How to improve your Korean listening comprehension

Sofie is a fluent Korean speaker from Denmark, and together we shared our tips for improving your Korean listening abilities.
Sofie runs a popular Korean language and culture blog here: sofietokorea.com/
Below are some resources that we recommend:
Video Resources:
“Talk To Me In 100% Korean” / talktomein100korean
Twitch / korean
KZbin (search for your hobby in Korean)
Netflix (for Korean shows)
Sofie’s KZbin channel recommendation / hirenze
Audio Resources:
Audioclip NAVER audioclip.naver.com/
Billy’s “Horror Radio” channel recommendation audioclip.naver.com/channels/...
팟빵www.podbbang.com/
Reading Resources:
Kids Donga News kids.donga.com
Naver Webtoon comic.naver.com
Ridibooks ridibooks.com/ebook/recommend...
Want to start learning Korean? Check out my book, "Korean Made Simple" on Amazon: amzn.to/2bDBi6h (affiliate)
Please consider supporting me on Patreon: / gobillykorean
"GO! Billy Korean" merch is out now! teespring.com/stores/gobillyk...
Become a member of GoBillyKorean: / @gobillykorean
00:00 Intro
01:10 Nobody Understands 100%
02:18 Active Listening
03:57 Comprehensible Input
06:20 Watch it Twice or More
07:51 Write it Down
09:31 Slow it Down
10:14 Audio and Video
11:46 Remember Reading
15:03 Continue to Study
15:28 Shadowing
Learn Korean with GoBillyKorean! Subscribe for weekly videos! goo.gl/9Dm5g
Music by Kevin MacLeod: “MJS Strings" and “Brightly Fancy.” (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 (creativecommons.org/licenses/b...)

[@MrJeffrey0414]

This has been my problem. Been studying Korean for almost a year now and I can say I am Elementary level already but when it comes to listening, it is hard to understand. I can understand what I read but not what I hear... I wish to improve as I progress studying.... thank you Billy!!

[@nicoleraheem1195]

You have to study listening twice as much as you study reading and writing.

[@nicoleraheem1195]

Try to listen to a text at least 25 times a day and study your book three times before moving on

[@keithng5249]

I have been doing Korean for about 3~4 years now, and I still remember how frustrating it was in the first year as you seemed like you haven't accomplished anything. Ultimately just don't doubt yourself and keep at it. I work a lot on listening too so I agree with Nicole, a lot more work has to be done on that. Right now I am studying at an intermittent level, I am able to converse and even if I hear words I don't understand (which is still very often), I can ask for it's meaning in Korean and then I can understand the context enough to carry on. But even so my heart beats really hard everytime I speak to a Korean, because every sentence demands 100% focus and the fear of not understanding them is still really great.

[@MrJeffrey0414]

Thank you Nicole and Keith. Appreciate the advice. I will now put more effort on listening.

[@teshi1424]

I think you can absorb alot by watching Korean shows, interviews and listening to songs. I started learning Korean this year and due to health problems I've not been able to get down properly and study but I listen to alot of Korean music and watch alot of variety shows so I'd say my listening is my strongest skills even though I don't know what the words mean yet, I feel that I'm laying a good foundation for learning the language without it feeling like a chore

[@TripleSomething]

Going on Twitch and going into chill streams with like

[@lumendio3]

Great Idea!

[@haakonplayer77]

thats an amazing idea! wow thanks!

[@wendyscribbles]

Thanks for the suggestions Billy and Sofie. My listening comprehension is the worse, but I'm working on it. A small suggestion for the reading portion, is I like going on hilokal and joining one of the room advertising reading practices. They read the text and go over the paragraphs meaning and grammar points, and then have everyone take turns reading after them. It's helped with my vocab, pronunciation, and listening

[@kb2o492]

I love when you do these types of things, I can always learn more while also making it fun! Thank you so much, both of you!

[@abudhabi9850]

You both are awesome! Thanks for sharing, really helpful.

[@kateblais--9396]

Thank you for these suggestions Billy! I was literally today trying to find a cartoon network show dubbed in Korean to practice listening and do like a dictation exercise and I got very quickly frustrated cause the characters are so hard to understand with their voices being very silly.

[@latifag7033]

Thank you for your videos billy very helpful😊

[@TifasaurusRex]

Love seeing Sophie again! Always great videos Billy ✅✅✅

[@CrisTryingToBeProductive]

I'm not studying Korean but after watching so many videos done by kpop fans I have picked up a couple of phrases, in any language the more you listen the more you will be able to understand eventually. While I was learning English I exposed myself to different accents and that helped me to be able to understand more.

[@Audem96]

I love watching videos about learning tips it's sooo motivating Makes me want to study immediately

[@KelahCash]

So good. Thank you for this!! Listening Comprehension is definitely an area I know I need work on & have been trying to be more international about it. So I'm grateful for these tips! 🥰 Sidenote: I laughed so hard at the, "Hey 현우 *wink*" shoutout. It legitimately made me BUST out laughing! You are so hilarious 🤣 I love your videos. Thank you for helping us SO much & SO continually!

[@NaitoNii]

Ooh I love that area! It's in Hongdae😁 it is a nice place to relax. Listening is so hard in Korean because of how much focus it requires and a speedy reply back to the speaker which adds some stress. But the feeling of understanding them when they speak is so great!

[@LaLeLu12209]

It was a very helpful video. My listening comprehension needs to get better. My problem is that I hear the words but then I stuck at one word and try to "translate" it ... "I know the word, I know it..." arghh. Mostly the conversation is too fast. So listening at a slower pace and shadowing is my next step I guess.

[@ElArtedelCringe]

Recently I started Taekwondo and as I have 3 years studying this language I watch the Kukkiwon Taekwondo's videos explained in Korean to learn the 태극 and I'm learning a lot of Taekwondo words

[@SakuyaLuigi]

I listen to Korean radio while I work. When I drive, my listening becomes passive, and when I'm stopped for a while, my listening becomes active. I found it funny when a segment was talking about food while I was driving, and I understood everything he said. I was like "I guess that's what my brain cares about the most" xD Maybe I should listen to more food related stuff, but I like having the variety lol

[@ajrt_2118]

Yeah. I don’t understand people in bars when they speak English and it’s my native language. I also watch tv shows and movies with the English captions on by default. I’m so lost when listening to Korean mumbles or when people talk over each other. 😅 It’s going to be a long road. 😆 My friend is J-교포 and a TikTok streamer. So, I’ve started following Korean streamers and am starting to understand more. 😊

[@theliarmaiq]

Extremely helpful

[@Lzvll135]

Voy a poner en práctica todos los tips de Billy, espero que me sirvan en inglés como en coreano

[@Bubbabee0914]

Thanks!

[@GoBillyKorean]

Thanks! :D Glad it was helpful!

[@ni5439]

Billy, could you show us your notebooks and the notes you took when you studied Korean? Whenever I try using notebooks, they become an unorganized mess. And I never review them because it's appalling to look at that mess

[@producermind9030]

No10 is a great tip!!

[@rajshekharfoundation5400]

Thanks it was good listening to you guys actually one of Billy’s videos encouraged me to learn Hangul!! I have a 6 months old granddaughter and I am trying to talk to her in Korean 😊 so I need to use more children material to be able to communicate with her I read The very hungry caterpillar and other stories to her in Korean I am not sure about my pronunciation but we are having fun . I am learning at TTMIK but at 69 years memory is a problem I keep forgetting and have to put in much more effort. Where and how do I find native Korean speakers?????

[@leslieskelton2504]

I feel like now that I'm almost at an intermediate level that I had to switch from trying to express something I wanted to say in my language (english) to Korean which hurts my brain cause it's not English, so I feel that I had to understand the usages and feel to certain things instead a direct translation from English to Korean. But what I'm finding is the more I spoke and practiced the more I could connect or pick up on what native Koreans where saying whether it be on social media, or a show, I don't understand everything but through exposure and knowing the general meaning I could understand what I learned.

[@user-zm4oy6mf5z]

When I was in school I found words in my 듣기 book that I couldn't hear on the CD. It was so frustrating. What I ended up doing is first send the sound bite in which the word occurred to a Korean friend. They wrote out exactly what was in the transcript, but I simply couldn't hear the sound. The sound was invisible to me, but not the Korean. I ended up putting the sound bite in a loop and listened to that one thing for maybe 15-20 minutes. Slowly the sound appeared in my mind. The reason I mention this is that listening actively doesn't work when you can't hear or differentiate the sounds.

[@Jonathanhusum]

소희 씨~~ 저희의 인가가 많고 매우 유명한 FOF 선생님 안녕하세요! ^^

[@hellobeatles613]

Hi Billy and Sofie!! I would like to ask what you think about transcribing. Is it a useful method to improve my Korean? Thank you!! ❤

[@cgreen9190]

I feel the pressure for sure when it comes to my listening comprehension. I'm a lady and I seem to have an easier time understanding Korean when spoken by a man more than I do listening to a lady. Is that the case for anyone else? I get the shadowing the way a Korean speaker talks but I'm not sure I want to sound like 현우 씨. I also do shadowing without realizing it. Now that it's been pointed out I will try to do it more often. I have just started getting to the point in studying where I will think things in Korean before English. Only small words like 네, 좋아요, 또는 물. I say water a lot since I am always misplacing my water cup haha! Thank you for the tips!!! 👻

[@thatswhatiwannawatch]

Hi! I have a question for Sofie, since she mentioned it.. On Ridibooks, are there any graded reader series? I've looked and I've not found any. But perhaps I just don't know the right words in Korean to find them! Any help would be so much appreciated. 감사합니다 선생님

[@cindystrachan8566]

I started attending a Korean church a couple years ago. It’s getting me used to hearing the speech but I sure wish I could slow down the playback speed on conversations. Koreans talk very fast. But God bless them many speak enough English that we can talk. Any tips for older learners? I’ve spoken English for 66 years and have a lot of ingrained habits I struggle with (ex: reading a ㄹ as an S, ㄴ as L etc.). Thanks for your books and videos.

[@melodywilson]

Im native english speaker and my daughter was talking so fast i had to ask her whst did you say 3 times. I do that with watching tv in any language to make sure i understand it.

[@wilsongt9870]

8:20 So that escalated quickly 🤣🤣🤣

[@Fluglecheese]

I chuckled at the hippopotamus line...

[@b.reed85]

Is it passive listening when you watch a kdrama while reading with subtitles? Generally I feel like I'm pretty engaged with the story while reading the subtitles. But I'm not sure if that would count as a sort of active listening. 🤔

[@GoBillyKorean]

Only you can answer that, but simply reading without trying to study from something is typically considered passive. For example, just reading a book in Korean without studying from it or looking up the words/sentences you can't understand would also be passive. It's not useless or anything at all (it's still helpful), but it'll be less effective than active studying.

[@lewishamilton9251]

카메라 초점이 팔에 가있네

[@vakhal3044]

how do you find content for you level ? what kind of books can you read that is beginner level. what audio content can you listen to when your a beginner. finding content for my level is difficult.

[@kemiidowu3052]

Is it possible to learn Korean on my own, through u tube or other online or do I need to go to school

[@GoBillyKorean]

Whatever you use (books, lessons, etc.) you need to be practicing by using what you're learning. No amount of KZbin videos or books (even my books) can make you fluent without doing your own practice outside of lessons.

[@njitram2000]

Off-topic but why is Sofie's name 소희 and not 소피? Since I have noticed that most f/ph sounds are usually converted to ㅍ.

[@seoul_mate]

It's Sofie herself who chose the spelling of her Korean name. She explained it on her blog.

[@limnaee1812]

I want to use Twitch but I can’t change my language to Korean? :C

[@GoBillyKorean]

You don't need to change the language to Korean. Just use the tag "Korean" in the Live Channels search feature.

[@yb12360703]

'한국어 코멘트 달아야 되겠다 '갑자기 ㅎㅎㅎㅎ 😆

[@dutchessdreamer4543]

I’m learning six languages and I can apply these tips to all of them. Thanks!

[@LuisPenaJr]

Ay no, why I understand Billy's English but not hers 🤯

[@tzveeble1679]

Just being surround by a language environment doesn't help, as you said. The Italian nonna or the Chinese grandfather never learn English even after 20 years in the country. Same thing other way around, especially if you don't live in the country and only watch dramas.

[@coreanzoon]

Billy says ‘ je suis la grande musique ‘ ??? 😂😂😂 lol

[@GoBillyKorean]

I think it's "le grand Muzzy."

[@coreanzoon]

@@GoBillyKorean I did now not the big Muzzy :) So you are the big Muzzy 😀 J’avais compris ‘la grande musique’ car tu prononces le ‘d’ à la fin de ‘grand’ , avec un accent bien de là-bas 😂: il ne faut pas :)

[@coreanzoon]

blague à part, I like your content very much.

[@GoBillyKorean]

@@coreanzoon My French is terrible :D

[@coreanzoon]

@@GoBillyKorean 아니요! Your accent is just funny 😆 ( how do you say that in Korean? ).

[@letsstudytogether..]

한국어 듣기 특히 어려워요.

[@stephendueker9006]

Learn vocabulary. Far more important than Grammer. Early on. Put the words in basic sentences and have no expectation that you will understand korean talking until several years of study and listening. Many words are not pronounced like they are written due to patchim and other rules. Learn vocab!