Business discussion course at an English school in Japan
I have been taking a business discussion course at an English school in Tokyo (this begs a time reference since you have present perfect continuous - so, something like 'lately' would work well). Usually, a recent news article is distributed to the students a week before the class and about 3 to 5 students then discuss in the class for 50 minutes based on the questions attached to the article.
I always wonder how I should behave in the class. I want to state my opinions as much as possible for practice, but at the same time, I want to listen to the other students' opinions with respect and share the time evenly. In the latest class ('This most recent class' works too), we had an interesting discussion but maybe I spoke only 5 minutes or so, which made me feel a little bit uncomfortable. I knew I could speak more but didn't want to be too selfish. Since listening to others carefully without interruption is thought to be polite (here/in Japan), if I kept talking, everyone would listen to me patiently...
Now I believe ('Through this I've learned' is maybe better) that the best way to practice speaking as much as possible must be is by taking private sessions. Until the discussion course ends by in October, I will focus on making the class more interactive by asking questions and giving responses so that everyone, including me, can have more chances to speak out. (The way this last sentence is phrased makes it sound like you're the professor of the class; I'm assuming you're a student taking the class instead?)