Swedish upper secondary school students encounter English outside of school for several hours per day. Students are in contact with English both in school and outside of school at least a few days of the week. Outside of school they are in contact with English on different platforms and when involved in different activities in their spare time. Students that are exposed to English outside of school could have their language improved by what they are exposed to. Several researchers (Sundqvist & Olin-Scheller, 2015; Ellis, 2011; Rugesaether, 2014) have found that encountering English when doing activities could have an impact on how learners’ language is improved. Depending on what activity the learner is involved in, the language from the activity could influence the vocabulary of the learner. Even how the language is structured is something that learners could see and use themselves, without knowing the grammatical rules.

The present study aims at finding how much Swedish upper secondary school students are exposed to English outside of school, what activities students are involved in when they are exposed to English, and how students assess their own reading and listening proficiency. To find an answer for these questions a quantitative questionnaire was used that asked students to answer eighteen questions about how much and what kind of English they encounter in their spare time. The students were also asked to assess their own language skills, the assessment questions are based on can-do descriptions from the Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR), these descriptions give examples of what learners should be able to do depending on how developed their language is. Data was gathered from 120 participants in three different grades from three different schools in the western part of Sweden.