Although it sounds incredible, you can learn to read Thai in 16 hours using the “Rapid Method”. Most people take 5-6 months to learn the traditional way, and still struggle to make any progress in Thai. The Rapid Method is based on quirky, bizarre and obscene pictures and stories. So you don’t need to memorize anything. This approach also helps you to acquire a useful vocabulary with minimal effort.

Once you can read, everything begins to fall into place naturally. You start to absorb the Thai language from your surroundings, and you will find that you can speak more clearly and understand what people are saying more accurately.

Learning to read provides you with the fundamental skills for gaining fluency in speaking and understanding.

February 20-24, Grandview Hotel, Chiang Mai – Mon-Fri 10am-3pm

Please visit www.LearnThaiOnline.com for more details and to register.

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This is true and it can be done in two days as well. The five days just makes the intense levels of concentration lighter. Yes it is very possible and I can state this with truth, as I did the course in Phuket. Go on try it?

It sounds to good to be true.I think it is probably easier for someone 20 than age 60.I will try it.

Let me add that anybody girl or guy, no matter what age can do this. I am over fifty years young and if I could do it anybody can.

A friend has tried on and off for 25 years and about this says finally he has found one that sticks..

Unfortunately learning the 70+ letters is a long long long way from being able to read due to a plethora of arcane and complex rules which must also be memorized. The senseless practice of not putting spaces between words in a sentence is far from helpful when learning. Most of the university educated Thais I know cannot even explain the rules of their own language which they regularly abuse anyway. Choke dee though...

If you just want to learn the alphabet then some flipcards and a few hours are all that's required. There is already an accepted mnemonic association that links Thai letters with Thai words.

Associating Thor thahan with tortise or Bor bai mai with "Uboat" is totally baffling at best...

As to reading,what cloud hopper said.

After years of putting it off, I have been going to school twice a week to learn to read and write.

I have run across the program above on you tube, tried it and found it to conflict with my studies. Your right Cloudhopper, there are many more aspects to learning to read/write Thai than just memorizing consonants with cute pictures. Online learning course's are fine as a help tool, to even close to as effective as an actual class room and native Thai speaker/teacher. One thing I didn't like about it and some of the other online tutorials is the narration in English by a non native English speaker.

I wish I could make my learning experience easier, but for me a teacher looking over my shoulder and correcting me when I'm wrong and being able to ask a question at the moment is the only way I'll learn correctly. And if I'm going to put the time and effort into learning I want to end up with the best education I can get.

With that said, if it works for you great.

If you want to learn to read for free just go to http://www.learningthai.com/books/manee/ and do two lessons a day (about 40 minutes). On day 1 do lessons 1 and 2 (all 5 parts of each), on day 2 do lessons 2 and 3, and so on. By the time you get to the end ( in a month, allowing for about 7 lazy days when you do nothing!) you can read the most common letters and are well on your way to learning to read properly; and it is FREE.

It worked for me...