BalthazarBeefheart

Parvis, on 2010-03-10 19:22:56, said:

Sadly comparing Walen and AUA are like comparing apples to oranges     Aside from both of them being fruit there are few similarities; so aside from both of them being thai language schools they have much more dissimilarities than things in common.

I still say AUA is NOT a beginning school, and if you know zero thai, you’re likely to come out of an hour’s lesson more discouraged than you entered.     I know David Long disagrees with this, but seeing as there is NO in class interaction, NO ability to ask questions and NO speaking it’s my own personal take on their methodology.  I guess I prefer to learn more interactively than passively.

However with that being said, ANYONE who knows even a smattering of thai can and will benefit from sitting their classes.     The teachers do a sufficient job in miming out new vocabulary words so you can at least glean the meaning.  They speak at normal thai cadence and speech patterns, so you’re exposed to regularly spoken thai, not a teacher over pronouncing words at a snails pace.  

I’m gonna try to sit some more classes at AUA this upcoming week just to gauge the level of my comprehension.  Last time I sat level 3-4 and easily understood the context of the hour long lesson.

The biggest drawback in my quest for speaking, reading & writing thai is my own doubts about my ability.    The extreme reticence I have in speaking thai; even if I know how to say it correctly, with the proper structure has held me back much more than what ever school or method I would care to attend.

When I add in the fact I recognize written thai words via context and/or memorized recognition, instead of by the toning and/or pronunciation rules; it means I sometimes pronounce words wrong.    

I still gotta take the time to learn the tone rules, but so far it’s beyond me.