* Finish off the shadowing of KGU. Make sure to concentrate on the NL to TL aspect of the shadowing/translation as much as possible. Maybe do the translations simultaneously?
* Finish grammar study: remember to make it NL –> TL as much as possible.
* Write out the vocabulary of the IL book in a notebook and make up mnemonics. <should be fun>
* Start the translating of the second news article. Make sure you do NL -> TL activities while you do the translations. Make your own sentences and remember to translate the translation back to the TL. Make up mnemonics whenever you can.
* At some point, do the shadowing of the Essential Everyday book. Do the translations from NL to TL.
* After you've done a 100 of the news articles, start doing shadowing and translating of the shadowed material full-time.
* Shadow the Migrant phrase book. Translate the sentences into Korean. Write the sentences out in a notebook as a kind of test.
* Translate the KGU English sentences into Korean if you haven't already done so.
* Translate the chunks and shadow them.
* Translate and shadow the illustrated dictionary and the English language books.
* Translate a 100 more news articles.
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How to do the translation-tests. Ummm, this is going to be difficult.
When should I do them? Need lots of scrap paper for doing the jottings. Hmmm. So difficult. Am I burdening myself too much? Maybe the shadowing is enough? Yeah, I think so. But doing the translations makes me think NL to TL. That's true. If you don't do it at the same time as the shadowing, you might forget. That's true.
How long does it take to translate a news article anyway? It depends on the length and difficulty of the article.
I think you can tackle one or two a day. So it would take two to three months. I don't know whether you are going to pick up a lot of vocabulary this way. Some might stick. You are just going to be INUNDATED with new vocabulary this way.
However, what can I do? I have to LEARN this vocabulary. The best way is to look up the words and make up mnemonics and use the word in a sentence.
That's the best way.
I really have to try my best. There is quite a lot of work. I don't really need a Korean teacher at this stage. There is SO MUCH material that I have at home that if I went about it really leisurely, it would take years to get through all the material.
So now that I think of it, four years is plenty of time to get really fluent at the language.
And you will start talking with people, but that will be for later.
You have to pick up the newspaper vocabulary I think because you want to be literate in Korean (as well as verbally fluent).
What about the chunks idea? I think it's a great idea still so I will keep working on it.
I am going to get Korean translations of the Japanese book and study that. I think that book is useful.
I think it's better to mix things up a little. Do different activities together. Grammar study, shadowing and translating.
What materials do you need?
IL text book
Notebook for the grammar study of IL text book.
Thick notebook for vocab in the IL book.
Computer for the news article translation.
Dictionary.
KGU book for the shadowing.
Computer or mp3 player for the shadowing of the KGU book.
Maybe a notebook to write out the translations?
After you've done the shadowing of the KGU book, do the shadowing of the Essentials Everyday book.
Then after you've done the shadowing of that book, do the shadowing and learning of the Migrants phrase book.
OK, that's enough for now. A too-long list and I start to get confused.
These activities should keep me busy for the next few months, maybe for the next six months?
Say, I was on track and finished all of this in June. What next? If I were a four-year student, I would concentrate on ... what?
I would know 20,000 words ... or hope to ...
I think I would start reading a lot and watching videos and TV in the language. Start conversing with people and chatting online. Improve my colloquial Korean. Mainly a lot of reading. What is there to read? Korean newspapers, I think. Anything that interests me. Articles on the web. Manga. So the second year would be spent doing a lot of reading and communicating with people. Consolidating what I've learned. The third year would be what??
