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OCR
EXTRAMURAL ENGLISH ACTIVITIES AND INDIVIDUAL LEARNER DIFFERENCES encounter opportunities to exploit self-instruction; as autonomous learning, to some extent, involves the ability and willingness to engage in the weaker form of self-instruction. 2.2.1.2 Naturalistic language learning The second category in Benson’s (2001) classification is naturalistic language learning, which takes place through “direct communication with users of the target language” (Benson 2011b: 77). The term naturalistic is used because this kind of learning imitates how children naturally acquire their L1 through communication and constant feedback. Communication in this respect would require mutuality and at least two real-time parties; however, offline singleplayer video games in the target language offer opportunities for learners to come into contact with a given L2, and here, there are no “real” L2 users, even though there may be “communication” or at least interaction, to some extent, between the parties involved. In contrast, films in the L2 of a learner provide stimulus. However, there is only one-way communication. That is, the learner or viewer watches and receives information but obviously there is no interaction between the learner and the movie. Benson (2011b: 78) therefore points out that “it could also be extended to situations in which learning takes place mainly through interaction with target language texts.” The notion that naturalistic learning is of key significance for successful foreign language acquisition is supported by Krashen (1982), who holds that interaction with speakers of an L2 offers access to comprehensible L2 input, which is an important component of language acquisition as it can facilitate it by extending learners’ L2 knowledge. 2.2.1.3 Self-directed naturalistic language learning The third category of out-of-class language learning is self-directed naturalistic language learning, which is a blend of self-instruction and naturalistic language learning. Tekkol and Demirel (2018) refer to Knowles (1975: 2) when he defines self-directed learning as the [I]ndividuals’ ability to taking initiative to identify their own learning needs, their ability to determine their learning goals, their ability to define the sources they need in order to learn, their ability to choose/use appropriate learning strategies and evaluate learning outcomes with or without help from an outsider. This means that learners plan, carry out and evaluate their own learning process as well as learning experiences (Merriam et al. 2007). Naturalistic 2°
