"high Speed Thai" System

[hawthorne]

I have always had great intentions of learning my wife's native tongue....but dam after hearing all of the techno speak on how to speak Thai. I give up before trying. I ain't that smart

[Ratsima]

BTW, if you have not done so, record your voice when tryng to speak thai, listening to yourself really helps alot. Finally, a while ago I was given a fantastic tip as I could not reproduce tones at all. Dont use your throat to generate the sound (and again dont strain at it), you have to find your 'voice', use your diaphragm, google on it, thai is in some ways like singing.

I have some software that lets me record my voice and then play it back and see the waveforms. I can use the same software to look at the recorded sounds in High Speed Thai for comparison purposes. What I'm hearing and seeing is that even when I think I have made a particular tone, I have not. It's just flat.

By the way, I sing the same way. I think I'm singing the right notes, but people tell me that it's monotone. I sing a song in one note!

However, I'm sure that my brain can do tones. We use tones in English. For example, a question almost always ends with a rising tone. I know that I must be able to both hear that rise and use it myself. But, when I consciously try to say a Thai word with a rising tone, it almost always comes out wrong.

As you note, I'm probably trying to hard. I'm thinking about just skipping the tone lessons and moving on.

Maybe I'll just end up communicating with people via pencil and paper.

[meadish_sweetball]

I have always had great intentions of learning my wife's native tongue....but dam after hearing all of the techno speak on how to speak Thai. I give up before trying. I ain't that smart

Don't let fancy terms and diagrams fool you. If we were to discuss English using linguistics terminology and diagrams it would look just as advanced.

Yet native speakers of English (or any other language) manage to learn to speak it just fine even before going to school. The theory is there to describe and to help for those who find it helpful, and to become aware of what most of us just do as second nature.

If you don't like the theoretical approach, then just keep talking to Thais until something sticks.

Many paths there are, hmm.

[meadish_sweetball]

BTW, if you have not done so, record your voice when tryng to speak thai, listening to yourself really helps alot. Finally, a while ago I was given a fantastic tip as I could not reproduce tones at all. Dont use your throat to generate the sound (and again dont strain at it), you have to find your 'voice', use your diaphragm, google on it, thai is in some ways like singing.

I have some software that lets me record my voice and then play it back and see the waveforms. I can use the same software to look at the recorded sounds in High Speed Thai for comparison purposes. What I'm hearing and seeing is that even when I think I have made a particular tone, I have not. It's just flat.

By the way, I sing the same way. I think I'm singing the right notes, but people tell me that it's monotone. I sing a song in one note!

However, I'm sure that my brain can do tones. We use tones in English. For example, a question almost always ends with a rising tone. I know that I must be able to both hear that rise and use it myself. But, when I consciously try to say a Thai word with a rising tone, it almost always comes out wrong.

As you note, I'm probably trying to hard. I'm thinking about just skipping the tone lessons and moving on.

Maybe I'll just end up communicating with people via pencil and paper.

How about the approach of listening to only falling versus rising tones - skip the high tone, low tone and mid tone for now? If the material offers no such exercise, maybe you could create the material yourself by cutting out sound files and arranging them randomly?

Also, a way of getting the tones to stick is to label them according to your own perception, using adjectives.

In my case I used internal Swedish labels, but translated they would be something like the 'robot' tone (mid), the 'something stuck in throat' tone (low), the 'plaintive' tone (falling), the 'argumentative' tone (high), the 'stupid' tone (rising). Feel free to use labels like the 'Oreo cookie' tone if it works better, the sillier the better, just as long as it helps.

[Ratsima]

How about the approach of listening to only falling versus rising tones - skip the high tone, low tone and mid tone for now? If the material offers no such exercise, maybe you could create the material yourself by cutting out sound files and arranging them randomly?

Good idea. They do have one rising/falling exercise.

Right now I've moved on to the reading exercises. The first lessons are on the mid-class consonants, so I'm getting quite a bit of mid/low practice. I won't say I'm getting any better, but it does feel good to be doing something (reading) that I'm better at.

[Ratsima]

I had my wife (native Thai speaker) listen to the two-syllable tone exercises in High Speed Thai. She got every one wrong; often way wrong. For example, one word that the course says is falling-high was identified by her as being mid-low. (เรียบร้อย)

So, if a native speaker can't master these exercises, is there any reason for a Thai learner to even try?

In any event, I'm charging on. The reading exercises in High Speed Thai are quite good and very extensive.

I've also found these ALG Thai videos on YouTube to be great listening exercises: ALG Thai

[katana]

I've found that although Thais will of course be able to speak and recognise the Thai tones, sometimes they won't know the correct name for the tone eg เสียงสามัญ - mid tone etc, just as a native English speaker won't always know the correct grammatical terms for parts of speech.

[Ratsima]

I've found that although Thais will of course be able to speak and recognise the Thai tones, sometimes they won't know the correct name for the tone eg เสียงสามัญ - mid tone etc, just as a native English speaker won't always know the correct grammatical terms for parts of speech.

Not the case here. My wife is well versed in English linguistic terms. She knows voiced vs. unvoiced, aspirated vs. not aspirated, etc. She knows the English words for tones. She's in her third year of law school, lived in the US for eight years and works in a law office as a translator and para-legal. Knowledge of the names of the tones is not the issue here.

Tomorrow I'm going to ask her daughter to try some of the High Speed Thai tone exercises. The daughter is a very bright, sixteen year old high school student.

[Ratsima]

We had a lively discussion about this last night. I'm more confused than ever. This time we got my wife's daughter involved. Turns out that neither one of them associates what they know as เสียงสามาน, เสียงเอก, เสียงโธ, เสียงตรี, and เสียงจัตวา with levels or changes in pitch. They both know what I mean by high or falling, they just don't associate pitch with เสียง.

I played this YouTube video for them:

and it was like some strange revelation had been made.

Back to the drawing board.

[Ratsima]

Also, a way of getting the tones to stick is to label them according to your own perception, using adjectives.

In my case I used internal Swedish labels, but translated they would be something like the 'robot' tone (mid), the 'something stuck in throat' tone (low), the 'plaintive' tone (falling), the 'argumentative' tone (high), the 'stupid' tone (rising). Feel free to use labels like the 'Oreo cookie' tone if it works better, the sillier the better, just as long as it helps.

Turns out this was probably one of the best and most revealing pieces of Thai language learning advice I've ever received.

The bottom line is that I simply cannot hear the differences between the tones.

This is not really true. I can hear the difference, I just can't identify that difference in terms of pitch.

[vincentv]

This is Vincent from HighSpeedThai.

Some people find it easier than others to hear the tones. I have followed many people through the pronunciation, tone and reading lessons. Most people pick it up quite easily. If you have listened to the tone listening exercises extensively, you can also use the speaking exercises for listening practice. As you rightly mention, the reading exercises will give you a large amount practice listening to the tones. After you have learnt to read you will go on to listen to 75+ hours of clearly spoken Thai which will further improve you ability to hear the tones.

Developing the ability to hear the tones can take longer for some, you mention that you have been studying Thai for 13 years and still are unable to determine the tones. I have never across someone in the same situation as you. You situation does not reflect the average users experience with the HighSpeedThai program.

Could you report back to me after you have completed 10 vocab lessons?

I am creating some more tone exercises for the tones section for those that need it.

[Ratsima]

Developing the ability to hear the tones can take longer for some, you mention that you have been studying Thai for 13 years and still are unable to determine the tones. I have never across someone in the same situation as you. You situation does not reflect the average users experience with the HighSpeedThai program.

I suspect that there are quite a few people in the same situation.

This morning my wife was correcting my pronunciation of หมู. She said, "That should be low tone, like this, หมู." I said, "Gee, that sounds like a rising tone to me." So, I said "หมู" with a rising tone (I think) and she said, "Yeah, that's right." She can't determine the tones either and she's been speaking Thai for most of her 35 years.

At this point I find the situation to be quite hilarious. After all these years and all these courses and I still can't hear the tones. I tried Meadish's technique of calling the tones using words other than the normal descriptive words. But that doesn't seem to work, either. No matter how hard I try and no matter how long I work on it I can't tell 'em apart.

[vincentv]

I try to follow as many people as I can through the program. Some people who have done short Thai courses and have been exposed to some spoken Thai pick the tones almost straight away. For others they need to spend a bit more time listening to all the syllables in the listening and speaking sections of the tone lessons as well as during the reading section. As you have been studying the language for so long but are still having troubles, perhaps it may be an idea to see an audiologist. I am sure they would be able to quickly identify where your problems lie and what (if anything) you can do to fix it. Please keep me updated.

[Ratsima]

I just finished taking a number of online hearing tests. Many of these are just used to determine you ability to hear various frequencies played one at a time. On all of these test I did well: "Thank you for taking our hearing check. Your result suggests that your hearing is within the normal range."

Then I took a couple of tests designed to check out musical ability or tone deafness. On this test:

.

http://www.nidcd.nih.gov/tunetest/

My result was: "You correctly identified 26 tunes (out of 26) on the Distorted Tunes Test. Congratulations! You have a fine sense of pitch."

But on this one:

.

http://jakemandell.com/tonedeaf/

I scored: "58.3% - Possible pitch perception or memory deficit"

When I was a kid I took up the clarinet. I became a technically competent player. Give me some sheet music and I can play it well. But, ask me to play a tune "by ear" and I simply can't do it. Even for a simple melody, like "Mary Had A Little Lamb", I simply don't know if the second note is higher or lower than the first.

(Please don't take this as criticism of High Speed Thai. I'm enjoying it. I'm learning a lot. I just can't master the tones. Never could Never will.)

[Khun Jean]

I was not good in speaking Thai a few years ago and not good at tones either. I then started to completely ignore the different tones and hoped they understood me anyway. Sometimes hilarious never mean spirited. In the years following i picked up most of the right pronunciations.

The rising and falling tones i still not do very well but not being afraid to say those words anyway most people pick up the right word because of the context. Talking Thai to my wife is easier as she is used to my version of Thai. After a long time outside Thailand it takes some time to get better again.

So my advice is listen carefully and talk, talk, talk and then talk some more.

[Ratsima]

It hasn't been my experience that Thais pick up the right word because of context. For example, my telephone number ends with "9". If I give some one my number they're OK for the first 9 digits. Now, they know they're listening to the phone number and that I'm about to say the last digit. There are only ten words in all the thousands of words in Thai that can possibly come next: 0-9. But my pronunciation of "9" is so awful that they hear "ข้าว" or "ขาว" or "เก่า" or whatever I've actually said instead of เก้า. I mean, it's a phone number. Shouldn't that be context enough?

Another example. I needed to buy some nails. I looked up the word (ตะปู) and practiced pronouncing it with my wife and proceeded to the hardware store. I told the nice woman owner that I wanted ตะปู. She didn't understand. I tried with other workers in the store. No dice. Now, this is a hardware store. The have a limited inventory of hardware items. Shouldn't that be context enough? How many hardware items are there that sound like "ตะปู"? Shouldn't that be context enough? Well, it wasn't. So, I pantomimed the action of a carpenter pounding a nail into a board. From that context they should realize that I want to buy a hammer, a nail or a board. No dice. So, I went searching myself, found the nails and brought the to the counter. Then and only then did they realize I wanted to buy ตะปู.

[thailoneus]

Hi everybody,

I was reading this thread with a great deal of interest and thought I should post my experience with the High Speed Thai course for the benefit of others.

Prior to finding HST on TV, I had tried various Phrase books, Thai for travellers etc. I also invested in a book/cd combination course "Colloquial Thai" by Moore and Rodchue. It was pretty good for a while but I got bored with it. The main problem with using multiple methods, is that you really get confused with the different modes of transliteration.

Having moved to Thailand 'permanently' in Nov 09, I decided to invest in HST because of the sales pitch content, and because I was determined to learn Thai. With a money-back guarantee, I thought, what the heck, let's give it a go. I have now been diligently engaged in the course for about 2.5 months. I must admit that it is the best darned approach to language teaching that I have experienced. In this time, I have mastered the tones, know the entire alphabet, vowels, and the impact of tone markers. I can read many shop signs and simple words even though I don't know what they mean,... yet. ....and really surprise my Thai friends!!

I followed Vincent's advice...Don't move to the next lesson until you have really mastered the current". "Daily review of what yo have learned, to move it into long term memory". These are extremely important. (I use the Reading Lesson Master everyday). And I am reaping the rewards of my patience. I have found HSTs method of teaching 'sounds' to be simply excellent. Its the closest to the real thing that I have seen.

I highly recommend HST to anyone who is 'serious' about learning Thai. Along with the course I believe it is essential that one uses every opportunity to use what one knows.

One other item...The rewards of learning to Read, and Write are great. At a minimum, Reading is a must.

There are some very good 'advice' type posts in this thread, and I have learned from them too. Thanks to all.

The one person I feel very sorry for is Ratsima, and I have no additional words of wisdom I can offer you. One poster recommended this:

"Here's a girl who does very clear tones, by the way:

Ratsima, With all the music studies you have done, can you not hear the tones in the utube video? I do commend you on your determination to use HST even with all the frustrations you are facing.

Good luck to all.

[Ratsima]

I've been spending about an hour and a half a day with High Speed Thai. I like it very much and have been learning a lot. At the moment I'm about half way through the Reading Lesson Master (Lesson 7). I could already read before I started this course, but with HST I'm actually learning all the pronunciation and tone rules. The HST reading lessons are very thorough and the Anki flashcard system is very well designed to help you learn the bits that are troubling.

I'm also spending about an hour a day watching the AUA - ALG Thai videos. Im up to level 5-10.3 and find that I can understand almost everything the instructor says. Although it's still not a real world situation, I think the language used by the instructors is more "real" than that which you hear on most instructional materials such as Rosetta Stone or Pimsleur.

I should add here that Vincent, the author of High Speed Thai, has been very good about keeping in contact with me and following my progress.

As for hearing the tones: Once I finish the HST reading lessons and move on a bit, I'll go back and re-evaluate my ability to tell rising from falling, etc. It may never happen, but I'm hoping that having a thorough understanding of the phonetic basis for the Thai tones will head me in the right direction.

[Parvis]

In my opinion - move on. You will get better over time - but by not continuing to learn to speak - even incorrectly - you will limit the amount you will learn EVER.

[Parvis]

In my opinion - move on. You will get better over time - but by not continuing to learn to speak - even incorrectly - you will limit the amount you will learn EVER.

[tjansen]

H

I've been spending about an hour and a half a day with High Speed Thai. I like it very much and have been learning a lot. At the moment I'm about half way through the Reading Lesson Master (Lesson 7). I could already read before I started this course, but with HST I'm actually learning all the pronunciation and tone rules. The HST reading lessons are very thorough and the Anki flashcard system is very well designed to help you learn the bits that are troubling.

I'm also spending about an hour a day watching the AUA - ALG Thai videos. Im up to level 5-10.3 and find that I can understand almost everything the instructor says. Although it's still not a real world situation, I think the language used by the instructors is more "real" than that which you hear on most instructional materials such as Rosetta Stone or Pimsleur.

I should add here that Vincent, the author of High Speed Thai, has been very good about keeping in contact with me and following my progress.

As for hearing the tones: Once I finish the HST reading lessons and move on a bit, I'll go back and re-evaluate my ability to tell rising from falling, etc. It may never happen, but I'm hoping that having a thorough understanding of the phonetic basis for the Thai tones will head me in the right direction.

Here is a fun way to know if you are changing your pitch. I happened across this game while humming in a tiled public bathroom a while back. If you hum a pitch, then steadily raise and lower it, you will come to a pitch that noticeably increases in volume. You might possibly find two such pitches. Be ready for some stares if there are others in the room. Being a singing engineer, I knew the physics of sound wave resonance / reinforcement. Absolutely useless information for producing and recognizing Thai tones, but a fun way to at least know when you are changing pitch.

On another note, so to speak, I just purchased High Speed Thai a few days ago and am very fond of it. The software that drills the lessons is quite the thing. One interesting thing I just noticed tonight, in Lesson 7, is that the High Tone, when produced with a short vowel word, is a single, high pitch, while the High Tone, when produced with a long vowel word, is more of a rising tone that falls off a bit at the end.

[canuckamuck]

Just thought I would add my 2 satang about High Speed Thai. There are two threads about it, but I chose this one because it was the original.

I ordered high speed Thai about a month ago, on the recommendation of a friend who's Thai is much better than mine and had been to a language school with me. He said it was way better than the school because they use more real speaking scenarios, real question and answers that you might come across everyday. I would say he is right.

I already knew how to read, but had no idea how to interpret tone marks. After about 2 weeks with high speed Thai, I finally understood the rules, and they stuck too. After the reading lesons, I have been burning through the vocab, because I knew quite a few of those words already. But now that I am past the 300 page point I am hitting some new words, and I am slowing down a bit. However it was not a waste of time to go through the sections of words I knew because seeing them used in everyday situations, I actually got to learn some words over again and how to use them right.

Any how, after trying a number of other books and CD's and a language course, I can say that this program is the most effective Thai training resource I have had. I will comment again later.

PS I do agree with some of the criticisms of the tone recognition audio bites. it is very hard to pick out a tone from a single word, at least it is with these. However, that is a very small part of the course, and you will still get the tones figured out even if you can't identify them all on the clips provided.

Edited August 8, 2010 by canuckamuck

[kriswillems]

I just got this course and have hit a roadblock at the section where you're supposed to distinguish between mid and low tones. They really sounded the same to me so I did a frequency analysis of two .mp3 files; one representing a mid-tone and the other representing a low tone. They even look the same to me:

.

Mid

.

Low

Am I supposed to hear a difference in tone between these two?

You better make an analysis of the frequency with the time on the X-axis (and look at the first harmonic of the sound). You can use this free, open source program:

www.speech.kth.se/wavesurfer/

It's true the mid-tone and low tone only differ very little. The low tone sounds a bit forced, unnatural, as if someone is trying to produce a low sound, but he/she can not because his/her voice-range doesn't go that far. In the frequency analysis the frequency difference is only very little.

Low and Mid tone are also for me the most difficult to distinguish. Making a mistake in the low-tone pronunciation doesn't lead very often to confusion or misunderstandings. But if you don't manage to pronounce the high or rising tone correctly, it will be very difficult to understand what you're saying.

[vincentv]

Hi there,

Have not tried wave surfer as yet. Will downland it and take a look.

The latest version of the program comes with voice viewer which allows you to view your voice as a spectograph. I find this very useful in helping people get a handle on the tones. The HST program now recommends that students keep this program open when doing the tone lessons.

It is best to have some kind of external microphone and external speakers, this way you can place the microphone between the speakers so that you can see the tones of the native speaker and also your own tones when speaking aloud.

Not sure which version of the program canuckamuck is running but the newer tone lessons have many more exercises with a new speaker that speaks at a faster pace. Your success with the tone lessons also depends significantly upon your hearing and natrual sense of pitch. Some may be able to fly through them in an hour others will need to spend a number of days and possibly come back to review them later.

Keeping this program open at all times when starting out is a great way to improve your tones quickly. You can conveniently minimize it to a very small size and best of all it's free.

http://slice-of-thai.com/voice-viewer/

[SoftWater]

One interesting thing I just noticed tonight, in Lesson 7, is that the High Tone, when produced with a short vowel word, is a single, high pitch, while the High Tone, when produced with a long vowel word, is more of a rising tone that falls off a bit at the end.

I don't know if this is true or not when you start looking at sound waves, but in my experience the best advice for learning high tone for short vowel words is to keep exactly the same "modulation" (not sure if that's technically the right word or not) as for the long vowel words (rising-falling), but clip it shorter and faster. I used to think high-tone for short vowel words was a single high pitch and suffered problems with being understood (or sounding unnaturally weird), and the key to putting that behind me was precisely by making sure there was the same "modulation" in the tone regardless of vowel length.

Best

Sw

Edited August 9, 2010 by SoftWater

[canuckamuck]

Well I am at page 516 out of 1006 in the High Speed Thai course. It has become a little more difficult, and I definitely have to review more and take more time. I continue to be impressed; every lesson has many pages of sentences in Thai using the new words and those we have already covered. I find that the sentences continue to be phrases one would actually use in real life. The Thai is sinking in, and I am using more new words in conversation.

I really think I am closing in on being conversational. So far I haven't needed any assistance at all from the HST support.

I will report again when I get to page 700

[SoftWater]

Canuckamuck - are you in Thailand? Are you getting chance to practice what's in the course on real Thais? And if so, how's your listening skill coming along?

Your reports are interesting (at least to me!), please keep them coming.

Good luck with your studies.

[Joosesis]

This is my first time reading through this post, so sorry to jump in late. And...my comment is not directly related to "high speed thai", but rather some of the fear and concerns about learning Thai that I read here.

I was listening to Chris Delivery's stand up show last night (Have you ever see Chris Delivery yet?). He makes a couple of great points to his Thai audience that I think are relevant for encouragement here.

You'll never be a native Thai speaker -- Chris told the audience not to worry about how they pronounce English or how they structure their English sentences. He tells them, with heart, that they will never be a native speaker of English and that is okay. If their standard (if our standard) is to go from zero to 'native', that is an unrealistic goal. For those of us who teach ESL, I think we'd completely agree with that. Yes, you have an accent and you mis-ordered your words, but I know everything that you meant to say. For someone who says they can read, but still can't quite speak, I would bet that fear is a lot of the reason.... don't worry if you screw it up, just be speaking. Certainly you will be continually improving, but you have to start somewhere.

Mis-communication is 50% on you and 50% on the other person -- Okay...maybe 50/50 is a bit much. However, two native speakers of a language will constantly say to each other, "huh?" "what was that?" "did you just say what I think you said?". In our native languages, we will just stop and ask...but somehow when we're learning, we now feel that any mis-communication must be all ours. We have to remember that it is also quite possible that the person we were speaking with mumbled or mis-spoke or doesn't know what the heck they are taking about.

Just some things to think about. It certainly helped frame my mind a bit more.

[canuckamuck]

Canuckamuck - are you in Thailand? Are you getting chance to practice what's in the course on real Thais? And if so, how's your listening skill coming along?

Your reports are interesting (at least to me!), please keep them coming.

Good luck with your studies.

I wish I had a way to judge my progress accurately. But I do think my listening is getting better, I am picking out more from TV and general conversations, I can get the drift of most conversations, and can follow some completely. I am definitely improved since I began, but how much is pretty hard to tell.

I have been in Thailand about 7 years, but I only got serious about learning Thai last year.

[Parvis]

I wish I had a way to judge my progress accurately. But I do think my listening is getting better, I am picking out more from TV and general conversations, I can get the drift of most conversations, and can follow some completely. I am definitely improved since I began, but how much is pretty hard to tell.

I have been in Thailand about 7 years, but I only got serious about learning Thai last year.

My experience is similar to yours. I have also been in Thailand for several years - but only started studying seriously since October 2009. I initially studied private lessons at a certain School - which shall remain nameless - but was a disaster. My observation was - this was not an issue with the teachers or method - but with the teaching material (lack of methodical guideline with useful subject). As I walk by this School almost daily - I notice now all new, very young - unknown to me - faces. Seems there was a "major teaching staff turnover".

I have now continued to study Thai on my own - since January. I can read - a fair amount. I understand Thai TV News - with reasonable comprehension. Unfortunately - my interaction, therefore my speaking practice with Thai people - is very limited.

I feel, I need more interaction on a personal conversation level with an experienced Thai teacher. This could even be an "Ex-Teacher" from the School with my previous "disastrous experience". I did like the quality of teachers/methods - in general - just not the teaching material.

Therefore - any recommendations - are highly appreciated.

Edited September 5, 2010 by Parvis