LESSON NOTES

Absolute Beginner Questions Answered

by Jay #10
How Do You Read the Falling Tone?

CONTENTS

Vocabulary
Sample sentences
Grammar

# 10
THAIPOD101.COM ABSOLUTE BEGINNER QUESTIONS ANSWERED BY JAY #10 1
VOCABULARY

Thai English Class

ป้ า aunt noun

SAMPLE SENTENCES

ป้ ากินไข่ต้ม ป้ าของฉั นร้องเพลงเก่งมาก

bpâa gin khài dtôm. bpâa khǎawng chăn ráawng pleeng gèng mâak
“My aunt eats boiled eggs.” "My aunt sings very well."

GRAMMAR

The Focus of this Lesson is the Question: How do I read falling (เสียงโท sǐiang thoo) tone of Thai?

The third tone of Thai language is called เสี ยงโท sǐiang thoo. In English, we describe it as a falling tone.
Falling tone is one of the trickiest tones in Thai as the sound contains both high and low pitches.

Language Tip

The falling tone, or เสี ยงโท sǐiang thoo, is usually shown by the Thai remark ้ . Its transliteration is ̂ . Just
like the transliteration remark, this tone first goes up and then down (↗↘). After all, it is the falling tone.
We need to go up first in order to be able to fall.

To say this tone, focus on pitching your voice to go slightly up first, and then to fall down at the end of
the syllable.

Here’s an example:

1. ป้ า
bpâa
“aunt”

Now, let’s see the difference of this tone compared to other tones:

THAIPOD101.COM ABSOLUTE BEGINNER QUESTIONS ANSWERED BY JAY #10 2

 1. ป้ ากินไข่ต้ม
bpâa gin khài dtôm.
“My aunt eats boiled eggs.”
The first and the last word of this sentence are in falling tone.

Let’s look at one more example:

1. ข้าจัดเสื อผ้าในตู้
khâa jàt sûuea phâa nai dtû.
“I organize some clothes in the closet.”
Every word on this sentence is in falling tone, except จัด, which is in low tone, and ใน, which is in
middle tone.

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