Ever thought about how to learn Korean and wondered if there was an easy way to get started quickly? 

We designed the Korean Kickstarter with just that in mind.

The Korean Kickstarter is a one-page 80/20 tool to kick-start your Korean sentence building. In Korean, by altering the endings you attach to your verbs, you can easily make subtle distinctions in the meanings of your sentences. Learning different endings is a quick way to advance your Korean. You can use this as just one part of your overall plan for how to learn Korean in 90 days! 

To get started, we just need to memorize a few common verbs:

To do this more easily, we can use some simple methods for memorizing Korean vocabulary or make funny visual associations using some similar-sounding English words.

For example, how about picturing a man eating a “mug” for “먹다.” Yum yum! Draw it on paper to really lock in the visual. Now that’s a tough picture to get out of your head!

With these basic building blocks, we can start to expand our knowledge quickly and put them to use! While many Korean students may be stuck at the stage of memorizing vocabulary for weeks or even months, unable to communicate in Korean, we can start expressing any idea quickly by memorizing a few verb conjugations.

For example, we can use the verb 자다 (to sleep) to express ourselves using four basic sentences. You’ll find the verb root (자) in each of them:

자야 하요 – I must sleep

자고 싶어요 – I want to sleep

잘거예요 – I will sleep

잘 수 없어요 – I can’t sleep

Now, let’s compare these four sentences to the following which use the verb 가다 (to go):

가야 하요 – I must go

가고 싶어요 – I want to go

갈거예요 – I will go

갈 수 없어요 – I can’t go

The verb root (가) is found in the same place as the sentences using 자다 (to sleep).

By memorizing these few conjugations, we can plug in different verbs as we learn them and express ourselves using simple sentences.

See the chart below:

All you need to do is memorize these few verb conjugations, and you get access to many many more sentences as you add new verbs to your vocabulary! It helps open up the language and express any idea very quickly.

This document helps you get started using a few basic verbs and conjugations. As you progress with your Korean, you can learn the rules for these conjugations, but even before then you can begin to see patterns. In many cases, the –다 ending of the verb has just been dropped and the new ending applied. These are the magic bullets that will help you get started as early as possible expressing more complex ideas. Use this as a kick-start in your Korean language learning journey and adjust on the fly. 

There you have it — a simple method for how to learn Korean quickly!

What’s your favorite hack for learning languages?