Learning tone rules

[GotR1GHT]

I must say it's pretty dam_n hard to learn and memorize all the tone rules.It's just too confusing.Everytime when i try to read something i have to stop and think which high-middle-low consonant goes with which mark,it's just going nowhere for me. So i started just memorize word by word with proper tone,for example:

หมา - maa - R(rising tone) - dog

ไข้ - kaai - F(falling tone) - fever

ไข่ - kaai - L(low tone) - egg

It's SO MUCH easier(at least for me) to remember and also at the same time i can learn to write and memorize so when i read something i can automatically remember the word and pronounce it properly.

Anyone think it's a good method to learn that way,any advices?

Edited November 26, 2013 by GotR1GHT

[PoetDrunkInTheBoat]

It is a good method for you if you can do it.

Before you go this route, you may wish to look at the tone rules as presented by the Paiboon publishing company in their English-Thai dictionary.

There you will find a chart on just two small pages telling you the easiest, simplest way to know and use the tone rules.

These two pages can be found very close to the first page of the book.

In my copy, these are pages 36 and 37.

Bon Appetit

These are pretty easy to swallow.

And if I can learn them, then surely you can too.

[AyG]

If you learn this way you'll never be able to read unfamiliar words correctly. Far better to take a little time to learn the rules - they become automatic pretty quickly in my experience. Then you only need to worry about remember the tones of exceptions (of which there are quite a few).

(Incidentally, it looks like you've got the vowel length wrong for ไข้ and ไข่ - short, not long.)

Edited November 27, 2013 by AyG

[Richard W]

If you learn this way you'll never be able to read unfamiliar words correctly. Far better to take a little time to learn the rules - they become automatic pretty quickly in my experience. Then you only need to worry about remember the tones of exceptions (of which there are quite a few).

(Incidentally, it looks like you've got the vowel length wrong for ไข้ and ไข่ - short, not long.)

Note that AyG is talking of the length of the /a/ bit - ส่าย and ใส่ have roughly the same overall length.

If you do learn enough words it may help to annotate the tone table with words whose tones you know.

[GotR1GHT]

What i realized is that for me knowing tone rules is useful for some words like mai,kaai,maa(all with their similar spelling and different meaning). But for all other words i will just remember how to pronounce it properly. For example:

If i see words like ม้า หมา ,tone rules would be useful because words like that are very similar and i would have difficult time recognizing what words means

but for any other words like ประเทศ บ้าน tone rules are not useful to me because i can just remember how to pronounce it and it wouldn't be difficult to memorize because there are no similar words like it.

If i see word บ้าน i will know how to pronounce it,because there are no similar words like it,but on other hand word like หมา one could have trouble identifying meaning because it could be easily mistaken by ม้า.

tl:dr tone rules(for me) -very useful for similar words like ม้า หมา ไข้ ไข่ ไม้ ใหม่ ,so you can identify it quickly

- any others words- just remember how to pronounce it

Edited November 29, 2013 by GotR1GHT

[tgeezer]

If you learn this way you'll never be able to read unfamiliar words correctly. Far better to take a little time to learn the rules - they become automatic pretty quickly in my experience. Then you only need to worry about remember the tones of exceptions (of which there are quite a few).

(Incidentally, it looks like you've got the vowel length wrong for ไข้ and ไข่ - short, not long.)

Note that AyG is talking of the length of the /a/ bit - ส่าย and ใส่ have roughly the same overall length.

If you do learn enough words it may help to annotate the tone table with words whose tones you know.

That is interesting I should like to know how to pronounce these words properly.

How do you make ขัย the same duration as ขาย ? Or an even better question; ขาด the same duration as ขัด

[Richard W]

Note that AyG is talking of the length of the /a/ bit - ส่าย and ใส่ have roughly the same overall length.

That is interesting I should like to know how to pronounce these words properly.

How do you make ขัย the same duration as ขาย ? Or an even better question; ขาด the same duration as ขัด

'Short' diphthongs have short nucleus and a long final resonant (nasal or semivowel): long diphthongs have long nucleus and short final resonant.

On the other hand, ขาด is longer than ขัด.

[tgeezer]

There are very few tone rules, you must be learning from the wrong books.

1. You need to know the alphabet, (I include vowels)

2. Know the tones.

3. Know that the base 4th tone (rising) applies to high class consonants.

4. Know what a dead word is and how it affects tone.

5. Know the effect of tone marks.

Your examples:

หมา you need 1,2 & 3.

ไข่ ไข้ you need 1,2,& 5

These words ขาด คาด คัด ปะ นะ you need 1,2 & 4 because they are dead words.

All other words you just need 1 and read them in a common tone. คาม คำ บาน ปา คาย คา etc.

That's it, 1&2 should be second nature so with any one word there is little to remember.

[tgeezer]

Note that AyG is talking of the length of the /a/ bit - ส่าย and ใส่ have roughly the same overall length.

That is interesting I should like to know how to pronounce these words properly.

How do you make ขัย the same duration as ขาย ? Or an even better question; ขาด the same duration as ขัด

'Short' diphthongs have short nucleus and a long final resonant (nasal or semivowel): long diphthongs have long nucleus and short final resonant.

On the other hand, ขาด is longer than ขัด.

I thought that it was something like that. I edited out ขัยี and ขายิ

[Delight]

For those who prefer charts I attach a couple. I distilled all the info relating to tone rules .in order to create them.

Note: Cross the appropriate ROW with the appropriate COLUMN to provide the answer.

[pbassham]

Here is my chart.

Hint: Things gravitate toward the bold line separating middle and low consonant rows - everything starts either high, middle, or low and heads toward this line. Some stick, some bounce off, some hug it.

[txp158]

What i realized is that for me knowing tone rules is useful for some words like mai,kaai,maa(all with their similar spelling and different meaning). But for all other words i will just remember how to pronounce it properly. For example:

If i see words like ม้า หมา ,tone rules would be useful because words like that are very similar and i would have difficult time recognizing what words means

but for any other words like ประเทศ บ้าน tone rules are not useful to me because i can just remember how to pronounce it and it wouldn't be difficult to memorize because there are no similar words like it.

If i see word บ้าน i will know how to pronounce it,because there are no similar words like it,but on other hand word like หมา one could have trouble identifying meaning because it could be easily mistaken by ม้า.

tl:dr tone rules(for me) -very useful for similar words like ม้า หมา ไข้ ไข่ ไม้ ใหม่ ,so you can identify it quickly

- any others words- just remember how to pronounce it

The tone rule is only useful when you are trying to write down a spoken word.

For instance the word, มา can produce 5 different sounds like the middle consonant but in order to produce the corresponding tone, you need to write like this มา, หม่า, ม่า, ม้า, หมา

So we group those consonants which have similar pattern as ม and call them low consonant. And all those words can only be written in this regard that is มา, ม่า, ม้า นา, น่า, น้า.

The tone rule is taught in school, so that you can remember how to write what is spoken correctly. They are not meant to be used in the reversed order. In other words, it's not used to to help you pronounce the word correctly. In order to do that, you just have to remember them all by heart. You can try, but it's going to be really confusing and hard, unless you remember what them all sound like in the first place (which isn't that hard to remember).

Edited January 5, 2014 by txp158

[GotR1GHT]

What i realized is that for me knowing tone rules is useful for some words like mai,kaai,maa(all with their similar spelling and different meaning). But for all other words i will just remember how to pronounce it properly. For example:

If i see words like ม้า หมา ,tone rules would be useful because words like that are very similar and i would have difficult time recognizing what words means

but for any other words like ประเทศ บ้าน tone rules are not useful to me because i can just remember how to pronounce it and it wouldn't be difficult to memorize because there are no similar words like it.

If i see word บ้าน i will know how to pronounce it,because there are no similar words like it,but on other hand word like หมา one could have trouble identifying meaning because it could be easily mistaken by ม้า.

tl:dr tone rules(for me) -very useful for similar words like ม้า หมา ไข้ ไข่ ไม้ ใหม่ ,so you can identify it quickly

- any others words- just remember how to pronounce it

The tone rule is only useful when you are trying to write down a spoken word.

For instance the word, มา can produce 5 different sounds like the middle consonant but in order to produce the corresponding tone, you need to write like this มา, หม่า, ม่า, ม้า, หมา

So we group those consonants which have similar pattern as ม and call them low consonant. And all those words can only be written in this regard that is มา, ม่า, ม้า นา, น่า, น้า.

The tone rule is taught in school, so that you can remember how to write what is spoken correctly. They are not meant to be used in the reversed order. In other words, it's not used to to help you pronounce the word correctly. In order to do that, you just have to remember them all by heart. You can try, but it's going to be really confusing and hard, unless you remember what them all sound like in the first place (which isn't that hard to remember).

Yep,that's why the only way to remember it+pronounce it correctly is to read,read,read every single day.Books,magazine articles..

Yeah when i'm reading it takes some time to discover what tone to use with that word but after some time i will memorize that word so when i see it again i will know how to pronounce it instantly.

[danphuket]

As AyG mentioned it is much more efficient to learn all the rules then to blindly memorize words as they are. Paiboon publishing dictionary is an excellent tool. They have phonetic transcription with all the tone marks for each syllable (audio as well). Let's take a word สมบูรณาญาสิธิราช for example. Can you remember how to pronounce it? If you know tone rules it is straightforward, if you don't... sombooranaayaasithiraat!