Good Thai Language School near BTS

[talberry2]

The school I recently attended didn't seem to work for me. I'm a rather slow learner, but certainly have the time to put into homework each day. Where I was going, they spent perhaps an hour on the Thai letters (and an hour on Thai numbers) and then we were off on the adventure learning everything else. I Spend the next few weeks still struggling on what seemed to me something we should have covered more time on (tones, letter sounds, etc). In any case, any suggestions here? I went to Unity and after observing for an hour at a class that had only been in it's 8th session, she was speaking Thai fairly fast and I simply don't think I have the acquisition ability to learn in a school like this. So whatever they're doing--I need something a bit slower. I don't want a 'visa-school'...but something a little bit less intense than Unity and the one I had been going to. Any suggestions?

[jarrcbb]

This doesn't answer your question but....

I'm a horrible language learner. While I mostly drifted through school without doing much work, this never worked in any language classes I took. But I found a magical solution... well not exactly magical but it basically makes it so I can do better than most of the other students in classes I'm in.

Anki. It's a flashcard program that uses a special time repetitions to make sure you don't forget things. For Thai you'll most likely have to make your own cards. If you're taking a class go over everything before the class and make flashcards for every single thing you don't know. I also attended unity and would make cards for the vocabulary, stories, characters etc.

There are some other programs that use the same spaced repetition method as anki, so you don't need to use anki necessarily.

I can't emphasize enough how much this completely changed my language learning abilities. From 0 to well not a 10, but I'd say my language learning ability with anki is something like an 8. You still have to put in a lot of time studying, but it works. Good luck.

[talberry2]

This doesn't answer your question but....

I'm a horrible language learner. While I mostly drifted through school without doing much work, this never worked in any language classes I took. But I found a magical solution... well not exactly magical but it basically makes it so I can do better than most of the other students in classes I'm in.

Anki. It's a flashcard program that uses a special time repetitions to make sure you don't forget things. For Thai you'll most likely have to make your own cards. If you're taking a class go over everything before the class and make flashcards for every single thing you don't know. I also attended unity and would make cards for the vocabulary, stories, characters etc.

There are some other programs that use the same spaced repetition method as anki, so you don't need to use anki necessarily.

I can't emphasize enough how much this completely changed my language learning abilities. From 0 to well not a 10, but I'd say my language learning ability with anki is something like an 8. You still have to put in a lot of time studying, but it works. Good luck.

Thanks for the tip. Yeah, I had recently bought a laser printer and was making up my own flashcards on vocabulary. Perhaps it had simply been done too late, but to be honest I couldn't understand how others in the class kept up, given the fact that every day were introduced about 40 new vocabulary words. I simply don't have the memory capacity to learn that many new words in one day--even if I studied my whole day away. The flashcards did help, but my mind simply isn't the 20 year old mind I used to have. Thanks for the advice, though

[SlyAnimal]

You could try learning the alphabet etc yourself. There are some good apps you can get on your phone to help you get the correct pronunciation etc (Search for an app called Walen, it's quite good. I used it even though I didn't attend their school at all. Their school might work well for you too, even though it has a reputation as a "visa mill", it's not too fast paced and has a solid focus on learning the alphabet first).

But yeah, if you try learning the alphabet yourself, it might be a good move, flashcards are another good way to learn too.

Learning the alphabet is all about repetition, it's just something you have to learn off by heart, and it simply takes time. I learnt the alphabet when I first came to Thailand, as I would go swimming after work each day, and on the songtaew to the pool I'd just stare at the alphabet song (+ translation + phonetic) and recite it to myself, I also had the video of it on my phone to listen to. When I got to the pool, I'd then swim and sing the song in my head, while visualizing the letters, and then check that I had visualized them correctly when I finished each lap. But yeah, everyone is different in how they learn.