A.U.A. Pattaya - Thai Language School

[Smokin Joe]

I have seldom seem AUA Pattaya mentioned so wanted to give them a plug.


A.U.A. Pattaya is in the Central Festival mall located between Beach Rd and 2nd Rd. It's on the 4th floor but is hidden away in the kids play area at the Beach Rd end of the 4th floor. They used to be located in the mall at Dolphin Circle. The one with Kiss Restaurant.


The AUA Pattaya website has not been kept up to date and shows no Thai classes since last Dec. They are still teaching Thai Language and the next term starts 16 Jun 2014.

Each term is 5 weeks long with about a 2 week break before the next term. Classes offered may include

Speaking 101, 201, and 301

Conversation 101 and 201

Listening Debate

Writing 101, 201, 301

Reading 101 and 201

They don't seem to be all offered each term and if enough students don't sign up a class may be cancelled.
The Speaking 201 class for the current term was cancelled due to lack of students.

The speaking classes are 2 hours a day Mon-Thur (40 hr class for 5,900 Baht)
The writing classes are 1 hour a day Mon-Thurs (20 hr class for 2,950 Baht))

The teaching method is traditional style. One teacher and a workbook that is followed. The Speaking courses are conducted using transliterated (Karaoke) Thai but also has the Thai language spelling. The Thai alphabet is not needed or taught in the Speaking courses although tones are taught and practiced.

From posts about AUA Bangkok and the AUA Bangkok website it appears that the Pattaya branch uses a different teaching method from the Bangkok branch.

[kriswillems]

I ever went to there to ask for information, the course for the lowest level looked ok.

The problem was that they didn't have classes for the higher levels.

So, if you start there you need to change to another school later on, which makes to school pretty useless for anyone that intends to go for serious language study.

Most schools in Pattaya have the same problem - nobody is interested in anything more than the lowest beginners level.

[Smokin Joe]

I ever went to there to ask for information, the course for the lowest level looked ok.

The problem was that they didn't have classes for the higher levels.

So, if you start there you need to change to another school later on, which makes to school pretty useless for anyone that intends to go for serious language study.

Most schools in Pattaya have the same problem - nobody is interested in anything more than the lowest beginners level.

I agree and that is the reason for the post. If they could get a large enough student base maybe they would be able to offer all the higher level classes every term.

If you haven't been to Walen their Book 2 and Book 3 classes are above the beginner level and are available to join up at any time. I went to Walen for a few months and learned a lot and enjoyed it. Completely different approach than AUA. They are a lot more flexible and in Book 2 classes we often would stray from the book to discuss how to say different things, or the same things in different ways, learn new words etc. Walen's Books 1 and 2 combined have about a 1500 word vocabulary.

I would be interested if anyone has any info on other schools that have group classes. I know Pro language does but during one visit to them I wasn't impressed. That had a very minimal for learning Thai in group classes.

Unless you want to pay for private lessons your choices are:

Walen (biggest and most flexible sched.)

AUA (good classes but not enough students)

Pro (distant 3rd)