they already have the grammar structure and sometimes similar words. What I have heard from Sana in an interview is that for them pronunciation was the hardest part.
As a "foreigner" who's been fluent in Korean for several years now, I partially agree with most of these points. The evidence suggests that when you start learning a language, especially one as complex as Korean, it's absolutely fine, if not recommended, that you begin with lots of comprehensible input with little to no output. The concept of "start speaking from day one" is partly a myth and partly language-dependent. If you were learning French as a native English speaker, this might be possible, but for Korean, you are far better off learning and listening to as much Korean as you possibly can because if you can't understand what other people are saying, it's pretty pointless to be able produce a few random phrases or sentences. Only once you start understanding the language can you truly participate in conversation and it's waaaay easier to learn how to speak once you have a decent grasp of basic grammar and can understand 1000+ words. I basically got fluent through the TTMIK's 이야기 series and 수다 타임. I literally memorised and mimicked everything from those series and produced it as often as I could with my Korean friends and 1.5 years later, I was essentially high B2, closing in on C1. Don't get it misconstrued though, speaking was ultimately the thing that led me to become fluent of course BUT it was because I developed my listening and vocab first and then got into speaking later on. Good luck guys.
1. Output (talking to speakers): 0.1 - watch/listen Korean speech 0.2 - read out loud, so it's good for your speaking also 2. Motivation 1.1 - internal, when you learn it for your own goals. 1.2 - instrumental, when you need Korean in practice, job. 3. Systematic & consistent learning opportunities. Mostly needed in professionals' help to continue "consistence".
It's important to remember that idols are also doing very intensive learning compared to the average person. Their companies hire teachers for them, and some of them spend hours a day every day doing their Korean lessons on top of their own study and practice outside of class. That's not reasonable for most people, unless you're a full time language student. So people shouldn't compare themselves to idols and get down on themselves about not getting the language as fast, because these idols should be learning much faster than you just based on how much time they're spending studying the language every day with a teacher at their disposal on top of being in a fully immersive environment. Their circumstances are completely different from most people's.
Its so fascinating that minnie and yuqi improved their korean so much by talking to each other even tho theyre both foreigners but they probably made each other very comfortable so they improved really fast
Felix is such an angel and always gives his honest advice which I greatly appreciate. Thank you for this video! I'm hoping to really take my Korean language learning more seriously this year! Fighting everyone!
I live in NY and started dating a korean girl 2 months ago who is studying here. I have been using duolingo and deerlingo to learn, but having her teach me the casual informal way to speak to her and her friends has really been the break through for me
Aw, Felix is one of the reasons why I’m learning Korean! ♥️ This clip of him always reminds me of that and helps me a lot to motivate myself! Thank you for this interesting video!
I would second your point about reading out loud. It is incredibly helpful. When I moved to France 20+ years ago and really started learning the language I was given a very helpful tip (much like what you said) "French is learned with the mouth" I think we concentrate so much on the internal cognitive aspects of learning that we forget that language is expressed through the body, mouth and gesture/body language. Muscles used in each language are different. My mouth used to actually ache a bit after speaking French all day because I was using new muscles. The connections between what you want to say and actually saying it (connecting language centre to motor skills) need to be practiced over and over again to build them. It really helped me to read out loud and ever since I try to do that when I study another language.
I think the US Government calls quick language learning tactics "immersion methods." I worked a truck driver for 30 years and worked my way inside and was transportation managing behind a desk too. At one place I worked, one of my peers was offered a transportation management position at a trucking firm in a small city in France. He took the job despite not knowing ANY French. I saw him three years later when he returned for some family event and he spoke French like a native, at least to my untrained ear. I saw him at a store, and he said the best way he learned is the motivation method described here. He HAD to learn as very few people around him spoke English. Great video and well presented TTMIK people.
A lot of comments here are about immersion, and while that definitely helps just being immersed doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll learn the language. I’ve met so many people who live in countries with very low English levels but who never get proficient in the local language even after years because they’ve found the few people who speak English and get by without it, or don’t challenge themselves etc. Even if you are immersed you still need to put in effort to improve, and at the same time you don’t need to be living in Korea to create an immersive environment!
If you think about it, immersion makes perfect sense. That’s how we all learned our language as babies.
I think what a lot of people tend to miss is, aside from factors such as motivation and exposure, languages that have been heavily influenced by Middle Chinese will share a working vocabulary that will often be as similar between each other as European languages'. It's a big reason why East Asian students tend to progress much faster in Korean. With Japanese in particular, both the vocab and the grammar are very similar, so naturally they are likely to learn Korean the fastest.
It's simple: 1) They have excellent teachers. 2) They have a full immersion environment. 3) They have enormous financial incentive to learn. A foreign English teacher in Korea has none of these things, so it should be no surprise that most of them never achieve fluency in Korean.
I really like the idea of learning languages. Lately, i started with Korean. And while improving with the basics, im worrying constantly about my motivation. For now, i think i have the motivation i need. But im not a person who can think on the future and being in peace with me. Depression, anxiety... This type of video helps a lot. Thanks. Now, apart of that. What video or playlist u can recommend from ur channel to start with basic sentenses? Or... How to start, basicly? I got hangul already... some general vocabulary... But not that much other than that.
Lisa is just naturally gifted at learning languages. She speaks Thai, english, japanese and Korean.