For twenty-five years, Let’s Start Talking has been sending people from English-speaking countries throughout the world to offer English conversation classes in exchange for cross-cultural experiences and the opportunity to meet new friends. Today, LST is offered on five continents and in almost thirty countries. Many thousands of people have improved their English using this very effective method.

LST was founded in 1981 by Mark and Sherrylee Woodward shortly after their return from living in Germany. They settled in Oklahoma where Dr. Woodward became a professor of English at a local university.  Meanwhile, he and Sherrylee began leading teams of students overseas during the summers, but not just as tourists. They trained them to help people practice their English in exchange for an opportunity to see the country “from the inside.”

Since then, LST has expanded into a world-wide organization, sending thousands to work in countries like Russia, Thailand, Brazil, China, Uganda, Australia, and many more. People in all of these countries have found an excellent opportunity to improve their English language skills and have made many new friends in the process.

Let’s Start Talking is a faith-based organization and its materials are all based on texts from the Bible.   These texts provide people of all world religions, as well as people of no faith at all, valuable opportunities to discuss meaningful topics, which leads to better English conversations.