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Korean From Zero! 1: Master the Korean Language and Hangul Writing System with Integrated Workbook and Online Course
Korean from Zero! is a fun, innovative, and integrated approach to learning Korean created by professional interpreter and author of 6 text books, George Trombley, Korean linguist Reed Bullen, and native Korean speaker Sunhee Bong. Using up-to-date and easy-to-grasp grammar, Korean From Zero! is the perfect course for current students of Korean as well as absolute beginners.
Features of the
* Over 600 New Words and Expressions
* Learn to Read and Write Hangul
* Extensive Grammar
* 90 Adjectives and Verbs Detailed
* Bilingual Glossaries with Hangul and English ...and much more
Features of the
* Over 600 New Words and Expressions
* Learn to Read and Write Hangul
* Extensive Grammar
* 90 Adjectives and Verbs Detailed
* Bilingual Glossaries with Hangul and English ...and much more
- GenresLanguageUnfinished
359 pages, Paperback
First published March 20, 2014
116 people are currently reading
325 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 5, 2016
Since Korean From Zero's title doesn't actually claim anything, I'll advise people about what you are getting; for free you are essentially getting a course on the Korean language. This is going to do almost nothing in terms of acquiring a conversational level of Korean.
In Book I and audio you will get a fair number of actual recorded conversation-like short dialogs, and some question-answer exercises. Conversation virtually disappears in Books 2 and 3. Even as a Korean Language book, the visual presentation is something you better examine in the second and third books before committing yourself too deeply. The layout is probably not as organizationally straightforward for a straight beginner as the authors would like to think.
They have presented this material in the same fashion as many people often do who greatly love their subject more than the research that must go into the display of something that will work better for the less gifted than what they themselves—oblivious to the pain—had to suffer to become fully fluent masters of the tongue.
Unfortunately, instructors have learned nothing since the days of the ancient Cortana phonograph record days, and seem to have lost track of: People best learn a conversational level of language when they are presented a graded mass of meaningful dialogic material. Added to that should be extensive and copious glossed grammar and vocab notes, a morpheme-level interlinear parsing (and even a trilinear, semi-transcriptional [but not IPA-like] romanization directly under the Hangǔl), and a translation on the opposite page, with more-informal notes.
Audio should be at several levels:
Natural (rapid street-level)
Natural (formal cadence)
Slow (Word-by-word, and even morpheme-by-morpheme)
Each of these elements can be found somewhere in the vast landscape of language pedagogy. Very few seem to have what should seem to be the obvious sense of putting them all together in one 8.5 x 11 inch format. The days have long past when such a construction would be a major typographic undertaking. The most onerous tasks would be capturing quality audio by native speakers, and the painstaking matter of fully proofed, linguistically informed, romanization, which is something of an art.
Nevertheless, it's surprising that nobody has seen it through to pull such a worthy project off at least once.
In Book I and audio you will get a fair number of actual recorded conversation-like short dialogs, and some question-answer exercises. Conversation virtually disappears in Books 2 and 3. Even as a Korean Language book, the visual presentation is something you better examine in the second and third books before committing yourself too deeply. The layout is probably not as organizationally straightforward for a straight beginner as the authors would like to think.
They have presented this material in the same fashion as many people often do who greatly love their subject more than the research that must go into the display of something that will work better for the less gifted than what they themselves—oblivious to the pain—had to suffer to become fully fluent masters of the tongue.
Unfortunately, instructors have learned nothing since the days of the ancient Cortana phonograph record days, and seem to have lost track of: People best learn a conversational level of language when they are presented a graded mass of meaningful dialogic material. Added to that should be extensive and copious glossed grammar and vocab notes, a morpheme-level interlinear parsing (and even a trilinear, semi-transcriptional [but not IPA-like] romanization directly under the Hangǔl), and a translation on the opposite page, with more-informal notes.
Audio should be at several levels:
Natural (rapid street-level)
Natural (formal cadence)
Slow (Word-by-word, and even morpheme-by-morpheme)
Each of these elements can be found somewhere in the vast landscape of language pedagogy. Very few seem to have what should seem to be the obvious sense of putting them all together in one 8.5 x 11 inch format. The days have long past when such a construction would be a major typographic undertaking. The most onerous tasks would be capturing quality audio by native speakers, and the painstaking matter of fully proofed, linguistically informed, romanization, which is something of an art.
Nevertheless, it's surprising that nobody has seen it through to pull such a worthy project off at least once.
December 5, 2018
I'm so impressed that this book is such great quality considering you can get the pdf for free. I love how easy and accessible it is, and my one complaint was that you couldn't hear the words being spoken, until I realised their website has every single phrase put on as a little audio clip that you can listen to.
So now I have absolutely no bad words to say about it. Use this alongside the website and it's the perfect way to learn Korean.
So now I have absolutely no bad words to say about it. Use this alongside the website and it's the perfect way to learn Korean.
July 8, 2017
This hovered at a 4-5 star for me.
While very similar to the Japanese from Zero series. It was a lot harder for me to read so I took off a star.
Korean has a lot of different spellings and rules unlike Japanese so the alphabet is a bit harder to grasp.
I enjoyed trying to sound of the word though and finding out that I had heard the word before and therefore could pronounce it properly.
I will definitely continue with this book but not till I'm closer to 95% certain of the alphabet! Lol. :)
While very similar to the Japanese from Zero series. It was a lot harder for me to read so I took off a star.
Korean has a lot of different spellings and rules unlike Japanese so the alphabet is a bit harder to grasp.
I enjoyed trying to sound of the word though and finding out that I had heard the word before and therefore could pronounce it properly.
I will definitely continue with this book but not till I'm closer to 95% certain of the alphabet! Lol. :)
March 3, 2022
It is a pretty good book and somewhat easy to understand. The only thing is that you have to have some understanding and basic knowledge of the Korean Language to be able to progress through the book. Although in the answer sheet there was a typo for a response. It said "아니요, 저것은 자전거예요." The answer section said this translated to "No, it is a bus" but the word "자전거" means bicycle. This might only be the case for my specific book but it was still a typo. Despite this though, I would reccomend to someone who was wanting to learn korean and was already into the culture.
July 31, 2022
Fantastic book. Easy to read with great explanations in bite size pieces so it's not too overwhelming when learning a new grammar point and such.
This is a textbook and workbook in one. It has an answer key at the back so handy if you are self learning like I am. I have a few other Korean learning textbooks but I found this one the easiest to follow.
No glossy pics or pages but still a great book. There is a few typos in the book but the newer versions I think have been updated.
Highly recommend if you are self studying.
Loved it...
This is a textbook and workbook in one. It has an answer key at the back so handy if you are self learning like I am. I have a few other Korean learning textbooks but I found this one the easiest to follow.
No glossy pics or pages but still a great book. There is a few typos in the book but the newer versions I think have been updated.
Highly recommend if you are self studying.
Loved it...
August 31, 2018
정말 재미있는데 좀 어려워요
November 1, 2020
It was a really amazing textbook! It had so much information and at the same time, it was all very beautifully presented, in a non-threatening way! I found it a pleasure to study from.
September 1, 2020
2.5 Please read my review at Coffee and Ramblings
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews