I'm combining these two topics, word limit is 500, so I need to trim up 50 words.
Please fix my grammar!!
-Tell us about a person who has influenced you in a significant way.
-Tell us about an intellectual experience, project, class, or book that has influenced or inspired you.
Salman Khan has helped my academic career in many ways. People have different ways of studying, and for me, I find it more effective when I watch videos rather than reading textbooks. When I was taking AP Chemistry, I struggled because of its abstract concepts. Since I had to take Chemistry exams that I was not prepared for, my grade gradually decreased. While researching online for chemistry homework help, I discovered a series of video made by Mr. Khan. His videos taught me what I did not comprehend in chemistry class at school. Even if I could not understand the videos, I replayed them until I was able to understand the concepts. Perhaps without his help, I would have not received good results for chemistry class. His lessons have helped me review algebra and geometry for the ACT and SAT, taught me physics and biology, and gave me a hand on calculus. His tutorials not only have helped me, but also have helped others all over the world. What was even more surprising is that all his videos are non profit.
I have always received hands from others. Then I realized I should help others too. Although my knowledge is very circumscribed and not professional, I found one area where I can teach like an expert-teaching people the Korean language. I actively researched how people learn new languages. I went to Barnes & Noble's to look over the Korean learning books, and I searched online tutorial videos how people teach their languages. As a result, there were wonderful tutorials videos that people could learn, and the Korean learning books were also beneficial to the beginners. However, I found those were somewhat limited to a certain range, and some of them were outdated. I believed I could back up those tutorials and could innovate them in my way. I understood that any Asian language is considered to be difficult to speak especially for English speakers because I know how difficult it was for me when I learned English. My enthusiasm of teaching my country's language had begun.
After watching Mr. Khan's videos, I learned a fact: If you do a problem while thinking out loud, people find that more valuable. Therefore, instead of showing how the Korean alphabet looks like, I approached the learners in a friendly way. Drawing pictures of the new word, and writing together on whiteboard like Mr. Khan does when he solves the problems were more efficient. My goal is to try to help the Korean learner as easy as possible and spread out the beauty of the Korean language. Hence, I made my own long term project: Upload Korean tutorial videos on YouTube. Although I do not have an expert knowledge, my Korean skills are average of Korean citizens and my English skills are ample to teach the Korean language to people, it was the best thing I could do to help others. I committed myself to upload as many videos as I can in order to help at least one more person who is interested in learning Korean. Someday, I want to be a person who can contribute and influence others by helping people like Mr. Khan. Also, I want to achieve my ultimate goal, that is, to make the Korean language as the second universal language.
