law school lessons: week 7
Well, week 7 is in the books. We’re nearing the halfway point of 1L fall semester. I know a lot more than I did seven weeks ago, that’s fo sho. But the thought of exams coming up in less than two months now… [please hold for major panic attack]
Seems like the only class with anything exciting going on any more is CivPro. Take this last week, for instance. We only had three days of CivPro because the professor was out of town, but it culminated in a real, live Battle of the Big Talkers. It was like THE CLASH OF THE TITANS!!!
Somehow our discussion about personal jurisdiction devolved into… polluted drinking water? You can’t possibly know just how epic it was unless you were there.
Sidebar: Is it weird that I remember this movie, while most of you probably weren’t even born when it came out in 1981? [cue midlife crisis]
So I’m thinking I’d better start outlining soon, right? I’ve read lots of advice posts all around these tangled intertubez, and I think I’m about ready to get started. Especially since I did absolutely nothing productive this whole weekend. Well, by productive I guess I mean law-school-related. I was, in fact, exceedingly productive at Talbot’s and Dillard’s.
If you’re thinking about outlining, or maybe you’ve already started but you’re not sure if you’re doing it quite right, check out some of these links. Also, if you have any other questions or advice to offer re outlining (or a helpful link that I missed — apologies), please stick them in the comments.
- Outlining 101 — Thanks, But No Thanks
- Intro to Outlining — Fearfully Optimistic
- When to Outline — The Shark, courtesy of Dennis Jansen
- Perils & Pitfalls of the Outline part 1 and part 1.5 — older but still relevant posts from Law School Survivor
- general law school advice (including outlining) here, here, and here.
Finally, if you’ve had it up to here with the über-anal Bluebook citation rules, you’ll appreciate this Courtoon.
Tags: 1L, bluebook, civpro, law school, law school lessons, outlining
Count me in as an advocate of the “outline all at once” theory. I recommend waiting until about 6 weeks out from the first exam. Then sit down and outline the entire class in one sitting. For the One L class this should not take more than about 8 hours if you focus.
The reason to do the outline for each class in one sitting is that this gives you the birds eye view of the class that you need to start prepping for exams well. Plus, it tends to persuade you that there is not that much material that will actually be addressed in the exam. And when you boil it all down, there isn’t that much to know for any particular semester.
I also reject the idea that a long or dense outline is a good outline. All my One L outlines were 15 pages of bullet points, max. As you know I discuss in the book my theory about outlining and how to do it effectively to not simply survive your One L exams, but to beat the curve.
Gary Young
Author, Law School Ninja: An Unconventional Strategy for Outsmarting Law School
soooo what’d you buy????
Totally agree with Gary on the bird’s eye view of outlining, it’s a great opportunity to review everything that you’ve “ahem, *cough*” learned through the semester, but I would like to add some additional advice.
Traditional outlines did not cut it for me. I took some amazing workshops through my law school on outlining differently. The workshops instead, called them “analytical templates”. Instead of outlining, you create a checklist to go through each of the major topics of the course (i.e., Statute of Frauds, Proximate Cause, Personal Jurisdiction, etc.)
You set it up as:
What’s the purpose of this rule?
What’s the common law rule?
What is the effect of this rule?
What are the required elements?
Are there any exceptions?
etc.
This style totally worked for me (although I know it might not work for everyone) and while it took a little bit of time and effort to set up, it saved me time in the long run because this style worked for me as opposed to traditional outlining where you include specific case rules, etc.! As a result, I raised my grades a whole letter grade in the spring semester and I beat out a lot of my section mates in the rankings who had higher grades after the fall.
Anyways, just my two cents, but traditional outlining isn’t for everyone, or maybe just me
By the way, love your blog as always lawschoolninja!!!
Hey, I remember Clash of the Titans too. Non-traditional law students FTW.
I foolishly started outlines before mock mid-terms. I quickly learned that my outlines, as originally conceived, were worthless. I’m thankful that I have a chance to revise well in advance of the finals.
I loved Clash of the Titans!!!