Random comments on studying
I will probably get Bs in all of my classes, so 0L readers, please take my comments with a heavy dose of salt.
Comments on Outlining Early
I started outlining recently, as I mentioned in an earlier post. I found it pretty helpful in that it forced me to synthesize concepts that previously floated around my head in no particular pattern. That, in turn, helped me better understand new concepts and place them in context. It also helped me identify areas where I truly needed further explanation, and gave me a good reason to go to office hours (besides to shoot the shit with my professors like many of my more academically-inclined classmates).
Comments on Supplements
I also recently began incorporating supplements into my studying. Initially, after browsing various law student forums and blogs, I got the impression that everyone uses supplements. False. Most of my classmates seem to be limiting their strategy to doing the assigned casebook reading. Unless they all “wake up” soon (or they’ve been lying about their studying), my guess is that the forums and blogs tend to be infested with overachievers, and I actually have less to worry about than I originally thought. I really do think they somewhat exaggerate the usefulness of supplements. Glannon for CivPro and Chirelstein for Contracts (supposedly the end-all-be-all of their respective classes) are only marginally useful. I haven’t gained any tremendous insights that I wouldn’t have gained from reading my casebooks and paying attention in class. Maybe the books better serve students whose professors didn’t write their casebooks?
Comments on Torts and Why I Need a Commercial Outline
I am, however, kind of struggling with my Torts outline. Mostly because in CivPro and Contracts, there appear to be more hard-line rules to follow, rather than wishy washy state-made case law. I attempted to outline this weekend, and ended up with basically a condensed list of case brief categorized by my professor’s syllabus. So I went ahead and ordered a commercial outline (the Crunchtime series). Hopefully it will provide some direction (I will let you know).
Comments on Lawyering
Doesn’t NYU know that creating an extremely vigorous lawyering program while simultaneously making it pass-fail is very counter-intuitive? I know most of my lawyering section feels very torn between our instinctive desire to do well in all classes, and our logical desire to do well in only the classes that are graded and thus determinant of our summer jobs next year.
I think NYU should implement something similar to Columbia (Soleil, feel free to comment) and separate it from substantive classes by having it at the beginning of law school. I know it’s difficult to work on legal research and legal writing before taking any substantive courses, but at the same time, it’s also difficult to give those very important topics sufficient weight when there is pressure to study for classes that are actually graded. Maybe NYU should do a combo-deal, where they devote 2-3 weeks to just lawyering at the beginning of the semester and then reduce it to a once-a-week exercise rather than a trice-a-week exercise during the year. I should really be promoted to dean or something.
Alright, that’s it for now. Sorry I’ve been so crappy at maintaining this blog.
7 Responses to “Random comments on studying”
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I think crunchtime could be helpful in giving you ideas on how to layout your outline. But beyond that, I’m not so sure. I might end up using crunchtime, but I could have given you the full emanuel’s outlines. I have them for all three courses and will never, ever, ever use them.
idwsj - October 1, 2009 at 1:15 am
Really? Why not?
I mean, I don’t think I’m going to use it instead of anything, or rely on it for any substantive purpose. More just to give me an idea how to arrange my thoughts. And I’ve heard that Crunchtime has good diagrams. LOL. I like pictures.
Valentina - October 1, 2009 at 1:39 am
Yeah I like pictures, although I don’t think crunchtime lays them out in a way that’s useful to me (but it can be useful to some). Crunchtime is basically the index of the full outline + pictures.
The regular ones . . . well so much of the information is not that helpful to me. Ditto for E&E’s. I should probably try and sell these on coases.
idwsj - October 1, 2009 at 12:54 pm
I’m not sure what Lawyering is, but I have a feeling it’s a bit different from our 3 week Legal Methods class because we don’t do any research or writing in LM. It’s literally just kind of like a practice course where we start reading cases and discussing them and we can experiment with different studying/note-taking methods before it really matters.
But I think our legal research and writing component is very different from yours…writing class meets once a week for an hour and legal research meets once a week for 50 minutes (but we only have 7 sessions all semester for legal research).
Either way, your system sounds pretty harsh compared with ours. Does it go all year long?
Soleil - October 1, 2009 at 1:35 am
It’s a year-long course, meeting 3x a week (1.5 hour sessions). We also have significant research and writing assignments. I’ve already written an “argument” for a mock case, an attorney letter (with my own research), and we have a complaint due next week (also with our own research). I think we have a major writing assignment coming up in November (I think 10 pages) and an interviewing assignment coming up in October.
I mean, I think it’s great and helpful, but it’s honestly just hard to make time for it when the grading system clearly relegates it to the last priority.
Valentina - October 1, 2009 at 1:43 am
Wow. I’ve only had an argument so far. Sounds like there’s a lot more coming…noooooooooooooooooo
idwsj - October 1, 2009 at 12:52 pm
Our equivalent to your lawyering class is 3/4 a year long (we finish before spring break) and progressively gets more and more complicated. We start out with a simple, closed universe memo the first semester and continue to refine that while most of the class time and assignments are geared to learning research techniques (mandatory westlaw/lexis certification, etc.) and then we have a major exam (that’s pretty much 25% of your grade all year) in the fall where we’re locked in the lecture hall with every single 1L and given a 200page research library and told to use our ALWD manual and pass the test.
Then 2nd semester we have our big open-universe memo and some smaller assignments (client letters, etc.).
Then, there’s the *required* second year equivalent of Lawyering 1, which focuses on appellate things. We’ve written declarations, requests for judicial notice, and a memo of points and authorities so far, as well as given a 10 minute oral argument (it’s week 6). We’ll continue to have oral arguments (increasing in length) and work on our memos this fall, and in the spring we’ll eventually turn in a full-length appellate brief (I think it’s somewhere around 30/40 pages) and do a full on, adversarial oral argument before a panel of local federal court judges at the federal courthouse downtown.
It’s a TON of work and easily takes the most time of all my classes (last year too). However, our classes are graded, so even though it’s credit-lite, it still does affect our GPA.
Sorry for the lengthy comment, but I always find it kind of interesting to see what other law schools do!
Oh, and as for supplements…I think they can be really helpful if you can find a supplement written by your casebook author, or your professor. They often stick all kinds of (more) helpful explanations in their supps than the main text. Last year one of our property professors had written the main supp for property and my professor geared her course to his, so we bought his supp and it literally saved my life. It just depends, though…while some things work for some people (“I loove my E&E!”), other people can’t use them.
Good luck!
Amanda - October 1, 2009 at 3:46 pm