The recent Education Ministry policy to reduce the number of Mathayom students per classroom has put more pressure on families of primary school children who want them to get into good schools, according to experts.
Every weekend instead of spending time on leisure activities, 12-year-old Linlada Srithongkul and her mother Dutdao have to wake up at 6am to travel from their home in Samut Prakan province to travel to a well-known cram school in Siam Square.
Linlada has to sit in these extra tutorials from dawn to dusk to prepare herself for the upcoming secondary school entrance exams, while her mother spends the day in nearby shopping malls waiting for her to finish.
"All my friends enrolled for extra courses at tutorial schools to brush up on subjects they've struggled with in regular school. If I do not do the same, I will be left behind," says Linlada.
She said her parents want her to attend Mathayomsuksa 1 (Grade 7) at one of the country's prestigious state schools where admission is highly competitive, so she has no choice but to take extra courses so she can compete for a place.
Ms Dutdao said she and her husband have spent almost 20,000 baht in a bid to better prepare their daughter for the upcoming entrance exams.
A recent Education Ministry policy to scale back the maximum number of students per classroom from 50 to 40 in secondary schools has put a lot of pressure on both parents and children, she explained.
"This means we are facing stiffer competition. To be able to pass the entrance examinations to famous schools, the use of tutorial schools is a necessity because only traditional teaching in schools is not enough to get high scores," Ms Dutdao said.
Somjet Bhakdipipat, father of an 11-year-old boy, said he is now spending at least 10,000 baht a month for his son to attend additional tutoring.
"I wanr my children to have solid foundations in English and maths and be able to compete with other kids, so I'm willing to pay for extra classes. As a parent, I always want to provide the best for my children," he said.
In his view, conventional teachers do not use the right approach, and tutoring schools teach students effective shortcuts to get high scores.
"All parents want their kids to study at well-known schools as they guarantee a better environment and quality of education. For me, being able to study at a prestigious school means a path to a good university, a good job and to choices and opportunities in life for my boy," Mr Somjet said.
Starting from the next academic year, the Office of the Basic Education Commission (Obec) will limit the maximum number of students per classroom nationwide at 40.
Obec secretary-general Boonrak Yotpetch said the idea is that with fewer students to teach, teachers can spend more time with individual children.
"Classrooms are packed, especially at top-ranked schools. We want to limit class numbers to improve education quality," he said.
Mr Boonrak admitted that the policy may cause the number of students who fail to win a place in top-ranked schools to increase.
"This policy may put more pressure on students and parents who want to study at popular schools, but I think it will only be a short-term problem because Thailand's fertility rate is in decline. The level of competition will eventually decrease," he said.
Mr Boonrak said Obec has asked popular schools to set up networks with nearby schools, so they can send students who failed to attend their schools to study at allied schools instead.
A study conducted by education expert Sompong Jitradub found that high-income or middle-income families in Thailand spend an average of 22,600 baht a year on extra tuition for their children and students are spending an average of nearly 3 hours a day at tutoring centres, studying up to seven subjects.
"Most parents see extra tuition as a safety net and something that is necessary because everyone else is doing it," Mr Sompong said.
Meanwhile, another recent study by the School of Economics at the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce found that 52% of low-income families in Thailand borrow money for their children's education.
Mr Sompong said the school admission process needs to be overhauled as it has created educational inequality and focuses too much on exam scores.
"Thai society puts too much value on exam scores. Students and parents don't have a lot of confidence in the state school system so they opt for tutoring to assist their children to achieve a higher score in exams," he said.
"But to really improve students' performances, the whole society must invest in and develop the learning and teaching that take place in the classroom."