Has ESL in its current global form failed to achieve its primary purpose, helping learners to speak comfortably? I'd say "Yes" and I'd say it the failure was systemic. I'd been wondering if there was any research on it. This is what I found and how it links to what I created in 2001 and have been working on ever since, English Out There (http://englishoutthere.com)

1. ESL Doesn't Work...
....if you want to learn to speak English comfortably
Jason West
20 years in ELT
Publisher of English Out
There, now confirmed as the
world's first social media
English course.
Interested in social and
mobile learning and the
eradication of pointless time
in the classroom.
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. To
view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons,
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2. The truth
hurts
1000 hours of ESL improved
their speaking the same as...
...1000 hours of NO ESL
This is incredible, but true.
To download visit: http://www.cic.gc.
ca/english/resources/evaluation/linc/2010/impact.
asp

3. Why does it
continue?

4. We've had
enough

5. Teaching
TEFL
gurus

6. Speaking
doesn't
sell

7. "Anger
is an
energy"
J. Rotten

8. Pressure
what
pressure

9. Know your
place

10. Stop
moaning

11. Rebel

12. Out with
the old

13. Speaking
is
messy

14. The tools

15. Pitch
perfect

16. It's not
called
English as
a second
language
for
nothing
What would happen to humanity if
2bn people earnt an extra 25% in
their lifetime?