Whack the Word

An English phrase sits at the top and Korean pops out of six holes. Hit the one that means it before it drops back. Sixty seconds, and a wrong hit costs you three.

What Whack the Word trains

Whack the Word is about reading speed. An English phrase sits at the top of the screen, and Korean phrases pop out of six holes and drop back again. Hit the one that matches before it disappears. You have sixty seconds; a correct hit plays the Korean audio, and a wrong hit takes three seconds off your clock.

How to play

• Read the English at the top

  That is your target until you hit it.
• Tap the matching Korean

  It works with one finger, so it plays as well on a phone as on a computer.
• Wrong hits cost time, not lives

  You never lose the game on one unknown phrase — you just lose three seconds, and keep learning.

Why speed matters

Recognising Korean slowly and recognising it fast are different skills. Menus, signs and subtitles do not wait for you to sound out every block, and neither do people in conversation. Short, fast drills like this one build the kind of recognition where a phrase like 맛있어요 (masisseoyo, “it's delicious”) registers as a meaning, not as a string of letters to decode.

Tips for a higher score

Look at the first syllable. Many phrases can be told apart by their first block alone. You do not need to read the whole line to know it is the one you want.

Do not panic-tap. A wrong hit costs three seconds, which is often more than waiting for the right phrase to appear.

Learn the phrases that keep beating you. If the same phrase catches you every game, open its page from the phrase list. Knowing when it is used makes it much easier to recognise.

How it works

Everything runs in your browser and nothing is sent anywhere. Your best score is remembered on this device only. The Korean audio is the same audio set used on the phrase pages.