Thai Language School Review: PRO Language Chiang mai

Thai Language School Review PRO Language Chiang mai

School: PRO Language
Website: PRO Language Chiang mai
Telephone Number: 053-400-980 , 086-431-0377

Address: 6/4-5 Nimmanhemin Rd. Suthep, Mueng, Chiang Mai.

PRO Language School in Chiang mai is located on the northern end of the trendy Nimmanhemin street where a lot of the Digital Nomads live, but the building itself is a bit older. Classes are two times a week: 2h at a time, with a 15min break in between.

From my experience with PRO Chiang mai, the biggest motivation for people to choose this school is the visa, location, the price, plus the flexible attendance rules.

In my opinion, Pro Chiang mai is a great school if you want to attain the education visa and speak basic Thai.

But, if you really want to learn Thai, then you’ll need to do a lot of work yourself on your own, take supplementary private classes, and/or enroll somewhere else as well.

Beginner level

At the beginners’ level, the first class covered the tones and the vowels in an hour and then moved on to greetings and basic phrases.

The pace was fast and each class or each 1.5 classes covered a different subject.

And while they did follow a book (written by the school itself) they also used a lot of handouts and had simple homework once a week. Considering the class was twice a week and 2h/day with a 15min break, that’s a good amount of homework (and we always checked it the following lesson). 

There didn’t seem to be much focus on making sure that every student could follow along. But, as many students were lax in their motivation, I cannot blame the teachers. If the teachers tried to get everyone up to speed all the time, they’d never get anywhere with the students who are motivated to learn. 

We spoke in pairs a lot, read out aloud from the book, and our teacher asked us a lot of questions. Our teacher was young, energetic, and happily took the time to explain.

She generously went off-topic to answer our questions about how to say this and that in Thai so we’d often ask her about everyday Thai things (such as how to speak to the taxi drivers and market sellers, what foods in restaurants are called, etc). And after answering our questions, she always got us back on topic again. 

Intermediate level

I was in an intermediate class at Pro Language for about six weeks. Officially, there were 15-18 students in my class.

The teaching was divided into speaking for the first hour, often following photocopied texts brought by the teacher, and then a reading and writing section after the break. The teaching was actually OK, albeit based on continual repetition.

I did learn to read basic Thai as well, so something must have worked.

The level was generally very easy and it was obvious that many students had absolutely no understanding of the Thai language at all. I genuinely liked the teacher, who tried hard to motivate students and get them to take part, but it must have been a thankless task.

I could have asked to move to a different class but as I was effectively getting private lessons at Pro Language I was more than happy to stay there. However, due to the low numbers of students showing up, the group was finally cancelled. I’ve just been moved to the next level where

I’m hoping that it’ll be a bit more challenging.

Should You Study at Pro Language School in Chiang Mai?

This totally depends on your purpose of learning Thai.

Pro Language School is a popular Thai language school in Chiang Mai for many reasons, including:

  • The location is great.
  • The price is good.
  • They can help you get an education visa for a 1-year stay in Thailand easily.
  • Their course can help you speak basic Thai quickly.

So, if this is what you are looking for, Pro Language School is a good option.

On the other hand, if you want an intensive Thai class, you might want to look at other options instead. Or you can get their private class. Their group class is quite big, so too many students who have different paces of learning can slow your Thai progress down.

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