Best Way To Learn Thai?

[cpr21]

Hello there,

Can anyone give me any advice about the best method to learn thai outside of thailand. Im living in the uk and planning to move to thailand in a couple of years to work, My wife is thai so i have her to help me but ive also been looking at rosetta stone and linguphone courses but they are quite expensive and i can't find any reviews about them, can anyone reccomend or are there better ways? there are no classes available in my area either. I don't think i can learn just from my wife she does'nt have the time or patience to teach me everything, I know im not going to become fluent i just want to get the basics so i can communicate. also ive read that its a really bad habit to write down thai words in english and to just get on with learning the thai text. is this right?

thanks for reading my post any advice would be really great, all the best carl.

[bifftastic]

Hi, I'm in a similar position to you, without the Thai wife! (my g/f is in Thailand)

I recommend you try this site. I signed up for the free introduction and there's lots of free videos and pdf files you can either watch online or download in formats you can put on your pc and phone.

Also this book was, and still is, very useful too.

I haven't seen the rosetta stone for Thai but I've heard people give it unfavourable reviews.

For learning the vowel and consonant sounds and letters in Thai script I found these videos helpful too

There's links next to them on the youtube site for more of the same, again I downloaded them and put them on my phone (repeatedly watching them helped the vowel sounds and the names of the consonants start to sink in my head)

I do think it's worth learning to read Thai script as soon as possible. I still lean on transliterations but after some months of learning the script is starting to become decipherable and it helps pronunciation no end.

I also use Thai2english which is, in my opinion, a very useful site. I d/loaded the desktop program, again available on a free trial, and ended up paying for it when it ran out. The desktop version has articles about grammar and tones and all sorts of useful stuff.

I think a combination of different resources is the way to go so you can use what suits you from all of them.

You have the advantage of being able to speak to your wife when you get started so these resources should help.

Also, the Thai language forum, once you have got some knowledge of Thai script, is a fantastic resource with very helpful and knowledgeable people who post regularly. This thread will also be very useful http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/298472-want-to-learn-thai/

I hope this helps,

Biff

[CaptHaddock]

I am in the same position as you.  My Thai wife and I will be moving to Thailand in about a year.  Unfortunately, there are no Thai language courses offered at any of the many universities here in New York City.  If there were, I would certainly choose formal study. 

But since Thai is not my first foreign language, I am able to teach myself Thai using the AUA books and tapes by Marvin Brown.  This set is not cheap, although much cheaper than a university course.  The important point in selecting the materials is that they are of sufficient quality to be used in a university course.  This standard excludes Rosetta Stone and most of the other materials prepared by amateurs and promising easy methods.  There is another thread here about a poor fellow who wasted many years on such methods with very little to show for it.

The materials should present all the aspects of learning the language in an organized fashion: learn the alphabet as early as possible, dialogue drills, reading, writing, grammar, listening comprehension, etc.  The only weakness of the AUA materials is grammer since Brown was using a modified ALM method.  The AUA books are available here:

http://www.einaudi.cornell.edu/Southeastasia/publications/category.asp?id=66

The CDs are here:

http://www.lrc.cornell.edu/sales

I rip the CDs and run them on my PDA using the program PocketMusic since that allows me finger control to repeat sections of the track easily.

Here is a free flash card program that uses the Leitner method.  You have to create your own cards.  However, that's an advantage because you want to coordinate the flash cards with the lessons in the book you are using.  Having a prebuilt deck of flashcards that is not so coordinated is a waste of time.  You won't remember a word unless you see it in use in your lessons.

http://www.memorylifter.com/

There are other, similar programs for free such as Anki.  These are terrific tools to assist in vocabulary learning.  Using memory lifter I type in the Thai word for the English prompt.  So, it checks my spelling and I learn touch-typing in Thai along the way.  No aspect of learning a language is optional, including spelling.

Like you, I teach myself rather than asking my wife to teach me.  However, I do practice with her and ask her to correct me.  You have probably noticed the charming Thai pedagogic practice of erupting in peals of laughter at your every mistake.

Although there are websites that offer some videos, I think these are largely a waste of time.  You need a reliable method that you can trust to lead you step by step to fluency.  Only university course materials offer that.  Then the point is just to grind away at it daily.  The website materials are too fragmentary to provide a completely reliable method.

At first I did about 30 lessons in AUA book I using their phonetic transliterations.  At that point I became dissatisfied with phonetics and switched to the "Reading and Writing Text" in the same series.  I then did 37 of the 60 lessons in that book to learn the alphabet which covers the alphabet up to the common irregular letters, but not the rare ones.  Now I am redoing the dialogue and vocabulary lessons in Book I, reading the Thai script version of each lesson instead of the phonetic.  This is a lot more fun and very reinforcing.  Having the phonetic version on the opposing page is nevertheless handy to check pronunciation since the tone marking is always explicit.  

As soon as I get to Thailand I plan to enroll in the Chulalongkorn intensive course in Bangkok.  Even so, my aim in my current study is still fluency.  If you aim higher rather than lower you will get further.

Good luck to you.

[Pescator]

I found the Linguaphone course to be an excellent resource. Highly recommended.

It consists of 40 lessons covering a wide array of aspects of daily life in Thailand and will introduce you to a vocabulary of some 800 words and phrases.

Plenty of explanatory as well as cultural notes along the way.

You will be able to do this course without knowing the thai script although it is also included in the course.

I did the course first and then went back and learnt the script afterwards.

In retrospect this was perhaps not the wisest way, but I had a time limit of a month to complete the course. And starting off with learning a new and exotic alphabet was for me at the time a bit too academical.

The rewards are instant when you can actually communicate with locals. The script, however, I didn`t find carrying the same reward at the time.

Upon completing this course you are well equipped to interact with locals in most common situations.

It gives you a good foundation on which you can build further, adding new words and phrases along the way.

  Quote

Like you, I teach myself rather than asking my wife to teach me. However, I do practice with her and ask her to correct me. You have probably noticed the charming Thai pedagogic practice of erupting in peals of laughter at your every mistake.

I`ve experienced that too on more occasions than I care to recall.

But I was never afraid to make a fool of myself. And a sidebenefit of this practice is that you will never forget what you said wrong and will remember the correct pronounciation or wording till next time.

This course is pricey, yes, but it is hard to put a value on acquiring a new language.

Mayby you can find it second hand, mayby you get get it from your library (I did).

Good luck.

[SoftWater]

^ I've long looked for the linguaphone course in Thailand, but have not been able to find anywhere that sells it. The last time I checked the linguaphone website they weren't distirubuting to Thailand.

The linguaphone course is authored (wholly or in part) by the excellent David Smyth of Teach Yourself Thai fame, and I strongly suspect based on that and the general reputation of linguaphone that it is well-worth the money.

Anyone know of an outlet please post. This is one major omission in my otherwise (almost) complete library that I really would like to fill.

[Joosesis]

  On 10/16/2010 at 2:45 PM, CaptHaddock said:

I am in the same position as you. My Thai wife and I will be moving to Thailand in about a year. Unfortunately, there are no Thai language courses offered at any of the many universities here in New York City. If there were, I would certainly choose formal study.

I would say get yourself to the nearest Thai temple. Most have regular Thai classes, or are eager to set them up upon interest. At my temple there is ongoing tutoring for farang and also a saturday Thai School for children who go to school on saturdays to keep up the language of their parents.

For those of you, like CaptHaddock, in the US or Canada, there is a list online of local wats. In NYC for example:

Wat Buddhayaram

2084 Anthony Ave

Bronx, NY 10457

Tel: (718) 933-8053, 365-7095

<LI>

Wat Vajiradhammapadip

New:110 Rustic Road Centereach

Long Island, NY

Tel: (516) 471-8006

<LI>

Wat Buddha Thai Thavorn Vanaram

76-16, 46th Ave

Elmhurst Queen, NY 11373

Tel: (718) 803-9881

Fax: (718) 803-3819

I'm sure most country results are searchable in google!

[james24]

I've just discovered (in the last week) a new way to learn and remember words.

To remember Thai words, if we dont know how to write the Thai alphabet we may write it down in phonetic English so to get the pronunciation clear. Well try writing down the english word for it first, then, using as many letters as you can from it, write the Thai word for it.

E.g

Learn = Rleaan.

For some reason this seems to work. Obviously this cant be done with every word but try it with as many as you can with as many same letters as you can and your vocabulary and memory of new words will improve.

Hope this helps :-)