Thai Language Courses

• This is a fun course that covers just a smattering of Thai language to help you enjoy your stay in Thailand.
• You will learn about Thai customs, the history and politics of Thailand, Thai music, Thai dance, Thai cooking, as well as enough language to get back in very basic situations. The format of each class is very informal and may include going out for a meal at a Thai restaurant or visiting interesting locations around Bangkok (including movie, music and dance events, plus bars and discos).
• If you sign up for a full year’s classes, you will be eligible for an ED Visa, which you can extend indefinitely without having to leave Thailand. It’s the ideal way to stay in Thailand – you get to experience and appreciate so much more than by relying only on the regular tourist or ‘expat’ activities. It’s fun and you get to meet people and make friends (Thai as well as ‘farang’ or other Asians).
• You should combine this course with the Rapid Reading Course if you want the maximum enjoyment and benefit from this course.
• This course is conducted in English.

• In a very short time, you will learn to recognize all the Thai letters and be able to sound out words correctly – with the correct tones.
• The Rapid system currently only works if you can understand English quite well. It uses stories and concepts and humor from Western culture that are explained in English. It will work if English is your second language, so long as your English is good enough to understand English movies or TV programs.
• We strongly recommend that you follow this course before starting any of our other courses. Phonetics is inaccurate and often misleading; and only a very limited number of classes will use phonetics. In order to progress quickly in Thai language you will need to be able to read Thai.
• Even if you are following the Thai Culture and Society course or are simply staying in Thailand as a tourist, you will benefit a great deal from being able to recognize signs and notices and menus. It will make your stay so much more enjoyable, and will enrich your experience – even if it’s just being able to recognize your favorite dishes on the menu or make out the destinations on the local vans and buses.

• One month course to introduce you to the Thai language.
• You will learn about the Thai tones and acquire a very basic vocabulary for getting around, eating at restaurants and buying things, including directions, asking questions, ordering food, numbers and counting words.
• We will practice set conversations so that you become competent in simple sentence structures.
• Ideal for tourists or regular short-term visitors to Thailand.

• Two month course, covering the same ground as the Introductory Course but a little more in-depth: including topics that are relevant to you if you live or work in Thailand, such as days and dates, the weather, and getting to know people.
• We will practice the kind of conversations you will have with people you are likely to meet.
• Ideal for expats, regular visitors to Thailand or if you have a Thai girl/boyfriend.

• Two month course, continuing on from the Beginner Course.
• You will consolidate sentence patterns and increase your vocabulary relating to getting around Thailand and meeting people.

• Two month course. By this time, you will be comfortable with simple conversations about yourself, asking about another person’s interests and family, ordering food, buying things and getting around on taxis and buses.
• This course focuses on more subtle aspects of the Thai language and culture, such as feelings, asking favors, visiting people, making complaints, etc.
• You will learn several ways of being polite or kind or indirect in your conversations, as well as be comfortable with using tenses (future, past, continuous) and active and passive sentence constructions.

• The advanced courses consist of private one-to-one instruction, based on your own level and personal interests.
• Together, we will read books, newspapers and articles, and study songs and movies. Depending on what you enjoy most, we will help you to select the right material and you will develop fluency in a more colloquial and idiomatic usage of Thai language.
• Suggested topics include political news, business news, crime news, sports, women’s magazines, healthy living, Buddhist philosophies, romantic novels, travel books, biographies of famous Thai people, popular Thai songs, etc. etc.

• This is a standard examination approved by the Ministry of Education
• The topics are fairly broad and general, and cover important aspects of being able to communicate correctly in Thai at a fairly high level.
• Passing this exam means you are considered competent to work in business or a Thai educational or government institution
• If you wish to prepare for this exam then we will customize an advanced course to suit your current level.
• We recommend that you take your time and follow an advanced program that you enjoy for its own sake. You will learn much more effectively and, when your teacher feels that you are ready for the exam, we will modify your course to include those aspects of the exam that you still need to work on.
• Click here for more details about the Grade 6 Exam and here’s an article on Stickman about the exam.

Comment from “bobcat”, who took the exam in 2005.

Dictation. A tape was played and we had to write what was said on the tape. I was at the front of the room and the speakers were at the back, so I was straining a bit to hear the tape. This part of the exam was not too difficult, although there were a few words in the passage that I had never heard before. I had to guess. I also know that I spelled one or two words incorrectly that I should not have - just dumb mistakes. Overall, this was not bad. The only thing was that the voice on the tape was quite quick, so you had to write very fast.

Essay. There was a choice of 3 topics - "Thai festivals", "Thailand today" or "Sports that I like". I chose "Thailand today". I wrote about all sorts of topics relating to Thailand and the topic was wide enough to allow for this. This part was not too bad at all. I used only vocabulary that I know so as to reduce the number of spelling errors. I ended up writing about 4 A4 pages and my hand was really sore after finishing this part of the test.

Comprehension. This was the toughest part of the exam. Mostly you were presented with a short passage and then were presented with a question and 4 possible answers. Most, if not all, of the questions had more than one possible answer. The vocab was really challenging to say the least. Topics ranged from invertebrate sea creatures, the process of producing honey, natural resources, tsunami, geology, environmental protection etc. There were also a couple of questions where you were given a passage with missing words and had to fill in the right words (you were given 5 words) in the right place. This was also tough as some words could have fit into several places.

Reading Out Loud and Conversation. This was done after a lunch break. All students had to wait outside the room to be called one by one. You went to a table where there was a teacher sitting and sat down opposite the teacher. My teacher asked me where I was from and how long I have lived in Thailand. She then asked me to choose a piece of paper out of a small container. The piece of paper had a number on it which corresponded to the number of a particular story. There were 3 or 4 different stories to choose from. I then had to read the passage aloud for her. Mine was about Songkran and its significance to the Thai people, both today and in the past. The vocabulary was quite okay, but it was peppered with a few tongue twisters. After I finished reading the passage, the teacher then asked me whether I understood it and what I thought about Songkran. We had a lovely chat about that and a few other things and that was it.

• If you need to reach a good standard of communication very quickly for work or study purposes then we can devise a schedule so that you study on a daily basis.
• It’s not effective to study more than 4 hours a day (2 hours per lesson separated by lunch or dinner break).
• It’s important to begin with the Rapid Reading course and we recommend that you also set aside time to attend the Thai Culture and Society program – just for a bit of fun, to round out your experience of Thai language and culture, and to break up the intensive routine.