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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 numbers ๑, ๒, and ๓. Do you remember how to write them all?
In this lesson, you’re going to learn how to write the next 3 Thai numerals.
Are you ready to start? Then let's go!
Here is the number "4" or สี่ (sìi) in Thai.
To write it, we start with a counter-clockwise head, then make a little hook pointing to the bottom right. From there, the line curves over to the left and above the rest of the number.
And this is the number "5", or ห้า (hâa) in Thai.
It looks almost the same as the number 4. The only difference is the line has a loop added at the top.
Then here is the number "6", or หก (hòk) in Thai.
We write หก using a small counter-clockwise head. Then the line continues to make the shape of a backwards letter C. And finally there is a little tail that sticks out to the upper left, which tails off at the last part of the letter.
Are you ready to practice writing?
Let's try all the numbers up to six starting from the 3 we learned in the previous lesson. Here we go:
๑​, ๒,​ ๓,​ ๔, ​๕,​ ๖
Now see if you can read this number:
The digits are 3, 6, and 5.
So it's 365, or สามร้อยหกสิบห้า (sǎam-ráawy hòk-sìp-hâa) in Thai.
Do you know how to read this word?
You might expect this combination of letters to make the sound เออิ (ee-i). But this is a special pattern that you have to remember. The vowel in this word is actually not สระ เอ but สระ เออ which you learned in lesson 13. Do you remember how to write words with สระ เออ?
With no final consonant, สระ เออ was written with สระ เอ on the left and อ on the right of a letter. And with a final consonant, it was written with สระ เอ on the left and สระ อิ above the letter.
So you might expect we would just add ย to the end of this and write เอย (ooei) with
สระ เอ, สระ อิ , and ย. But for some reason, the สระ อิ does not get written when the final consonant is ย.
A word that uses this pattern is เนย (nooei), which means "butter". As you can see the initial consonant is น, and we have the vowel sound represented with combination of สระ เอ on the left and ย on the right.
Now it's time to learn the last tone rule.
Are you excited?
This rule is about using the tone mark ไม้โท (mái-thoo) with low class consonants.
And the rule is:
Low class consonants with ไม้โท make a high tone.
One important word using this is น้ำ (nám), which means "water". น้ำ has the initial low class consonant น. The vowel is สระ อำ , and we write the tone mark mái-thoo above the consonant to give it a high tone. น้ำ (nám)
Another word is ร้านอาหาร (ráan-aa-hǎan), which means "restaurant". ร้านอาหาร is actually a compound word. The first word is ร้าน (ráan), which means "shop", and the second word is อาหาร (aa-hǎan), which means "food".
The first syllable has the initial low class consonant ร with -้ (mái-thoo) added above it to give it a high tone. The second syllable is a mid tone อา (aa), and the last syllable is a rising tone หาร (hǎan) that starts with the initial high class consonant ห.
To write the whole word ร้านอาหาร in order we use: ร, -้ (mái-thoo), สระ อา , น, อ, สระ อา, ห, สระ อา, ร.
ร้านอาหาร (ráan-aa-hǎan)
Now it's time for Pradthana's Points.
A good reason for learning to read Thai is being able to read Thai menus. A lot of restaurants in Thailand will hand out Thai menus to Thai customers and English menus to Foreign customers. But often the Thai menu has far more choices listed on it than the English version. So knowing how to read Thai can increase your dining options.
Did you know that even Thai has a few irregularly spelled words? In the next ตัวอักษรไทย Made Easy Lesson you'll learn how to write the most common ones! See you there! สวัสดีค่ะ!

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