Writing legal essays is hard, even in the most ideal circumstances. Writing them for the bar exam is not an ideal circumstance, where you are limited to 25-35 minutes (on average) and have to write many essays, on different topics, on the same day. So, how does one succeed in this task, where it feels like you are set up to fail? Practice. It’s cliché for a reason, but practice really DOES make perfect. Having said that, I can provide you with helpful tips.
1. Practice. Yes, I’ve said that already, but it really is the single most important thing you can do to increase your chances of passing the bar exam. And by practice, I mean practice writing out full essays, not mere outlines. It also helps to practice writing a few essays together, in test like conditions. The more essays you can fully write out between now and the bar, the better.
2. Use your notes. When you practice, always use your notes. Practice as if it’s an open book exam. While I fully realize that the bar exam is never going to be open book, the more you write something down, the higher your chance of remembering it. This means that if you “test yourself” and guess the law, that incorrect law you guessed is now competing for memory space with the correct law. On the other hand, if you are using your notes and copying that law in your practice essay, correctly, not only are you writing it down, which helps with memorization, but you are writing it down in CONTEXT, which is also going to help you remember the applicable law.
3. Outline. I realize you are pressed for time, but you really don’t have time NOT to outline. There is no one right way to outline, but you must think about what you are going to write, and plan, before putting pen to paper. Or, rather, for most of you, before typing. This ensures that you will not forget issues, and it will help you stay organized. As most of you are typing on the bar exam, type your outline as well. This means that you are not re-copying things, but rather, just turning your outline into complete sentences and paragraphs.
4. Issue Organization. Not all issues are created equal. This is also why outlining is so important. You may very well spot four issues on your fact pattern, leaving roughly five minutes per issue. (Taking into account the time it takes to read and outline). In addition, each issue may have sub issues, and most rules will have elements and exceptions. That’s a lot to get through in roughly half an hour. So, you need to plan. Which issues are most important? Which elements of the rule are most important? For example, in a battery claim, it might obvious that there was contact, and it might be obvious that such contact was intentional, therefore, you may only one to spend a sentence on each of those elements. But it might not be obvious as to whether the contact was offensive, which is then where you need to spend more of your time
Month: February 2016
Protected: Property Materials
Protected: Practice Essay Exam and Sample Answers
Tips for Studying for the Bar Exam
Or…how not to become a hermit the rest of the month.
Ok, to be fair, even studying effectively you probably are still living the hermit life. That’s ok, it’s only 4 more weeks (more or less) . Say it with me, 4 more weeks – you can do this! Trust me. Would I lie to you?
Clearly, studying for the bar exam is not the most fun thing you can imagine doing. Though, if doing MBE questions just for kicks is your idea of a good time….who am I to judge? For those of you that don’t get your kicks from MBE questions, since I can’t make the studying more fun, at least I can tell you how to make it more effective.
Essays: Practice your essays with your notes, looking up rules of law. I know, this sounds like cheating, but I’m not suggesting you do it ON the day of the exam, I’m suggesting you do it during practice. Also, the bar exam is actually testing your ability to analyze, and looking up rules in your outline will not help you there. But, it WILL help you learn the correct rules, which is the first step. Plus, it is more effective than trying to memorize rules by reading outlines again and again, or even flashcards for that matter. If you look up rules as you write, you are actively applying facts to those rules, and practicing your writing, in addition to learning the rules, since you are copying them down. This is all active learning; the doing rather than just passively reading. When given the choice, active learning is always more effective.
Also, please PLEASE write out your practice essays. Let me repeat that, WRITE OUT ESSAYS IN FULL. Thinking about them in your head, or just drafting outlines, will not help you. You’ve heard practice makes perfect? It’s a cliché for a reason, and now is the time to put that cliché to the test. Write out as many essays as you can in the next 5 weeks. Using your notes, of course.
MBE: As with the essays, you want to be actively learning from the MBE practice questions. If you do not learn from every MBE question you do, you are wasting your time, and just doing that MBE question for fun. As I said before, I won’t judge….but the general feeling is that MOST people have other things they like to do in their spare time. How does one learn from doing an MBE question? Do one at a time, check the answer, and then figure out what you did wrong.
You might have went wrong on substance; forgetting some element of the rule, or just being confused on the black letter law. In that case, now is the time to review our outlines/flashcards/charts, to brush up on the black letter law.
You might have had a reading comprehension problem, reading the call of the question or a certain fact the incorrect way. If that’s the case, take a mental note and be sure to read a bit more carefully in the future. Having said that, make sure you are consistently paying attention to the call of the question; variations such as “which is the least likely outcome” often throw students off course if they are not paying attention.
Perhaps you were torn between A and C, and don’t quite understand why C is the better answer, since they both seem ok to you. In that instance, read the explanation in the back of the book, re-read the question, consult with a tutor, do what you need to do to assess why one answer was the “best” out of all options. Sometimes the way to do this is to figure out why the other three options are incorrect. Remember an answer has to be both factually and legally correct, and never only a little bit legally correct.
What all of these things boil down to is learning from your mistakes, something your mother has been telling you to do since you were just a wee thing. The types of questions asked, as well as the rules tested, are often repeated, which means you are likely to see them again and again – so what better way to master them then to learn from each question? Remember merely tallying your score and shrugging, moving on to review an outline without knowing where your weaknesses are, will not help improve your score. You have to know where you went wrong. You have to learn FROM the questions, and I cannot stress that enough.
Having taken this all into consideration, perhaps you might have time, after studying EFFECTIVELY, to actually see your friends, get some rest, eat……
Good luck!
