is hearing the hardest thing?

[BananaBandit]

I can read & write basic Thai. 

 

My accent is probably quite goofy, but I can make myself understood most of the time. 

 

Problem is:    I can't hear this language to save my life.  (for what it's worth, i'm a pretty young guy and my hearing is not impaired)

 

Is hearing Thai more difficult than speaking, reading, or writing for you guys ?

 

I've found that when farlang speak Thai on TV or YouTube, I can understand them much better than when Thai speak Thai... This might sound a bit silly, but I'm just being honest....  Do others have a similar viewpoint ?
 

[tgeezer]

I have ‘got by’ with speaking for years but still can’t understand what I am hearing much of the time. 

I quite enjoy watching news programmes with subtitles on the internet when I already know the story from the news in English. It took me years before I became aware of the importance of tones and vowel length and was able to recognise them in spoken Thai. Now when watching,  I know what I don’t know and can pause and repeat. Talking of which, yesterday I watched ไทยรัฐนิวส์โซว์ #พริตตี้ตาย and was struck by the repetitive nature of it and the use of English making pause and repeat and the need to translate unnecessary. 

eg. วนมาวนไป to a picture of นำ้อุ่น (name) pacing up and down after ‘dumping’ ร่างลัลลาเบล (name) on the โซฟา (sofa) . 

 

[BananaBandit]

9 hours ago, tgeezer said:

eg. วนมาวนไป to a picture of นำ้อุ่น (name) pacing up and down after ‘dumping’ ร่างลัลลาเบล (name) on the โซฟา (sofa) . 

yeah, i remember those exact subtitles from the broadcast !  (largely because I was wondering what "wohn mah, wohn bpai" meant)    

[BananaBandit]

9 hours ago, tgeezer said:

I have ‘got by’ with speaking for years but still can’t understand what I am hearing much of the time. 

for me, trying to hear Thai is like trying to translate an alien language into a foreign language into English

[EricTh]

I hate to break this to you.

 

Listening is always easier than speaking because the right tones, right grammar is spoken by native Thai.

 

What we learn in Thai schools are mainly formal words that is not used in spoken Thai and there are many informal words.

 

You think speaking is easier because you are speaking at a very basic level like ordering food, how much, where is toilet, what time etc. 

 

When a Thai person answers, he goes up to lower and higher intermediate level.

 

That is the sad reality of Thai teaching in Thailand, they don't teach 'much' informal words and the way that Thai actually speak.

 

Moreover, when foreigners speak Thai , they usually ignore the tones, uses formal words, uses English grammar so there is a mismatch here if you think Thai people speak like you.

 

Thai has many layers of languages, the formal words come from Sanskrit/Pali.

 

http://eastasiaorigin.blogspot.com/2017/08/origin-of-thai-language.html

[sunnyboy2018]

Listening is one of the four language skills and often, in all languages, the most difficult to learn and teach. Try watching short chunks of movies, TV programmes and you tube videos. Also try and find same with subtitles in Thai.

[tgeezer]

14 hours ago, BananaBandit said:

yeah, i remember those exact subtitles from the broadcast !  (largely because I was wondering what "wohn mah, wohn bpai" meant)    

That is the sort of thing which interests me. I have just noted วนไปวนมา in my notebook and wondered how it was in the subtitles. I looked for วนมาวนไป in Longdo (my on line dictionary) and found that I got it wrong in my original post, it is วนไปวนมา. We can deduce a meaning for it in the context we see on the video and I found numerous examples of its use in translating English. ฟังเพลงเดิมวนไปวนมา probably comes from playing a record on a gramophone! I have been riding around for hours- ฉันเดินวนไปวนมาเกือบชั่วโมงแล้ว The word walk used but the reader knows the cont text. 

It is logical that the verb is seen from the subjects point of view so ไปมา and is food for thought.  

If I remember rightly เป็ยศบ was used to say that she was dead and ไม่มีสติ unconscious? 

If you can still find the clip perhaps you can confirm or refute that. 

 

 On the subject of why verbs are in a certain order, how about อยากรู้อยากเห็น from my earliest encounter with this phrase I used to think that to be wrong because I took เห็น as seeing in the physical sense, See first, then through seeing know.  I thought later that it was; know then through knowing understand, I now think that it means: like to know and รู้เห็น could just as well be, เห็นรู้ but it just isn’t. 

 

[smo]

Listening - or to be more precise, being able to discern the difference in sound (among similar sounding words) - is half of the task. For example, one (of the "easier") example : "(feeling) tired" vs. "butter." The other half is pronouncing - ie able to replicate the sound/difference in sound (among similar sounding words) that you heard. If you could do both then you're getting on. I have listened or tried to, to many farangs on youtube living in the provinces with thai wives, who proclaimed themselves to be able to speak thai. No, they don't, not when they speak to other folks outside of their in-laws circle. Looking back to the many thai courses offered along the Sukkhumvit corridor that I have gone to, they are really money mills for the teachers - who can't possibly teach the language to the number of students in each class, unless they go one on one, then they're getting somewhere.

 

I've been learning, however very slowly, nah, minutely (unless I get more motivated than usual) within the thai community that I live among. If you're lucky you can find one that possesses pronunciation that is palatable to your ears, and also the patience and time to sit with you. My teachers are a middle-aged couple selling chicken rice in the university canteen across the street. I would plop down at one of the tables in front of their stand in the afternoon when they are cleaning up or just wanting to chill out. Then I would open my books and start "reading," then they would join in and so forth. The husband's pronunciation is priceless, I can hear every syllable he utters (think of Whitney Houston, I could hear every LETTER when she sang.) Still there are words/sound that I would never in my life be able to produce correctly, for example (in Thai) "plain/bland (soup)" and "taro", unless I have my voice box totally redone.

[Jane Dough]

I taught Thai for decades including to many foreign adults. 

 

For me personally I realized from the get go that focusing on tones and accuracy of pronunciation was key. But it took me years of listening to train myself in truly understanding the sound I was hearing and how to physically produce it. 

 

As a Thai teacher I figured that most people could not and would not have the time to be able to do this so I concentrated on the general cadence of sentences to help them speak with relative clarity. 

 

For others who couldn't trust their ears but who had more time to devote to learning Thai I advised learning written Thai and especially its rules. The learning of the spelling of a word thus became a help in its pronunciation. The learner could - with the help of a native speaker - hear its pronunciation then figure out how words of a similar tonal value would sound. I always said that the around a dozen central rules or items of knowledge for figuring out Thai tones were the most important things to learn as a gateway for good pronunciation for people from a non-tonal language background. 

 

Incidentally those commenting on วนไปวนมา would see a version of that in today's story on TV about sharks "circling" at an island in Krabi. 

 

Rooster

[EricTh]

On 9/23/2019 at 3:12 PM, Jane Dough said:

I taught Thai for decades including to many foreign adults. 

 

 

 

 

As far as I know, Thailand usually don't hire foreigners to teach Thai language. How did you manage to get that position?

[Jane Dough]

46 minutes ago, EricTh said:

As far as I know, Thailand usually don't hire foreigners to teach Thai language. How did you manage to get that position?

Because I was the best.

 

Rooster

[BananaBandit]

On 9/23/2019 at 3:34 AM, smo said:

Still there are words/sound that I would never in my life be able to produce correctly, for example (in Thai) "plain/bland (soup)" and "taro", unless I have my voice box totally redone.

I've probably spent a total of 3 hours just trying to practice my pronunciation of "peuhhhuuk"  (taro)....still, nobody understands me......i can write it. i can read it. i can't speak it......  by the way, i highly recommend the taro icecream at 7-11 ....  i-sah-greem peuhhuuk zaaaaapp !!
 

[EricTh]

17 minutes ago, BananaBandit said:

I've probably spent a total of 3 hours just trying to practice my pronunciation of "peuhhhuuk"  (taro)....still, nobody understands me......i can write it. i can read it. i can't speak it......  by the way, i highly recommend the taro icecream at 7-11 ....  i-sah-greem peuhhuuk zaaaaapp !!
 

I have heard many foreigners speaking Thai and they usually just ignore the tones. So it's not just the pronunciation that you have to practise but also the tones.

 

That's why I said listening skill is easier than speaking if you want to speak correctly. 

 

If Thai people speak slowly then it's not a problem understanding them but most speak too fast. 

Most Thai people have trouble understanding native English speakers too because most foreigners speak too fast. Thai people have been learning English for 11 years (if I am not mistaken) in government schools.

[tgeezer]

20 minutes ago, BananaBandit said:

I've probably spent a total of 3 hours just trying to practice my pronunciation of "peuhhhuuk"  (taro)....still, nobody understands me......i can write it. i can read it. i can't speak it......  by the way, i highly recommend the taro icecream at 7-11 ....  i-sah-greem peuhhuuk zaaaaapp !!
 

 

Why so hhh in your transliteration, maybe if you are trying to say those nobody is likely to understand!  

เผือก two vowels combined eu+a should be simple enough.   

[tgeezer]

I find identifying the English meaning of one word can cause so much delay that the rest is lost. Better not to try to translate what you hear. 

[jackdd]

20 hours ago, BananaBandit said:

I've probably spent a total of 3 hours just trying to practice my pronunciation of "peuhhhuuk"  (taro)....still, nobody understands me......i can write it. i can read it. i can't speak it......  by the way, i highly recommend the taro icecream at 7-11 ....  i-sah-greem peuhhuuk zaaaaapp !!
 

When looking at your transliteration "peuhhhuuk" (which is way off), i guess you just say it wrong (not just the tone, but the syllables as well)

 

 

Of course hearing is more difficult, because it has countless of variations, reading is always the same.

But i like talking with people much more than reading a book, so learning to speak / listen is easy for me.

[bannork]

I would agree that listening is the hardest skill, as mentioned by another poster, you are not in control of the 'material'. With writing and reading you can stop and start at leisure, check the word in a dictionary, and with speaking, it's you yourself choosing the words, so you have various options on how to say something.

But with listening you are at the complete mercy of the speaker: their accent, speed of delivery, level of Thai. In my own experience it's constant exposure that really aids listening comprehension. Repetition, hearing certain phrases repeated again and again until they become familiar subconsciously is the way to go.

Ask an English speaking Thai friend if you can record them speaking basic sentences you use in everyday life.

[illiterate]

I think the hardest thing is it gets taught improperly. Evidence being how few people can speak after semesters of college classes. This is not exclusive to Thai of course. People waste time learning ridiculous words they will never use, like engineer, and of course they will forget them. Reading and writing is taught way way to early in the process. There is so much bias in that regard because of course a Thai teacher cannot tell students not to learn to read and write, even though that is the way we should be taught initially. The list could go on and on. 

[mlkik]

6 hours ago, illiterate said:

People waste time learning ridiculous words they will never use, like engineer, and of course they will forget them. 

If you want to learn a language to a reasonable level and be able to converse well you will soon realise that many words you thought you would never use infact will need to use.

Engineer is not a rarely spoken word in English so why do you assume that it is a word in Thai that you do not need to learn.

My Father was an engineer so when Thai people ask me what he did for a living how would I reply to them if I had your attitude and simply did not bother to learn words that I thought were ridiculous ?

Many years ago when using the Becker , Thai for Advanced Readers I thought it a waste of time learning the chapter on religion.

However now living in Thailand and going to the local temple ,I wish I had spent more time with that chapter.

It depends on your goals ,maybe you are happy just to order a beer and some fried rice or maybe you want to have the same level of conversation as you do in your native language.

 

[ColeBOzbourne]

10 hours ago, illiterate said:

I think the hardest thing is it gets taught improperly. Evidence being how few people can speak after semesters of college classes. This is not exclusive to Thai of course. People waste time learning ridiculous words they will never use, like engineer, and of course they will forget them.

In my opinion, the function of an academic class is to give the student a solid foundation in the language. It is then up to the student to go out and fill in the gaps until they can understand and converse in the daily use of the language. If students still can't converse after semesters of college classes, it's because they failed to apply themselves outside of the classroom. It's easy to 'pass' a college language class without really learning to speak the language. Many people take foreign language courses as a requirement or prerequisite, not because they are actually motivated to learn the language.

 

Learning vocabulary, like 'engineer', is not just about you being able to say it. It's also about you understanding if someone else happens to say it, or if you hear it on the news or some TV program. I don't want to be limited to picking up bits and pieces of what I hear because there are certain words I didn't think I need to learn.

 

If the student's goal is to converse with locals in the daily language, then taking a course billed as a 'conversational' class might be helpful. IMO, the academic classes should be taken to build a strong foundation, then the conversational classes to improve upon that, and finally the student needs to supplement that formal learning with as many outside sources as possible. There's nothing easy about it, the teacher can't force it to happen, the brunt of the work lies on the student's back.

[Percy Penguin]

14 minutes ago, ColeBOzbourne said:

There's nothing easy about it, the teacher can't force it to happen, the brunt of the work lies on the student's back.

+1

 

I've sat in a few classes now but the way I see it they just enable you to go out and learn. The actual learning mostly happens out of class.

[cmarshall]

Those who have never learned a second language to a high level underestimate how much time and effort are necessary to achieve moderate fluency, especially in listening comprehension which is the hardest skill to master.  This is all the more so with a language like Thai that is so distantly related to English.  

 

I notice that most Thai speakers do not know how to slow down their speech and to simplify it to help a foreigner understand.  I assume that's because they are not used to foreigners trying to communicate in Thai.  Not surprisingly, those Thai speakers who have learned English fairly well do a lot better at this than the average Thai.  By contrast those of us from immigrant cities like New York are more accustomed to speaking with foreigners whose grasp of English is tenuous and adapting our speech accordingly.

[fcbkk]

Yes the understanding is the hardest. After over 10 years in Thailand (and investing not a little time learning) i still often encounter situations, where i understand literally nothing. Can any of you recommend a channel e.g. news with subtitles to practise? 

 

Thanks 

[BritManToo]

35 minutes ago, fcbkk said:

Can any of you recommend a channel e.g. news with subtitles to practise? 

The people around you aren't speaking the same language as the people on the news channels.

So not much use.

[BritManToo]

On 10/10/2019 at 7:48 AM, mlkik said:

Engineer is not a rarely spoken word in English so why do you assume that it is a word in Thai that you do not need to learn.

Never heard a Thai say 'engineer' in any conversation I've had or overheard. (wisawagon)

Mechanic maybe (chang-fit or chang kru-ang)

 

Are you confusing the English words 'mechanic' and 'engineer?

[BritManToo]

On 10/10/2019 at 1:08 AM, illiterate said:

Reading and writing is taught way way to early in the process.

Disagree, reading is the first thing you need to learn, and a great aid to pronunciation.

Transliteration gives you no guide to pronunciation.

[BananaBandit]

7 minutes ago, BritManToo said:

Disagree, reading is the first thing you need to learn, and a great aid to pronunciation.

Transliteration gives you no guide to pronunciation.

I suspect that one reason why so many of "our" accents are dreadful is because of faulty transliterations.   
 

[mlkik]

8 hours ago, BritManToo said:

Never heard a Thai say 'engineer' in any conversation I've had or overheard. (wisawagon)

Mechanic maybe (chang-fit or chang kru-ang)

 

Are you confusing the English words 'mechanic' and 'engineer?

If you watch the news or current affairs programmes or read newspapers the Thai word for Engineer วิศวกร will be used , therefore it is a word I am glad I learned.

With so much construction going on in Thailand วิศวกรรม - Engineering will also used a lot,just as it would be in English.

 

[tgeezer]

12 hours ago, BritManToo said:

Disagree, reading is the first thing you need to learn, and a great aid to pronunciation.

Transliteration gives you no guide to pronunciation.

I tend to agree with this because although I can’t relate in detail  how I got to this stage,  one thing I do know is that I decided very early on, that learning phonetics any more than as an initial aid to memory for consonants would be time wasted.   That being established books in English became unnecessary.  I was able to start with primary school books which added to my enjoyment of the process and gave me topics to discuss with most native speakers. 

 

[fcbkk]

13 hours ago, BritManToo said:

The people around you aren't speaking the same language as the people on the news channels.

So not much use.

It seems like a good idea to help build improved understanding and if it is 'only' news, as there is a chance that i am already aware of the context.

Anyhow, i wrote 'e.g.' news. If you know of any good channcel with subtitles that does not talk news language then why not suggest that?

 

Iif anyone knows of any good channels with subtitles to try then i'd be grateful to hear. Thanks