At this stage you will need materials which is bite-sized so it is not too overwhelming, on topics related to everyday life instead of difficult professional topics and written with most up to date usages and slangs used by native Koreans nowadays. Below are my recommendations of reading resources at intermediate level.
Easy Korean Reading for Beginners
To kick off your reading practice as an intermediate learner
This is a good piece at lower intermediate level published by Talk to me in Korean. The sentences are very short and relatively basic vocabulary was used, hence tailor-made for learners starting to read their first passages.
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Facebook / Instagram
Now finally you can start to understand some of what your favorite Korean celebrity is talking about! Subscribe to the Facebook page or follow the Instagram of the Korean singer / actor you love and read the latest updates from him / her first hand!
Apart from celebrity account, you can also follow channels of topics you are interested in, for example IG accounts of your favorite brand, cartoon character, travel, pets etc.
Naver Webtoon
I highly recommend Naver webtoons – in particular I like Penguin loves Mev. It talks about the life of a Korean girl married to a British man and is thoroughly hilarious and enjoyable by itself.
Apart from that, of course you can search for webtoons you like. The advantage of webtoons is that like cartoon, there are more pictures than text. The texts are usually bite-sized and not overwhelmingly difficult. There is also an English version of the page where you can try to find if the same webtoon is available in both Korean and English. Many of them are so popular that they are made into drama series / movies and novels in different languages!
There is popular webtoon ranking chart for each gender / age category i.e. 10+ female, 10+ male, 20+ female etc. It is easy to find something you like.
Children's story
Some people also recommend to read children’s stories. This is also a good alternative, but I don’t find the materials too engaging to hold my interest for long. Afterall, they have been written for children. If you are interested to try out a few, you can check out this website or simply search for 동화 or 어린이 이야기 on the internet.
Learning technique
The good thing about learning a language is that unlike other subjects such as coding, cooking or mathematics, language is part of day to day living. There is no need to study a language at a certain time or setting. Instead of setting aside time at home to sit at your desk to study, why not read a piece of webtoon during commute? While you kill time by browsing through Facebook and Instagram anyway, why not read the posts of the celebrity you like and IG posts in Korean of the topics you are interested in? Make it a habit or a daily routine – for example whenever you take the train to work you read one piece of webtoon so you get continuous exposure.
When you first start, you will be bombarded with a huge volume of new vocabulary that you have not come across before. It is okay to go slowly and cover only one short passage / IG post / webtoon at a time, spending time to check the dictionary and re-reading it a few times to familiarise yourself with the sentence structure in usage.
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