Tag Archives: final exams

April 23, 2020 · 7:24 pm

Planning the Day Before a Final Exam

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Some law students have already started final exams, and others will be starting soon. I thought today would be a good time to talk about some dos and don’ts for the day before a final exam.

Let’s start by being honest. There’s no way to study for an entire course in a single day, although many law students try. And our “don’t” list really relates to that realization.

So don’t try to study your entire course outline, cover to cover on the last day. You shouldn’t be studying things you already know at this point, and this approach assumes everything is equal. Additionally, students tend to focus so much attention on the early part of the outline that they run out of time before they get to the end, or at least lose focus. For these reasons, a “let’s do it all” approach rarely is helpful.

Instead, do start the day by identifying your high priority topics for study. How can you do this? Start by creating a checklist for all of the issues you’ve covered in the course, following the organization of your outline. (Have questions about how to create this checklist? I’ve written more about it here.) At the beginning of your studies for the day, go through that checklist ranking everything on a 3-point scale. Write a “1” next to each issue that you feel comfortable with – in other words, you if you saw this issue in an exam question you would be happy to see it. Write a “2” next to each issue that you feel OK about, even if you aren’t really confident. These are the ones you would see on an exam and say to yourself, “I would rather see Issue type #1, but I can make this work.” Then, write a “3” next to the issues that you don’t feel like you know well enough to write about them on the exam.

Once you categorize the legal issues by topic, do focus your final day of review on the topics you feel less confident about, the ones you’ve labeled with a “3.” If you run out of “3”s to study before you run out of time, then start reviewing your “2”s.

And do remember that not all legal issues are equal, and that means they shouldn’t receive equal time. As you look at your list of “3” issues, make note of which ones the professor spent the most time on in class. Those are the ones that get more time in this final review as well, as they are likely more complex or more important since your professor devoted more time to them.

Additionally, don’t stay up all night the night before the exam. Students sometimes think they have no choice but to stay up studying because there’s just not enough time, but this approach can really backfire. I’ve known students who stayed up, just to fall asleep in the morning and miss their exam, and I’ve also seen students fall asleep in the midst of a final exam. But even if these dramatic things don’t happen to you, the lack of sleep can still cause harm. Your memory and ability to focus are affected by lack of sleep, which could mean that you don’t perform as well as you could on your final. Students who skip sleep often still feel tired the next day as well, when you may want to turn your attention to studying for the next upcoming final exam.

Instead, do protect your sleep and do all of the other things that help you be healthy, manage stress, and stay focused. Make sure you set aside enough time to sleep each night throughout the exam period and especially the night before each final exam. Eat good food that will fuel your brain, and resist the urge to exist on junk food. Be careful about your caffeine intake – too much caffeine can make you feel more anxious, upset your stomach, and interfere with sleep. And don’t forget to take regular breaks as you study on that last day. Taking a short walk or doing something else for a short time will allow you to come back to your studies with more focus, ready to get your work done.

By doing these few basic things – and avoiding just a couple of “don’ts” – you will maximize the value of your review on the the day before your final exam. And the more effective your studies are, the greater your academic success!

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April 8, 2020 · 5:02 pm

Tips for Success on Open-Book Exams

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Every semester at about this point I have students asking me about how to study for open-book exams. With so many law students taking their exams online at home this time, the number of open-book exams have only increased. So I decided this is a good opportunity to discuss some strategies for success on open-book exams.

Let’s think about the scenario. Your professor has just announced that she is making the final exam open book. What should you do? Do you tell yourself:

  1. “No need to study. I’ll just look everything up during the exam!”;
  2. “I’ll study for the exam like I would for a closed-book exam. But isn’t it great that I can look things up if I forget something?”; or
  3. “Let me “pre-write” my answers so I don’t have to think my answer during the exam.”

So let’s take these options one at a time. What about the first option, giving up studying since you can just look everything up? In reality, the answer to this question demonstrates why open-book exams are traps for the unwary. There are two reasons why that is the case. First, most law school exams have time limits. Every time you have to look something up during the exam, you aren’t writing. And better-prepared students continue to write. If you look things up constantly throughout the entire exam, you will write substantially less than other students. It’s hard to get the points you need to succeed on the exam if you haven’t written enough.

But there is also a second, related reason why just looking things up during the exam isn’t a good strategy. Law school exams don’t just ask us to repeat back information, but instead requires synthesis. If you haven’t synthesized the material by creating an outline or similar resource prior to the exam, then you will have to synthesize it during the exam instead. And there just isn’t enough time to do that in most law school exams. If you take this approach, you almost always set yourself up for failure.

So what about the opposite approach, option three? Is it a good idea to try to “pre-write” your essay answers? On the surface, it seems like a great idea. If you have the time, why not carefully craft your essay answers in advance, just leaving space to “plug in” the facts? Unfortunately, just like option one, this approach contains multiple pitfalls for students.

One problem with pre-writes is that they are overinclusive. You can’t anticipate the twists and turns of the fact pattern, and therefore you must include all possible scenarios. Let’s look at Torts as an example. You identify a negligence issue in your torts essay question. Of course, your pre-write would contain the basic elements for negligence: duty, breach, causation, and damages or injury. However, what would your pre-write include for negligence? You don’t know what type of defendant there is going to be in the fact pattern, so your pre-write would have to include different duty standards for adults (the reasonably prudent person standard), the standard for children, the standard for professionals like doctors, etc. You would also have to include the rules for when people have a duty to act, the rules for rescuers, etc. And we are still on just the first element of the test! If you write about aspects of the rule that are not actually being tested in the fact pattern, you don’t get any points for that information. And writing about something that gets no points means that you aren’t writing about something else that did have value.

A second problem with pre-writes is that overplanning makes you inflexible. You may not have anticipated your professor’s approach to an essay question, and the pre-write may not properly address the question as a result. In that circumstance, a student may feel paralyzed during the exam because their careful plan is not longer appropriate. It’s hard to pivot to something new if your mindset is fixed.

There’s also a third, different problem with pre-writes: a potential ethical issue. Students who pre-write essays may inadvertently plagiarize, not giving appropriate citations for information that they are using from course materials. And, if you’ve worked with a study group, your pre-writes may look similar, if not identical, to your friends’ essays. No one wants to make a professor concerned about potential cheating on exams.

So how should you prepare for that open-book exam then? In reality, some version of the second option is the best. You need to synthesize course materials as you would for a closed-book exam, creating an outline, roadmaps, or whatever form your synthesis typically takes. You need to make sure that your synthesis is organized and focused. Even though you don’t want to pre-write your answers, a well-organized outline can provide a template for how you complete your analysis in your essay. And by synthesizing the law, you will understand it. That will allow you to spend more time writing and less time processing the law in the midst of your exam.

What are the benefits to taking this approach to your open-book exams? Well, a good outline provides a safety net. If you forget an element of a rule, or otherwise lose focus for a minute in your exam, you can look up what you need. While you don’t want to do that too often, since it takes time away from writing, doing it occasionally can be a real help. And in these current times, things that reduce our stress are important indeed!

There is a second benefit for complicated legal issues – it helps to keep your analysis organized. If you’ve approached your synthesis of these issues by creating road maps (with step-by-step instructions for how to work through the issue), checklists, flowcharts, or other similar tools, you will have thought out in advance how to organize the analysis in your essay. Organization means clarity for the reader, as well as less opportunity to forget to talk about something important.

Finally, if you create a table of contents for your outline, you have a built in issue-spotting checklist. If you feel “stuck” at the beginning of the exam, or find you have time near the end, run through the issues in your table of contents. With each one, ask yourself: “Do I see any facts that trigger this issue?” This approach will help you maximize your issue-spotting on an open-book exam.

Following these strategies allow you to take advantage of the benefits of an open-book exam, while avoiding the possible pitfalls. I wish you productive studies in the upcoming weeks, and the best performance possible on your finals. Most importantly, take care of yourself, and stay well!

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April 1, 2020 · 4:53 pm

Managing Time in A Crisis

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Have you ever heard this quote, commonly attributed to the philosopher Voltaire: “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.“? As you approach final exams, it can be a good adage to remember. Law students approaching final exams often have ideal goals in mind: I want to have the perfect outlines. … I want to complete a certain number of practice exams for each class. … I want to create flashcards for every key term for each class. … I want to go to my professors’ office hours and make sure I’ve addressed any questions I have about course materials. … I want to meet with my study group and go over what I’ve learned. … You get the picture.

These are great academic goals, and in an ideal world we would do them all. In fact, under normal circumstances, law students start out with plans to do these things and prioritize their time so that they accomplish most, if not all, of them by the end of the semester. But our current circumstances are not normal, and it’s hard to maintain a “business as usual” approach to law school studies. You’re adjusting to a new online learning environment, and some of your course requirements may have changed as your professors transitioned your class to online platforms. There are likely more distractions than normal, such as news updates about the coronavirus on TV, family members or roommates (or even pets) sharing your home space and needing your attention, or neighbors who are noisier than usual. There may be new stresses as well: financial concerns, bar exam uncertainty, fear that you or those you care about getting the virus. And it’s understandable that all of these things are going to have an effect on your study plans.

In these circumstances, attempting to stick to the “perfect” plan may paralyze you. You likely see at this point that your original goals are not fully in reach. For some, that realization can reduce your motivation to try at all. For others, the tasks ahead of you seem insurmountable. You may be struggling to just keep up with the day-to-day work in your online classes, let alone prepare for final exams.

So how can you make progress under these circumstances? I think there are five keys to managing your study time during this challenging time:

First, be realistic. Assess the available time you have each day to study, and create goals that fit within that time. Depending on how much time you have on a particular day, choose one, two, or at the most three things you intend to accomplish. The size of the task or tasks should be dependent on the time available. And budget that time so that each task has a limit and tasks don’t expand past the time you have available for them.

Second, prioritize tasks. Not everything is equal. Rank the things that you hope to accomplish based upon their level of importance, and make sure you focus first on those tasks you’ve ranked the highest. If you still have time available after that, you can tackle lower ranked tasks. But keeping your focus on your highest priorities ensures that you ultimately spend available time on the things most important to you.

Third, minimize the distractions you can control. Not all distractions are within your control. And let’s face it, some of the things (or people) that may distract you from your studies can be more important than your school work. But just as not all tasks are equal, not all distractions are either. So, to the extent possible, create a study schedule that manages distractions, reduce your connection to social media during study times, inform friends and family of the schedule you are trying to keep, and find ways to keep yourself accountable to yourself and your goals.

Fourth, take care of yourself. It’s easy in times of crisis to let go of routines and practices that keep you healthy and able to focus on your studies, but now more than ever you need to do the things that take care of you. Try to protect your sleep schedule as much as possible. Take regular breaks from your studies, so that you come back to them refreshed and able to focus. If you can, try to get some exercise every day, even if it’s just a solitary walk in your neighborhood or a yoga session that you follow online. And eat regular meals – your brain still needs fuel!

Finally, reach out for help when you need it. Sometimes it’s difficult to come up with a plan by yourself, especially when you feel isolated. But although you are studying at home, you are not alone in this. If you are struggling to come up with a study plan that works for you in these difficult circumstances, reach out to your law school’s academic support professionals, student services, or your professors for guidance. Stay connected with your study groups, or even just classmates who used to sit next to you in the classroom – you and your fellow students can be a good support system for each other, encouraging and sharing what works for you.

Ultimately, this semester may not turn out to be perfect, but it can still be good. And good still helps you make progress towards your larger personal and professional goals.

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April 4, 2017 · 3:08 pm

A Road Map to Success on Law School Exams

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The most common way to study for law school exams is to create an outline for each subject, synthesizing everything from the course (case briefs, class notes, etc.) into a single coherent document. Outlining is an effective way to study, as it forces you to consider how cases, statutes, and hypotheticals fit together. A good outline identifies the key legal issues from the course, pulls the rules, definitions, and explanations from the cases related to those issues, and organizes the material in such a way that the student can predict how to use that material on the exam.

Although outlining is a solid approach to your law school studies, some subjects benefit from an even more focused approach – a technique that I’ll call “road mapping.” A road map takes the material related to a legal issue from your outline and turns it into an action plan for how you will analyze that issue on an exam. If you take this approach, each legal issue should have its own road map. When you identify that legal issue in a fact pattern on the exam, you will know exactly how to tackle that issue.

So how do you create a road map?

  • First, start with identifying the issue. The issue is the starting point on your road map. You may want to think about what types of facts may signal that this issue is “in play” in the question. For example, if you are taking a Torts exam, and the defendant is identified as an employee, you may ask yourself: “Could there be a vicarious liability issue here?” Usually, you’ve identified all possible issues for a subject in that subject’s outline, so this step is usually easy.
  • Second, ask yourself: “What should I do first?” Generally, the first thing that you want to do is identify the appropriate rule for the issue. Does this issue have two or more possible rules? In many subjects, there may both majority rules and minority rules. Some professors may assign jurisdiction-specific reading based on the state your law school is in. And in Contracts, for example, you must determine if you should apply the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) or the common law. As soon as you realize that there is more than one possible rule, you know you must answer a preliminary question. For example: “What jurisdiction are we in?” or “Is this a contract for the sale of goods?” Identify what the steps are for determining the applicable rule. Then based on which rule is chosen, determine what the actual rule statement should be.
  • Third, ask yourself: “What should I do next?” Answering this question requires you to think about how the rule should be explained or defined further. Does the rule include a series of elements that must be met? If so, how would you work through those elements in an essay exam? Keep repeating this process until you reach the end of your rule analysis portion of your road map.
  • Fourth, ask yourself: “Are there exceptions to the rule that I’ve identified and explained?” Those exceptions should be included in the process as well – after determining if the rule would otherwise be met, you will want to work through the possible exceptions.
  • Fifth, ask yourself: “Have courts applied public policy to their analysis of this issue?” If so, you will want to identify and explain what public policies may be applied to the issue, and determine when you would want to go into that policy discussion.
  • Sixth, having gone through this process, identify at which points you would want to include facts from the exam hypothetical in the analysis. Note in your road map the places where you would apply the legal rule to the hypothetical facts.
  • Finally, note how you would approach the conclusion to any analysis of this issue.

As you can see from the steps above, the key to a good road map is being intentional. Don’t just memorize rules – think about how you would apply those rules to a new set of facts. Your road map should be an action plan for how you would tackle each issue on the exam.

The last month before finals is the perfect time to create road maps. Much of your outlining should be completed by this stage, and you should be focused on reviewing material and taking practice exams as finals approach. An additional benefit to road mapping: you will identify aspects of  legal issues that you don’t yet understand, and you have the time at this point to work through those legal issues and go to your professors’ office hours to refine your understanding of the material.

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May 2, 2016 · 3:36 pm

How Time Management Contributes to Success on Law School Exams

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If only I’d had more time.

Such is the lament of law students across the country during the final exams period. Time is almost always an issue during law school exams – some professors even warn students that it’s impossible to completely answer all questions in the time allotted. A student’s ability to manage time during the exam can be key to academic success, and the failure to do so can have disastrous consequences. Almost every semester, students do poorly or even fail exams because they spend too much time on one part of the exam and either don’t have enough time to finish or never get to the final part of the exam. And the time constraints also contribute to feelings of stress both before and during the exam.

You may feel like you have no control of the time challenge. After all, it’s your professor who creates the exam and determines how much time you will have to complete it. All you can do is show up on the day of the exam and write as quickly as possible, hoping to make it to the finish before time is called. In reality, however, there are steps you can take to manage time during the exam. These steps, by themselves, are not sufficient to guarantee success – but with a strong study plan before the exam, and good written analysis during the exam, time management can contribute to your academic success.

With that in mind, here are some tips for managing time during your law school exams:

Assess Before You Write. You can’t manage what you don’t know. If your professor doesn’t give you specific details about the number and type of questions in advance, take a minute or two at the beginning of the exam to evaluate what the parts of the exam are and what each section is worth.

Follow Your Professor’s Instructions. If your professor tells you how much time to spend on each section of the exam, pay attention to those instructions. Your professor designed the exam with those time constraints in mind, and the time is likely to correspond with the value of each part of the exam.

Assign Time Based on Value. If your professor’s instructions do not include time suggestions, allot time based on value. For example, let’s say you are taking a Contracts Law exam that is scheduled for 3 hours. When you look at the exam, you see a multiple choice section, worth 1/3 of the exam, and two essays, each worth 1/3 of the exam. You should allow 1 hour for the multiple choice section, 1 hour for the first essay question, and 1 hour for the second essay question.

Create a Schedule for the Exam – and Stick to It. Once you have calculated how much time you should spend on each part of the exam, create a schedule. Write down the times you should finish one part of the exam and move on to the next, and then stick to the schedule. If you happen to finish a section a little early, then the remaining time can go towards another section. But don’t “steal” time from one section to give to another by ignoring the schedule altogether.

Don’t Let Open Book Exams Get Out of Control. Occasionally, students will have an “open book” exam, where the professor allows students to bring in casebooks, outlines, and class notes. Students often think that open book exams are easier, but that is usually not the case. Every time you have to look something up during the exam, you are not writing. It is almost always better to prepare for open book exams in the same way that you would prepare for a closed book exam, and only look things up during the exam if you really can’t remember the law you need to answer the question.

Take Practice Exams to Develop Time Management Strategies. If your professors have released any old exams, take a few timed practice exams before the exam period begins. Practice exams allow you to develop your time management strategies without worrying about grades.

With these time management tips in mind, good luck on your final exams!

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April 28, 2016 · 2:12 pm

5 Tips for Surviving (and Thriving) during Law School Final Exams

image courtesy of Stuart Miles at freedigitalphotos.net

image courtesy of Stuart Miles at freedigitalphotos.net

As law students head into final exams, here are 5 tips for surviving (and thriving) during the final exam period:

(1) Take care of yourself. Law school exams are not a sprint but a marathon. Make sure that you get plenty of sleep each night – if you stay up late (or all night) trying to get ahead on your studies, your brain will not function as well afterwards. The next day, it will take you longer to accomplish tasks that would normally be easy, and lack of sleep also has a negative effect on memory. A tired brain does not contribute to academic success in law school. It’s also important to not skip meals – brains need food too! And make sure that you take regular breaks from your studies. Take a walk, or do something else that gets you up out of your chair. After each break, you will go back to your studies refreshed and ready to tackle your outlines!

(2) Create a study plan. Students commonly spend most of their study time on the first exam or two, and then they run out of steam before the end of the exam period. Print out a blank calendar, and divide up your days so that each class gets a reasonable portion of the remaining study time. You will realize that you need to rotate your schedule to give each class its due. For some students, maybe assigning one subject per day makes most sense; for other students, studying two subjects a day may work better. The important thing is to be intentional – if you have a study plan, you know exactly what you should be doing each day to stay on track and maximize your studying.

(3) Identify your priorities. Students often study for exams by going through their outlines over and over again, from cover to cover. Although that approach may work for reviewing course material throughout the semester, it is usually not the most efficient way to study in the days leading up to your final exams. Instead, create a checklist of issues for each subject (instructions for creating a checklist can be found here). Once you’ve created your checklists, start each day by printing out the checklist(s) for that day’s study subject(s). Go through the checklist, evaluating if you can comfortably discuss the law for each issue.

(4) Develop road maps. After you’ve created your outline, think about how you would actually use the information on an exam. If you identify a particular legal issue in an essay exam question, what would you do first? What would you do next? Some students create a flow chart that shows the analytical process they would use in their essays, while other students list a series of steps (kind of like following a recipe). The form is up to you, but try to do much of the thinking about how you would organize your analysis for each legal issue before you get into the exam. If you do, you will spend more time writing during the exam, and less time thinking. And your essays are likely to be more focused and better organized. The process of developing a road map also helps you to identify topics that may need more review.

(5) Take practice exams. Sometimes your professors have released old exams or practice questions. If they have, there’s an opportunity to better understand what your professors are looking for in the exam answers. One way to use a practice exam is to simulate the actual exam experience. Find a quiet, distraction-free place to take the practice exam. Time yourself, so that you write for the amount of time that the professor would allow for that question during an actual exam. If the exam is closed book, don’t look at your notes. Taking an exam, even if you only do one essay, can be a great way of assessing how prepared you are for the exam. You can then spend more time reviewing the areas of the law that seemed too vague or fuzzy. If you feel that you don’t have enough time to write out complete essays, you can still use a professor’s old exams to test your ability to spot legal issues and make sure that you know the law for those issues.

Following these tips can help you make the best use of limited time in the days leading up to final exams. Good luck on your exams!

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April 7, 2015 · 9:54 am

Using Study Groups to Develop Hypothetical Practice Questions

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Yesterday, we explored some of the dos and don’ts for effective law school study groups. Today, I want to take that discussion a step further and explain how the members of your study group can develop your own hypothetical practice questions as you prepare for final exams.

One way to test your understanding of course material in law school is to go through hypothetical questions, but your casebooks and commercial study aids often have a limited number of practice questions. Students often ask me where they can find more practice questions, and I always explain that it is possible to create your own hypotheticals. This approach is particularly effective if you participate in a study group. For the best results, you should first complete your outline of the legal issue(s) you want to practice.

Here are 5 steps for creating hypothetical practice questions:

  1. Identify specific legal issues that you want to practice. The best issues for this purpose are complex issues—the kind that you might have some difficulty with on an exam. For example, in Civil Procedure you might want to practice how you would apply the law to fact patterns where the Erie Doctrine or Subject Matter Jurisdiction was at issue. For Constitutional Law, you might choose to focus on Equal Protection or Due Process issues. For Evidence, maybe you want to explore some of the hearsay exceptions.
  2. Assign each member of your study group a time period or jurisdiction for their hypotheticals. Taking this approach ensures that two people do not bring the same hypothetical to the next group meeting. For example, if your group is going to study the Erie Doctrine, maybe one person looks for Erie cases from the Second Circuit, another looks for cases from the First Circuit, and the third looks for cases from the Third Circuit. Just make sure that, if the law has changed in recent years, you do not assign time periods prior to any changes in the law.
  3. Each person will look for cases on Westlaw, LexisNexis, or other legal search platforms that focus on the legal issue your group has chosen. You may choose to create your own search terms or may look to see what other cases have cited the cases you studied in class. Just make sure that any cases you choose are still good law! (An added benefit to this process is that you practice your research skills as well!)
  4. Look for cases that have a well-developed but concisely worded set of facts and good explanations of the legal outcomes. The statements of facts from your cases will become the foundation for your hypotheticals, and the court’s explanations are your answer keys for the hypotheticals.
  5. Have each member of the study group bring 3 to 5 hypotheticals to your group’s next meeting. Take turns having each person present one of their hypotheticals. The other members of the group should talk through their legal analysis for that hypothetical, based upon their outlining and studying prior to the group meeting. After the group’s analysis is complete, the person who brought the hypothetical should explain how the court actually resolved the legal issue(s) in the underlying case.

Taking this approach, your study group can create an endless number of hypothetical questions. The process of talking through the legal analysis for these hypotheticals, as well as explaining how the court actually resolved the legal issues in this case, will improve your understanding of important legal issues and provide practice for how you should analyze similar fact patterns in your exams.

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April 6, 2015 · 4:50 pm

Using Study Groups to Study for Final Exams

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

With final exams coming up soon, I’ve had a number of law students ask me about how to use study groups to study for final exams. Study groups can be very helpful as you are preparing for finals—if you take the right approach. But it’s important to avoid some common pitfalls associated with study groups if you want to maximize their value in the upcoming weeks. Today, we will explore some of the Dos and Don’ts associated with law school study groups.

Don’t use study groups to divide up the work. Sometimes law students think that study groups can provide a shortcut for creating an outline. They will divide up the course materials among the members of the group, with each person only creating one part of the outline. The problem with this approach is that outlining is about synthesis. Some of the most important parts of law school learning take place as you weave together the course materials and figure out how everything fits together. Students who take the “divide and conquer” approach to outlining only fully understand the material that they have outlined on their own—if they are tested on the legal issues that others outlined, they do not tend to perform as well.

Instead, do use the study group to reinforce your own outlining. Some of the best study group meetings take place when everyone in the group has already tackled his or her own outline. Set a specific goal for what legal issues everyone must outline prior to the study group meeting. When the group comes together, you can compare what each person has done. If you have identified something you don’t understand, maybe another member of the group has figured that issue out and can explain it to you. You will be better off as you begin to see how others have interpreted the course materials, and you can clarify your own understanding of the legal issues. Even students who are teaching other members of the group benefit in this environment, as the process of teaching the material helps the teacher to understand it even better as well.

Don’t let study groups become a time drain. Sometimes study groups meet for long periods of time without really accomplishing anything. Law students usually have limited time available to study, and it’s important that your group study sessions do not degenerate into a gossip fest or otherwise not accomplish its goals.

Instead, do create an agenda for each study group meeting. Get the members of your study group to set goals for what you want to accomplish at each meeting, and create a plan for how you will accomplish those goals. Make sure that the study group stays on track at each meeting so that your goals are accomplished and your time is used effectively.

Don’t schedule so many study group meetings that you don’t have time to study on your own. Study groups can be one effective way to study, but as I talked about before, it is important to have the time to work on your own outlines as well.

Instead, do schedule study group meetings to ensure that you maximize both your personal study time and the benefits of the group. If properly spaced out, study group meetings can provide additional motivation for your studies and a system of accountability. There is nothing like knowing that someone else expects you to have something done to help you stay on track with your personal study plans.

Stay tuned for tomorrow’s blog post, when I will explain how a study group can be used to create and explore hypothetical practice questions! And happy studying!

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February 24, 2015 · 12:15 pm

Making the Best Use of Spring Break in Law School

Law students the world over look forward to breaks from law school. Some students view these breaks as a holiday—a time to get away from the intense daily demands of their studies, travel, and visit with family and friends. Other students have ambitious plans for catching up or getting ahead in their studies. Regardless of which approach you take, you are probably pretty happy when you see Spring Break finally approaching. There is nothing wrong to either approach to Spring break, at least in the abstract. In fact, the best Spring Break plans should probably include some of both. The key is to come back to law school after the break in a better place than you were before—and accomplishing this task takes just a little advance planning.

Here are a few tips for making the best use of your Spring Break or other holidays:

Set reasonable goals for studying during the break. I often have law students tell me that they are going to outline for all of their classes during the break, do practice exams for each class, get ahead in their reading assignments, and read a bunch of supplements. Spring break can be the perfect time to work on getting caught up in your studies, but it is important to set realistic goals. After all, Spring Break usually only lasts a week. You aren’t superhuman, and you can’t do everything. When you set unrealistic goals for yourself, it is easy to get defeated and give up when you realize that you can’t get everything done. Instead, decide what your highest priority items are, and focus on those first. Create a study schedule for yourself during the break, and set reasonable goals for what you intend to accomplish during each of those study sessions. You will be focused and productive, and your efforts will build momentum for the weeks leading up to final exams.

Image courtesy of smokesalmon at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of smokesalmon at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Give yourself permission to take some time off. Don’t get me wrong—it’s good to work on getting caught up on your studies during Spring Break. In fact, I encourage you to do so. But it isn’t particularly healthy to work long days every day during the break, including weekends. There is still a lot of time before the end of the semester, and you don’t want to burn yourself out. If you take a little time off from your studies, you will come back refreshed and ready to tackle the hard stuff. At the minimum, give yourself a couple of days off entirely. Do something fun. Get out of the house. See your friends and family. Read that book (for fun) that everyone has been talking about. Go see a movie. Do something entirely unrelated to law. On the days that you study, take regular breaks. Maybe you will decide to get up and do your studying from 8:00 am to 2:00 pm each day, and then take the rest of the day off. (You can even accomplish this if you travel on vacation during the break—just make sure your goals and study schedule are reasonable!) If you set realistic study goals for yourself and create a study plan to achieve those goals, you will be able to build in some time to relax as well. Your studies will be more productive, and you will return to law school ready to tackle the remainder of the semester.

Image courtesy of digitalart at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image courtesy of digitalart at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Make vacation plans that recharge your batteries, not leave you even more tired. Maybe you are caught up on your law school studies, and you’ve decided to go on vacation during Spring Break. (Or you are making it a combination study/travel break!) It’s important to make sure that your vacation plans don’t leave you exhausted as you are heading back to classes. It’s still a long uphill climb to final exams, and you won’t be setting yourself up for success if you have run full speed the entire break. It’s best to avoid the type of Spring Break plans that were popular in undergrad, where everyone partied hard and drank heavily every night. Think about what you need to do for yourself to recharge your batteries while you on vacation, and following through on those things will help you in the long term. I also recommend that you not plan to come home at the very last minute—it’s good to give yourself the time to get sorted about before classes resume, and you will have reading to do for your upcoming classes.

Above all, think balance. As with everything in law school, taking a balanced approach to Spring Break and other holidays will help to keep you on the right path to academic and personal success.

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February 3, 2015 · 6:32 pm

5 Tips for Reading Statutes

Law students must develop a number of important skills to be successful in their legal writing assignments and exams. Those same skills are equally important for success on the bar exam and in legal practice. One skill every law student needs is the ability to read statutes. Because statutes are a primary source of law, the ability to read, understand, and apply a statute can be critical to academic success in many law school classes. As an attorney, your ability to read and interpret statutes will enable you to provide better legal advice to your clients and predict legal outcomes. But reading statutes is not always as easy as it seems on the surface.

Here are some suggestions for how to be more effective in reading statutes:

(1) Slow down! Don’t read too fast. Statutory provisions are often pretty short, and it is easy to let yourself skim the statutes without really seeing the important details. Take the time to read the statute carefully, and you will understand it better.

(2) Put the statute in its proper context. Law students (and lawyers) often try to read statutes without putting them in context. But statutory provisions do not exist in a vacuum. Statutory codes often contain tools to help you interpret their provisions, if you take the time to look for them.

It can often be helpful to look at related statutes. For example, in criminal law, there can be different degrees of felonies or misdemeanors, each set out in a separate statute, for the same general criminal act (such as drug possession or drug dealing). Comparing the differences between these related statutes can help you understand how a court might interpret them and apply them.

You should also look for statutes that provide definitions for key terms. Sometimes definitions are included as provisions in the statute at issue, but often there is a separate statute that provides definitions for key words. You don’t want to make assumptions about what a word means when the legislature defined it for you.

In some cases, the legislature may have even provided specific interpretive instructions. For example, sections 15.15 and 15.10 of the New York Penal Law provide specific interpretive rules for interpreting culpability requirements for state criminal offenses.

If you look at the table of contents surrounding the statute at issue, you are more likely to find these context clues.

(3) Pay attention to the details. Every word in a statute has a specific purpose. Certain types of words are signals. For example, if you see a list of requirements for a legal test that are connected by the word “and,” you then know that all of the requirements must be proven in order for the test to be met. In contrast, if you see a list connected by the word “or,” then the test may be met without proving all requirements. Other signals include words such as “unless,” “except,” “shall,” and “may,” but this is not an exclusive list. Specific areas of the law may have their own signal words as well. So, for example, words specifying mens rea (such as intent, knowledge, recklessness, etc.) can be signal words for criminal law statutes.

You also want to pay attention to punctuation. Where a comma is placed can affect the meaning of a statute, as can the use and placement of other forms of punctuation.

(4) Break the statute down into smaller pieces. If the statute is complex, it can help to chart or diagram the statute so that you force yourself to identify the key components. Maybe the statute sets out specific elements for a legal test—identify the parts of the test and see if you can define what each of those elements mean, using those context clues I mentioned earlier. Ask yourself what the statute is meant to do. Understanding its purpose can also help you to separate out the parts of a more complex statute.

(5) Use cases to inform your understanding of the statute. You can often find cases where the court analyzes the meaning of a statute. If you are having difficulty understanding a statute, try Keyciting or Shepardizing the statute to find cases that interpret and apply the statute. Case law can further your understanding of a statute’s meaning. (In some cases, you may also find a government agency’s interpretation of a statute helpful—you may want to look for administrative code provisions, administrative law rulings, and advisory letters if you are reading statutes in areas of law with agency oversight, such as tax, immigration, employment discrimination, securities, etc.)

The key to reading statutes is to go below the surface—take the time to get to know the statute and its context, and you will have a better understanding of its meaning and application.

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