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University teaching shows why Thais' command of English is so abysmal!


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On 12/6/2016 at 10:13 PM, Shawn0000 said:

 

That theory would work if English was a phonetic language, as it is not it is actually way off.  Spelling is obviously not the problem as Thai students ability to spell far exceeds their ability to pronounce and also understand spoken English, the problem lying in the unbalanced teaching of the four skills.

 

Actually, not to nitpick, we use the term phonemic, not phonetic. Spelling is one of the main problems. To minimize its importance is baffling. Did you miss my post or your are just ignoring me? I would agree that a better balance should be achieved and bringing the oral aspect early on and then later on the writing/reading would be helpful. Still, not all students learn well in this type of teaching. English forces teachers to make compromises that they would not otherwise make. There are many other reasons. I wonder what is the rate of illiteracy in Thai children today. That should be a good measure to see how efficient or inefficient their core system is. There are many variables. To dismiss English spelling as a mere distraction in the debate is unfair to Thais, teachers, students, parents. There is no magic bullet. The magic would be to get to the underlying issue.

 

@ SPRQ 

Quote

 

There is no such thing as a "phonetic language". There are languages that have a spelling system which closely correlates with the spoken language, such as Spanish, and languages where the spelling system is anarchic and so does not correlate very well with the spoken language, with English being an outstanding example.

 

It's truly tough for students worldwide that the world's lingua franca has such a chaotic spelling system, but there's nothing we can do about it now.

 

 

Thank you, both, for acknowledging that English spelling is problematic.

 

What if I were to tell you the impossible: that there are solutions by credible people with PhDs to fix it. Would you be open to actually hear it?

 

 

 

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English spelling is much more "problematic" if you see languages as needing to be consistent between the written and spoken versions of it.  in the west, we see almost no need for this because the two things are specialized for two different things.  Not Thai.

Thai is much more consistent between how it is spelled and how it is written.

English and Thai are quite unlike in this aspect.

this skews aspects of both teaching and learning English to Thai L1 and Thai L2 (where I live).. and is part of the crux of the problem.

 

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2 minutes ago, EnlightenedAtheist said:

 

Actually, not to nitpick, we use the term phonemic, not phonetic. Spelling is one of the main problems. To minimize its importance is baffling. Did you miss my post or your are just ignoring me? I would agree that a better balance should be achieved and bringing the oral aspect early one and then later on the writing/reading would be helpful. Still, not all students learn well in this type of teaching. English forces teachers to make compromise that they would not otherwise make.

 

@ SPRQ 

 

Thank you, both, for acknowledging that English spelling is problematic.

 

What if I were to tell you the impossible: that there are solutions by credible people with PhDs to fix it. Would you be open to actually hear it?

 

 

 

 

I do acknowledge that English spelling an issue, and not only for foreign language learners, I just didn't feel that it is one of the biggest issues in the case of Thai's English learning, the shortfall being in the speaking and listening skills, but then these do have a relationship with spelling, so I may just be plain wrong.

 

Yes, I would be interested to hear any solution.

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if your L1 is very consistent between it's written system and it's spoken system, you tend to believe that teaching and assessing the written one only.... is valid.

that's my point.

 

but it's not valid.

that's also my point.... and maybe the other guy's point too (Shawn0000).

 

and my third point is that language is not primarily for communication purposes anyways.  all human languages are first and foremost for thinking, not speaking, listening, writing or reading. for thinking in our own heads.  that's the current accepted theory in linguistics. as to the language capacity, not it's externalization. and so..... students need to use English for all of these things, or the Thai system will never work out very well. and certainly, only focusing on the written system works out quite poorly.

but it does "work" for Central Thai... and for a reason. the one I kept hammering on.


 

    

 

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On 06/12/2016 at 8:35 AM, rabas said:

 

The use of ever as in "I ever been to Scotland" is fairly common in Asia, Singaporeans say it too.

As weird as it sounds, ever is ever listed as an antonym of never.

 

http://englishthesaurus.net/antonym/never

http://www.synonym.com/synonyms/never

 

The word ever is a bit weird in English.  It's only secure usage is as a transformation (in some mannar) of never.  It has meant both 'always' and 'not never', so it's hardly surprising that it is little used.

 

Is that phrase quoted properly?  Syntactically, it ought to be "I've ever been to Scotland".

 

On 06/12/2016 at 8:39 AM, atyclb said:

an extremely common error is "I'm work" I'm live" and they dont seem to learn and correct the error.

The problem is that the border between verb and adjective is fuzzy at best in Thai.  It's been claimed that they can be distinguished by how the abstract noun is formed, with one prefix for verbs and another for adjectives, but some words can take either.

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6 hours ago, maewang99 said:

English for instance has only 5 vowel graphemes, because written English is specialized for reading and writing. 

Central Thai is only for speaking and listening.

I think that it's more the power of the printing press and classicism.  After all, Thai doesn't have 21 different symbols just for vowels.  Thai inherited a larger vowel set from the Indic languages than did English from Latin, and remember that Middle English was also 'only for speaking and listening'.

 

6 hours ago, maewang99 said:

you got my gist.  that's the important thing. but defining Kam Mueang as a dialect of Central Thai is rather silly. 

I'm not sure.  Kam Mueang looks set to merge into Siamese, as distinctive vocabulary is lost.  I'd be interested to know how aspiration works in Kam Mueang as a sociological variable - rule-based or by knowledge of Siamese.  If it's rule-based, there's no obstacle to Kam Mueang being absorbed into Siamese as opposed to simply dying out.

 

On a technical point, Kam Mueang lacks an army, let alone a navy.

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On 12/6/2016 at 3:30 PM, GAZZPA said:

What? There are no versions of English. English is English. There are some slight differences on some words and some local slang but mostly it is purely accent, nothing more.

 

From what I observe thai people have a better grasp then the press would have you believe. Of course if you speak too fast then it can be a problem for some but generally its ok for basic things everyday.

 

However, neighbouring countries such as Singapore, Malaysia and particularly the Philippines are light years away with English language skills.

 

 

 

 

I think this statement shows a marked lack of prior research - the comments display a profound lack of knowledge of the English language and a large use of assumption.

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On December 7, 2016 at 0:09 PM, pookiki said:

It's not a matter of being argumentative, it is a matter of what one believes to be the most important issue that defines them as an individual. For some, it may be their nationality, for others it may be their ethnicity.  I consider myself a citizen of the world.  That is they way I stress that we all in the same boat on this planet.  At the same time, I am very proud of my ethnic heritage which is Irish - second generation Irish in the US. Potato famine Irish to be exact.  Why should you be offended about the way in which I define my own existence?   If you look at the situation in Burma with the Rohingya, the issue of 'self-indentification' is a major point of contention.  The Burmese government says 'Rohingya' don't exist. They are 'Bengalis'.  The 'Rohingya' say they have a right to self-identify. The Burmese Constitution defines the number of 'recognized' ethnic groups in Burma. Being a Rohingya isn't on the list -- so they don't exist.

 

If your consider the term "English' to be the way you want to self-identify and it is a term for you that only defines 'nationality', so be it.  Each one of us decides how we define our ethnicity/cultural heritage/nationality.  Let it be. 

I am not offend by how anybody defines themselves, why would I be? But I won't be told by you or anyone else that my identity as English is not valid or that my identity is confusing.

 

I have nothing else to say on this matter really, and I think you are being argumentative. I made my point clear a long time ago.

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5 hours ago, Richard W said:

The word ever is a bit weird in English.  It's only secure usage is as a transformation (in some mannar) of never.  It has meant both 'always' and 'not never', so it's hardly surprising that it is little used.

 

Is that phrase quoted properly?  Syntactically, it ought to be "I've ever been to Scotland".

 

The problem is that the border between verb and adjective is fuzzy at best in Thai.  It's been claimed that they can be distinguished by how the abstract noun is formed, with one prefix for verbs and another for adjectives, but some words can take either.

 

cool explanation thanx. if i ever knew that detailed explanation at an earlier time in my life i had surely forgotten.

 

another common thing they say   "i am girls"  even if a single girl says it.   although the border is fuzzy at best in thai dont people learn the rules of other languages??

 

also after someone corrects them they should be able to avoid that simple error.i had to learn new rules to read, write, speak thai as do many others.

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7 hours ago, Richard W said:

I think that it's more the power of the printing press and classicism.  After all, Thai doesn't have 21 different symbols just for vowels.  Thai inherited a larger vowel set from the Indic languages than did English from Latin, and remember that Middle English was also 'only for speaking and listening'.

 

I'm not sure.  Kam Mueang looks set to merge into Siamese, as distinctive vocabulary is lost.  I'd be interested to know how aspiration works in Kam Mueang as a sociological variable - rule-based or by knowledge of Siamese.  If it's rule-based, there's no obstacle to Kam Mueang being absorbed into Siamese as opposed to simply dying out.

 

On a technical point, Kam Mueang lacks an army, let alone a navy.

 

English has about 18 vowel symbols and many ways to represent them. Is this a small problem?

 

-insane complexity of english vowels 6 a.gif

 

 

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1 minute ago, Shawn0000 said:

 

I see no reason why it should have two n's but it does.  What is your point, by the way?

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/innit

Oxford living dictionary. I sat there with my mouth open in horror, i didn't realize that standards had fallen so low. He also ordered a bottle of 'woh er' i had to translate to the waitress that he meant water, will we find woh er in the dictionary soon ? Ali G is alive and well

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3 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

Oxford living dictionary. I sat there with my mouth open in horror, i didn't realize that standards had fallen so low. He also ordered a bottle of 'woh er' i had to translate to the waitress that he meant water, will we find woh er in the dictionary soon ? Ali G is alive and well

 

There is quite a difference between an alternative pronunciation and an alternative contraction.

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1 hour ago, EnlightenedAtheist said:

Ther ar hundrudz uv thozundz uv erruz like thoze in thu sistum.

I think you have two typos in there.  Did you mean "thouzundz" and "errurz"?

 

What's going to happen to the pronunciation "thare" (or however you spell it) of there?  What are you going to do about the stressed, or at least, unslurred, forms of form words?  What would be written "ov" exists.  Conversely, the unstressed form of are is "u" or "ur".  Have you thought through the articles?

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On 9/12/2016 at 8:56 PM, EnlightenedAtheist said:

 

Why should I take any advice from someone who is not willing to learn much anything? You choose not to answer questions (that --in truth-- you cannot answer), finding bogus reasons and try to demean anyone, finding more bogus reasons. Maybe, in a funny sort of a way, it is on-topic though. Do you have a printer? Is it working? Are you Thai? Teaching English?

Whoa!  To me  your  tirade  contains  valid  and invalid  content.

Again to me  most invalid is the proposal  that reading is an  essentil prt of  language. If so then how  to explain the  common and  sometimes exceptional successes  of the  illiterate?

Language is  about  communication  rather than some  measure  of  academically  measured demonstration  of  capacity.

Fluency  can be  acquired  without equivalent literacy.

The  acquisition of a  second  language is most  commonly  desired  for spoken communication at least initially.

I  have seen comments  such as the  "English"  language is  a  bastard language  etc.

The  reality is is that it is the   International  language. Most likely reason for that is that yes it is a  bastard language. As  such it is an internationally rapidaly adaptive and progressive  language despite the  critics  who  refer to the  purist origin  of such an "orphan " language.

Your item (8) is quite likely to be the  most  valid. The  sad  aspect  for  any  country  that devolves into a system that defers to that outcome invites the suppression  of  intellect due to the presumption that intelligence is  derived  from  wealth. Whereas the  evidence  commonly demonstrated is that despite those being able to  afford  the  academic acquisition of various " qualification) s " are too often inept in  capacity.

Educators  are the  product  of their  peers.

In  any field... who were the "qualified" peers?????????????????????

 

 

 

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2 hours ago, soalbundy said:

Oxford living dictionary. I sat there with my mouth open in horror, i didn't realize that standards had fallen so low. He also ordered a bottle of 'woh er' i had to translate to the waitress that he meant water, will we find woh er in the dictionary soon ? Ali G is alive and well

Nothing to do with "standards" and you are referring to the glottal stop and well known  characteristic of pronunciation especially in British English.

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6 minutes ago, Loeilad said:

Nothing to do with "standards" and you are referring to the glottal stop and well know  characteristic of pronunciation especially in British English

for me it has to do with standards, i wouldn't hold a conversation willingly with someone who cant speak properly, it shows a lack of self respect, when someone uses the 'word' innit i shut down.

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does not matter, sts and teacher will give the answers  out...so a valid test...555555. it is more the concept of discipline of study....need to work it... here..too.....and we have the do you know who my father is... I will void my bladder where ever I choose..even on myself..

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12 hours ago, soalbundy said:

for me it has to do with standards, i wouldn't hold a conversation willingly with someone who cant speak properly, it shows a lack of self respect, when someone uses the 'word' innit i shut down.

There are several billion English speaking people who don't agree with you and might well consider you to be laughably out of touch.

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At the end of the day this discussion is useless and meaningless, as most of us know full well the Thai education system is flawed from the top down and they will not under any circumstances change to ensure their students improve unless they themselves can see kudos in doing so. Logic is not their strong point , never has been, so let us just sit on the sidelines and watch what used to be near the top of the ASEAN tree slide down to become third rate educationally and also internationally.

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12 minutes ago, Loeilad said:

There are several billion English speaking people who don't agree with you and might well consider you to be laughably out of touch.

Yes, i agree, but i have certain standards of behaviour and i stick to them. I taught myself German 40 odd years ago with a girlfriend who spoke only high German (we lived in Bavaria) and a copy of 'The Pate ' in German. It took me several years to appreciate the soft beauty of the Bavarian dialect, i still have a slight Bavarian accent when i speak high German, but i frowned upon anyone who could only speak the dialect, someone only speaking Bavarian couldn't communicate with another German living in Hamburg only speaking platt deutsch. Language is about communicating and the more beautiful a language is the better the experience. It is also an important marker for their standard of education,although not always, and social standing, i come from a working class family but my parents were insistent that we spoke the 'queens English' free of accent, that isn't easy living in London. I find speaking to a 'chav' distressing and so i avoid it.

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45 minutes ago, Loeilad said:

 

12 hours ago, soalbundy said:

for me it has to do with standards, i wouldn't hold a conversation willingly with someone who cant speak properly, it shows a lack of self respect, when someone uses the 'word' innit i shut down.

There are several billion English speaking people who don't agree with you and might well consider you to be laughably out of touch.

 

shhh.png

 

He does not capitalize his 'I's. No self esteem.  Innit funny?

 

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On Friday, December 09, 2016 at 0:10 AM, William C F Pierce said:

 

Despite what you think, you should try reading the daily UK news papers. There is not one editor that does their job of editing mistakes or making sure the articles are up to standard. As children grow up they read their parents newspapers and start to learn the same mistakes. International reports continuously prove the UK is declining in basic education compared to other countries. Even Thai English language newspapers frequently commit the same mistakes as English newspapers. The number of times the word "and" is used to wrongly start a paragraph in a newspaper is indefensible. The word has a meaning of in addition to one or more items before it in  the same sentence followed by the final item, with no comma before the word "and". SUCH AS:  Red, green, blue, puple, black and white were the colours of the exhibition painting. I suggest you give a reason to qualify the statement you have made.

Not forgetting the use of the Oxford comma -- black, and white --

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