Thailand to recruit 10K English teachers

[anddy]

44 minutes ago, PeterRS said:

The reason most farang do not speak Thai is laziness. I know - I am one of them (although I do speak a little). If tones are the problem, why is it that many foreigners living in Hong Kong and the south of China can master the 9 tones required in Cantonese, or those living in the north the 4 tones in Mandarin? The same is true for grammar. Why should it be any more difficult for a foreigner learning Thai than an Englishman learning German? The grammar is not very similar.

good point on the Chinese comparison, if that's the case that many foreigners living there master those tones. In my opinion based on my experience it is best to learn the tones by NOT making a conscious effort to do so, but to let the ears and the brain "tune into" them over time. It does take time and patience (up to a year), but then it all happens naturally and you wonder how you ever could NOT distinguish them. 

Another observation on the tones: it is a myth that western languages do not have tones. They do not have tones in individual words that would change their meaning, but they have tones in sentence structures. Consider these sentences, which in their word content are 100% identical, but not in their meaning:

It is raining.
It is raining?

The spoken distinction is ONLY in the tone, making them distinguishable as a statement and a question. So the claim to be "tone deaf" when it comes to languages is simply an excuse. I do acknowledge though that it (a) takes time to be able to distinguish the tone in words (see above) and (b) to get used to the tones' meaning changing quality in words rather than sentences and (c) that in Thai you cannot change a sentence into a question by changing the tone (or sentence melody if you will); Thai always requires a dedicated question word.

[10tazione]

4 hours ago, vinapu said:

that would be too distracting and not conductive to a learning process

but fun

[10tazione]

1 hour ago, anddy said:

Maybe you just need some more listening exposure to allow your ears to "tune in" on these sounds?

... or maybe an ear doctor ...

[spoon]

This topic does interest me a lot too. Being a bilingual myself, and studying two other languages in high school and university, learning the differences between languages is fun. I also helplessly trying to venture few more languages but learning languages does requires a lot of effort and times. English with their tenses and pronounciation, malay with the prefix/suffix, french with their conjugation and word gender, arabic with their jointed script and gender (quite diff than french), now thai (chinese, vietnamese as well) and the tones. Korean alphabet is also very interesting as it is clearly man-made and well documented too. Maybe when i have more time, id start to learn thai lol. There is obvious advantage of knowing the language that might greatly improve my experience there so motivation is there lol

[10tazione]

1 hour ago, anddy said:

Not sure what wikipedia means by "no audible release".

I am not sure, but I guess it means the following: When you say in english "stop", you press your lips together for the "p", and then quickly release them, so that it makes a sound like when opeing a bottle of beer:

Now instead release the lips more softly/slowly, and you don't here a "plop" (is it "plob" in english?). I think, that could meant by no audible release.

[vinapu]

6 hours ago, anddy said:

 Not sure what wikipedia means by "no audible release". 

 

similar to silent moaning perhpas ?

[anddy]

On 9/23/2020 at 2:06 PM, 10tazione said:

I am not sure, but I guess it means the following: When you say in english "stop", you press your lips together for the "p", and then quickly release them, so that it makes a sound like when opeing a bottle of beer:

Now instead release the lips more softly/slowly, and you don't here a "plop" (is it "plob" in english?). I think, that could meant by no audible release.

yeah sounds about right

[anddy]

On 9/23/2020 at 2:01 PM, spoon said:

This topic does interest me a lot too

This was about ENGLISH teachers and has morphed in to a Thai language and (with your post) a general language thread lol

On 9/23/2020 at 2:01 PM, spoon said:

learning the differences between languages is fun.

yup agree. Especially when it's languages from totally different backgrounds, like European vs Asian laguages

On 9/23/2020 at 2:01 PM, spoon said:

learning languages does requires a lot of effort and times

only agree 50%. Time yes definitely, and there is no real short cut to learning a language. Effort, I now disagree, because I put close to zero effort (only plenty of time) into my Thai learning by absorbing it through the "ALG = Automatic Language Growth" method used by AUA Thai Program (www.auathia.com), based on the research by Dr. Marvin Brown. I was very skeptical of this approach, but I chose this school anyway because it was an important point for me to (a) not have a rigid teaching schedule, where missing classes would meaning being left behind and (b) to be able to be lazy, i.e. not do anything at all to learn or "study" the language, no homework, no books or other material to study, no nothing. 

And, lo and behold, eventually it turned out their promise of effortless and natural language absorption(*) DID work. I now speak fluent Thai with very good pronunciation (the Thais tell me and make a point of specifically mentioning that part, coz many farang don't get the tones properly) 

(*)absorption: why is this spelled with a "p" instead of a "b" when it comes from "to absorb" (not "to absorp")???? 

On 9/23/2020 at 2:01 PM, spoon said:

arabic with their jointed script

Thai has that too, no spaces between words, which is a pain in the [insert your preferred body part lol].  One gets used to it, but it would be so much easier with spaces, especially since there are a LOT of combination words, so sometimes it is not at all clear where a word begins and ends, if a syllable (which alone can be a standalone word) is part of the previous or following syllable/word

On 9/23/2020 at 2:01 PM, spoon said:

Korean alphabet is also very interesting as it is clearly man-made

Are there any non-man-made alphabets? Which are they? 

 

[spoon]

1 hour ago, anddy said:

Are there any non-man-made alphabets? Which are they? 

Not many actually documented how they came up with the alphabets. I believe korean script is quite new, and there is a detail historical records on how the king and the scholars came up with the writting since chinese language dont really have alphabets but rather symbols  or combination of symbols. There are few historical korean drama based on this event too. 

[anddy]

4 hours ago, spoon said:

Not many actually documented how they came up with the alphabets. I believe korean script is quite new, and there is a detail historical records on how the king and the scholars came up with the writting since chinese language dont really have alphabets but rather symbols  or combination of symbols. There are few historical korean drama based on this event too. 

very interesting, didn't know that at all about Korea. Of course I was joking coz your earlier post sounded like the "man-made" is a special fearure haha. I know your main point was about it being documented.

Thai script, while based on some others (as many words are), is credited to King Ramkanghaeng, who apparently came up with the set of characters including the tone markers and the related system. That was some 700 years ago. 

On the general topic of script, last year I read a small book about it. Rather interesting how some scripts developed and that often political and prestige considerations, rather than suitability, were the factors determining which script was adopted for a particular language. Goes to show how Latin became dominant in Europe ages ago, as the Roman Empire was the ruler of much of Europe. 

[10tazione]

5 hours ago, anddy said:

Are there any non-man-made alphabets? Which are they? 

Klingon

[anddy]

Just now, 10tazione said:

Klingon

oh of course, how could that slip my mind  

[vinapu]

38 minutes ago, 10tazione said:

Klingon

what bar this guy is working in ? 

[spoon]

Another thing i might want to add, the korean king at that time wanted the poor and slaves to be able to read and learn too. However, chinese characters are only accessible to the nobles, and even then, they are not able to properly represent all the sounds made by korean language. Of course, its not so easy to learn and memorize thousands of characters too. Thats why i had high respect to anyone who are able to learn chinese characters as second language. Granted there are basic characters that are easy, and have meanings directly related to the shape. 

Thai script to me definitely looks like sanskrit/hindi script. So is myanmar's script and to some extend, i believe laos and cambodia too. Malay used to be written using script adopted from arabic. Vietnam on the other hand seems to have came out with their own version of the roman alphabet. Interesting how spoken language and written script somehow got influenced very differently.

[Guest]

 I think the French had a big "influence" on the adoption of a modified Roman alphabet in Vietnam.    

At least most of Europe seems to have benefitted from Roman "standardisation" of alphabets, whereas in east Asia, it seems almost every time you cross a border, it's a new alphabet.   

 

6 hours ago, anddy said:

only agree 50%. Time yes definitely, and there is no real short cut to learning a language. Effort, I now disagree, because I put close to zero effort (only plenty of time) into my Thai learning by absorbing it through the "ALG = Automatic Language Growth" method used by AUA Thai Program (www.auathia.com), based on the research by Dr. Marvin Brown. I was very skeptical of this approach, but I chose this school anyway because it was an important point for me to (a) not have a rigid teaching schedule, where missing classes would meaning being left behind and (b) to be able to be lazy, i.e. not do anything at all to learn or "study" the language, no homework, no books or other material to study, no nothing. 

And, lo and behold, eventually it turned out their promise of effortless and natural language absorption(*) DID work. I now speak fluent Thai with very good pronunciation (the Thais tell me and make a point of specifically mentioning that part, coz many farang don't get the tones properly) 

(*)absorption: why is this spelled with a "p" instead of a "b" when it comes from "to absorb" (not "to absorp")???? 

Thai has that too, no spaces between words, which is a pain in the [insert your preferred body part lol].  One gets used to it, but it would be so much easier with spaces, especially since there are a LOT of combination words, so sometimes it is not at all clear where a word begins and ends, if a syllable (which alone can be a standalone word) is part of the previous or following syllable/word

1   Your criteria for selecting ALG seem very sensible.   

2   Don't expect logic with English spelling.    On the other hand, at least the Grammar is easier than certain other European languages.

3  I would have thought you might have been very familiar with long words with no spaces   ?      e.g. Rechtsschutzversicherungsgesellschaften.       We wouldn't dream  of writing legalprotectioninsurancecompanies, or whatever it's supposed to be.    Although having not learned the Thai alphabet, I note a similarity between a lot of their letters, which probably does not help.

[anddy]

3 hours ago, z909 said:

 I think the French had a big "influence" on the adoption of a modified Roman alphabet in Vietnam.    

At least most of Europe seems to have benefitted from Roman "standardisation" of alphabets, whereas in east Asia, it seems almost every time you cross a border, it's a new alphabet.   

 

1   Your criteria for selecting ALG seem very sensible.   

2   Don't expect logic with English spelling.    On the other hand, at least the Grammar is easier than certain other European languages.

3  I would have thought you might have been very familiar with long words with no spaces   ?      e.g. Rechtsschutzversicherungsgesellschaften.       We wouldn't dream  of writing legalprotectioninsurancecompanies, or whatever it's supposed to be.    Although having not learned the Thai alphabet, I note a similarity between a lot of their letters, which probably does not help.

1. I thought so too lol. Suited my laziness for studying at this age

2. yup

3. Well we have the long words, but that's one thing. Having an entire sentence without spaces, coupled with the difficulty of telling which syllable belongs to which word (depending how you "allocate" it, it can give a totally different meaning) is another thing. OfcourseeveninenglishorwhateveryournativelanguageyoucanstillreadasentencewithoutspaceswithoutTOOmucheffort. Justneedsgettingusedto, but still with spaces it is so much easier, avoiding the ambiguities too.

 

[10tazione]

4 hours ago, vinapu said:

what bar this guy is working in ? 

I am sure I saw him in Tawan

[Guest]

Link to a Bangkok post article on teaching English in Thailand:

https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/2037779/low-score-in-english-skills-sparks-revamp

Extract:

"The kingdom is currently ranked 7th in Southeast Asia, behind Singapore, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia and Cambodia, respectively, and ahead of Myanmar. It ranks 20th out of 24 countries in Asia"

From experience of visiting the countries (except Indonesia) & working with people in a some of them, I'd say the order is about right as well.  

The most remarkable point is that Myanmar is last on that list, despite being a former British colony.   Normally ex colonies of the UK (&US) have the sense to maintain some English language skills, since it's useful for international trade.

Whilst I very much respect the rights of countries to throw off the shackles of colonialism, it makes sense to keep certain things in place.   

Vietnam & Cambodia have recognised French language skills benefit from a much smaller network effect, so it's not a priority.  Tourists who try to speak French in Cambodia do not get very far.   

They still keep the good stuff, like railways & croissants though.

 

 

 

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