Higher education students in English medium instruction in non English-dominant countries use L2 to share ideas and demonstrate learning thorough the medium of English and are often required to enhance their ability to communicate in this language while studying. However, the conditions provided for these students in university courses may or may not be conducive to the development of their skills to effectively communicate in speech in academic contexts. This exploratory study presents preliminary results of a larger research project, conducted to design, implement and evaluate a theoretically-driven, genre-based L2 speaking course for academic communication. Drawing on skill acquisition theory and activity theory, in order to understand how aspects of the learning activity enable or hinder the development of genre-based L2 speaking, this study captures the experiences of ten participants -- Polish undergraduate English Philology students -- with various facets of the course. The results bring to the fore the teaching and learning strategies that the students most value and most frequently use within their educational context. Additionally, the study, being part of a broader design-based research project, offers draft principles for course design.