Vocabulary

Learn New Words FAST with this Lesson’s Vocab Review List

Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.

Or sign up using Facebook
Already a Member?

Lesson Notes

Unlock In-Depth Explanations & Exclusive Takeaways with Printable Lesson Notes

Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.

Or sign up using Facebook
Already a Member?

Lesson Transcript

สวัสดีค่ะ, ดิฉันปรารถนาค่ะ! Welcome to Thaipod101.com’s ตัวอักษรไทย Made Easy!
The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn the Thai alphabet: ตัวอักษรไทย!
In the last lesson you learned the letters จ ต and ป. Do you remember how to write them all?
In this lesson, you’re going to learn about 3 more vowels plus words with consonant clusters.
First let's look at a new vowel. It's called สระ เอา (sà-rà ao). It makes the vowel sound "ao" like the OW in "how". สระ เอา is a short vowel, but it counts as a long vowel for determining the tone.
To write สระ เอา, all you have to do is write สระ เอ before the consonant and สระ อา after the consonant.
Take a look at this word. Can you read it?
The initial consonant is ม. And we write สระ เอา, with สระ เอ before and สระ อา after the consonant. So this word is เมา (mao), which means "drunk".
สระ เอา is a live syllable ending, so เมา is said with a mid tone.
Let's practice writing it.
สระ เอ, ม, สระ อา, เมา
Next let's take a look at a new pair of vowels. These two symbols are called สระไอ ไม้มลาย (sà-rà ai mái-má-laai) and สระ ใอ ไม้ม้วน (sà-rà ai mái-múuan). They both make the short vowel sound "ai" like the I in "Hi".
Just like สระ เอา, สระไอ is a short vowel, but it counts as a live syllable ending for determining the tone.
Both versions of สระไอ are written to the left of a consonant.
Let's write these.
สระไอ ไม้มลาย is used more often. Start with a clockwise head at the bottom, draw a tall vertical line, then finish with a little zig-zag at the top. สระไอ ไม้มลาย
สระ ใอ ไม้ม้วน is only used in a handful of words. You start writing it the same way, but at the top you make a curl. สระ ใอ ไม้ม้วน
We can use สระไอ to write the word ไกล (glai), which means "far".
ไกล has an initial consonant cluster. ก and ล blend together to make the sound "gl" like the GL in the word "glue".
So the vowel sound ไอ (ai) comes after both of the consonants.
There are only 3 letters that make consonant clusters when they follow other consonants. These are ร, ล, and ว .
This is a big difference from English, which can make clusters from just about any combination of consonants.
Take a look at the word ใคร (khrai). This is the question "who?" The two letters ค and ร combine to make an initial consonant cluster with the sound "khr", like the CR in "crash".
Let's write those two words.
สระไอ ไม้มลาย, ก, ล...ไกล
and
สระ ใอ ไม้ม้วน, ค, ร... ใคร
This is a good spot to introduce a new symbol. It's called ไม้ยมก (mái-yá-mók). [ ๆ ]
This symbol is used to show that a word should be repeated.
For example, if we add ไม้ยมก to the end of ใคร which means ‘’who’’, it makes ใครๆ (khrai-khrai), which means "anyone".
Let's try writing it together.
สระ ใอ ไม้ม้วน, ค, ร, ไม้ยมก.
That makes ใครๆ
Now it's time for Pradthana's Points.
There are only 20 words in Thai that use สระ ใอ ไม้ม้วน, but some of them are very common words, so you'll see it often. This means you'll just have to memorize which words use it. When you're not sure about how to spell a word, it is better to try writing it from memory first, and then check afterwards to see if you spelled it right. This gives your brain a chance to exercise its power of recall instead of depending on a dictionary all the time.
Can you write the Thai word for "island"? First you'll need a new consonant. In the next ตัวอักษรไทย Made Easy Lesson you'll learn that and much more! See you there! สวัสดีค่ะ!

Comments

Hide