한국어 수첩

Friday 1 February 2013

일월 시험이 끝났습니다! posted at 08:41

I haven't be able to update this blog for the past week mostly because I started to call the 대학교 도서관 (University Library) my new home! After spending a consecutive four days in the library studying non-stop, yesterday I finished my review tests for this half term. I had a presentation last week, as well as a portfolio deadline and then this week was my listening and review test in all one go!

I was really pleased with my last result for my previous listening and review test so I wanted to keep up my good results in these tests as well. In the last five chapters of my textbook (as I explained in my previous post about books my class gets tested after every five chapters covered) there was a lot of new verb forms and grammar which was hard to master and understand.

One of the main focuses I had was to remember all the future and probable forms, and in what context I should use them in translate. I became especially confused at first by -(으) ㄹ 거에요 and -겠 forms in regards to when I should use them. For those who don't know -(으) ㄹ 거에요 is a probable future term with quite high intention, for example 이번 주말에 시내에서 살 거에요 (next week I am probably going to shop downtown). The other form is -겠 is another future form that has very high intention similar to that of making new years resolutions. It also has the meaning of "I bet..." so for example 내일 날씨가 아주 좋겠습니다 (I bet tomorrow's weather will be really good.) The same can be done with -(으) ㄹ 거에요 and even the form -(으)ㄹ까요 (shall we? or do you suppose?) but these forms are for more half informed guesses about information whilst -겠 form is for statements with evidence i.e commenting on the weather after watching a weather report on the television.

However the problem I faced with these forms is that in some questions it is very explicit whether the speaker has got firm evidence or not (or even whether their intention is firm or not). For example in my studying I came across a question that said "He won't receive money from his father this week, I bet." which instantly made me think it would be -겠 form but in fact it was -(으) ㄹ 거에요 in the answers. Thus I asked 선생님 (teacher) what I should do about this, and she said it was fine which ever form I use, but just to make sure in colloquial speech I am aware of the context.

After reviewing these forms over and over again they began to make sense and I felt more confident about using them in my tasks. The actual tests themselves were okay but not brilliant. I am always overly self critical after exams but the listening especially wasn't my best test. I found it hard to catch everything even though I had studied the majority of the vocabulary included. Therefore in the future I must give more time to practicing my listening with audio files and by having more colloquial dialogues with 한국 친구 (Korean friends).

I found the review tests was good despite all my worrying before the test. With this I just have to make sure next time I have fully memorized the dialogues in the past chapters we have learnt because a lot of the translations used the same sentence patterns which would have helped me greatly if I knew them word for word rather than vaguely. Additionally I shouldn't rely on what I was given in previous tests as this one was very different to before. This means that when studying I have to try and cover everything even if it seems a lot. I am happy with the amount of time I spent studying this time but I could have planned it better and maybe made use of it.

After my tests I then went to celebrate with friends at a Japanese restaurant who also had finished exams that day. 일본 식당에서 라면을 많이 먹었습니다. 그리고 거기에 아주 재미있서 기분이 좋았습니다. (At the Japanese restaurant I ate a lot of Ramen. Also as it was really interesting there, I was in a really good mood.) ^^

Labels: diary, korean help, korean progress