Best Way To Learn Thai

[Ratsima]

I can read well enough to understand menus, street signs, food labels, etc. But, I've learned to read the same way a deaf person might learn to read. I know what the word is and what it means, but not how to pronounce it. If I tried to read it out loud no Thai speaker would understand me. I've never been able to memorize the Thai alphabet, or the classes of consonants or the tone rules. I have spent considerable time on this, but it has never "stuck". Memorization is not my strong point.

I even created and published a flash card deck of the Thai alphabet with IPA pronunciations. Spent hours and hours with it but still can't remember the alphabet. Stupid me.

Thai Character Flash Card Deck

I agree that it would be enormously helpful if I lived in a situation where I had to use Thai. I don't. Ms. R spoke excellent English long before we me (outside of Thailand) and that's the language we use at home. I'm kind of a recluse, so the only time I ever have to use Thai is when I'm out shopping.

That said, I would dearly love to be able to talk to people: neighbors, family, people on the street. It's a horrible embarrassment to me to have to admit to people who know how long I've been here that I have no idea what they're talking about.

Edited January 13, 2010 by Ratsima

[dptbkk]

That said, I would dearly love to be able to talk to people: neighbors, family, people on the street. It's a horrible embarrassment to me to have to admit to people who know how long I've been here that I have no idea what they're talking about.

I wouldn't worry about that ... I have a very good friend who's been here 20 years and is married to a Thai ... the other day, I kid you not, I said, sitting with him in a restaurant, "How about we have phat kraphao?". To which he said: "What? Kraphao? What is it?" To which I said: "You're kidding, right? You know - 'kraphao', staple food, stuff fried with holy basil" "Ahh" says he "Phat Krapao" pronouncing it perfectly ... if you wanted a fried suitcase ... Yet he seems to get by pretty well!

[meadish_sweetball]

True - the learning process is "somewhat" different as an adult - but looking back at my own experience I certainly learned my 3rd and 4th language as an adult in some form of "total immersion" - and I even claim English - my 3rd language - is now my primary language.

I'd agree that immersion, at some stage, is necessary to become fluent. I also think for most people it is possible to learn completely by immersion, even as an adult. If anyone of us were to be completely cut off from all other languages and forced to interact only with Thais who spoke no other language, our survival and comfort would depend on learning Thai, so we would do it. More or less well in individual cases, but it would happen. Ask the Westerners who have been long-term prisoners in Thai jails, for example.

But for me at any rate, the immersion practice I had after one year of structured theoretical Thai language training, made the immersion much more valuable as I had the tools to analyze more correctly what was going on, and could categorize it and pin it up on the stuff I had learned structurally before. If you get thrown straight in, sink or swim so to speak, it can be a considerably more frustrating and bewildering experience, and some things will take a long time to figure out.

[Ratsima]

Yes, but you cannot learn a second language as an adult the way you learned a first language as a child. The studies from psychology and language acquisition are overwhelmingly conclusive on this point. Alas, some schools still keep trying to sell this idea...

Please don't take this the wrong way…

I finally have YouTube up and running and have watched many of the videos you recommended. I also did some digging around the methodology of ALG (Automatic Language Growth) which, I gather, is the method used by AUA. This method is based on the theory that adults can and should learn a second language exactly they way they learned their first language as a child.

You can learn a bit more here: ALG World and here: Common Myths (about language learning)

and view a video explanation of the methodology here:

I'm not sure I agree with everything, but it's interesting to ponder.