Law School Exams: A Guide to Better Grades is the complete handbook for students seeking to improve their performance in law school. This book offers a concise and practical strategy that can be applied to almost any law school exam, regardless of topic or level. Alex Schimel is a Lecturer-in-Law at the University of Miami and a leading expert on law school academic success. The new edition offers unique insights by reducing the exam format to a series of repeatable steps. It also teaches students how to ¿prepare for exams, instead of preparing for class,¿ with proven time-management and outlining techniques.
Professors Fischl and Paul explain law school exams in ways no one has before, all with an eye toward improving the reader’s performance. The book begins by describing the difference between educational cultures that praise students for “right answers,” and the law school culture that rewards nuanced analysis of ambiguous situations in which more than one approach may be correct. Enormous care is devoted to explaining precisely how and why legal analysis frequently produces such perplexing situations. But the authors don’t stop with mere description. Instead, Getting to Maybe teaches how to excel on law school exams by showing the reader how legal analysis can be brought to bear on examination problems. The book contains hints on studying and preparation that go well beyond conventional advice. The authors also illustrate how to argue both sides of a legal issue without appearing wishy-washy or indecisive. Above all, the book explains why exam questions may generate feelings of uncertainty or doubt about correct legal outcomes and how the student can turn these feelings to his or her advantage. In sum, although the authors believe that no exam guide can substitute for a firm grasp of substantive material, readers who devote the necessary time to learning the law will find this book an invaluable guide to translating learning into better exam performance. “This book should revolutionize the ordeal of studying for law school exams… Its clear, insightful, fun to read, and right on the money.” — Duncan Kennedy, Carter Professor of General Jurisprudence, Harvard Law School “Finally a study aid that takes legal theory seriously… Students who master these lessons will surely write better exams. More importantly, they will also learn to be better lawyers.” — Steven L. Winter, Brooklyn Law School “If you can't spot a 'fork in the law' or a 'fork in the facts' in an exam hypothetical, get this book. If you don’t know how to play 'Czar of the Universe' on law school exams (or why), get this book. And if you do want to learn how to think like a lawyer—a good one—get this book. It's, quite simply, stone cold brilliant.” — Pierre Schlag, University of Colorado School of Law (Law Preview Book Review on The Princeton Review website) Attend a Getting to Maybe seminar! Click here for more information.
One L, Scott Turow's journal of his first year at law school and a best-seller when it was first published in 1977, has gone on to become a virtual bible for prospective law students. Not only does it introduce with remarkable clarity the ideas and issues that are the stuff of legal education; it brings alive the anxiety and competiveness--with others and, even more, with oneself--that set the tone in this crucible of character building. Each September, a new crop of students enter Harvard Law School to begin an intense, often grueling, sometimes harrowing year of introduction to the law. Turow's group of One Ls are fresh, bright, ambitious, and more than a little daunting. Even more impressive are the faculty. Will the One Ls survive? Will they excel? Will they make the Law Review, the outward and visible sign of success in this ultra-conservative microcosm? With remarkable insight into both his fellows and himself, Turow leads us through the ups and downs, the small triumphs and tragedies of the year, in an absorbing and thought-provoking narrative that teaches the reader not only about law school and the law but about the human beings who make them what they are. In the new afterword for this edition of One L, the author looks back on law school from the perspective of ten years' work as a lawyer and offers some suggestions for reforming legal education.
The Strategies and Techniques for Teaching Series is intended to help you, as a new law teacher, prepare for your first semesters in the classroom. It begins at the preliminary stages of planning a new course, and takes you all the way to writing and grading your final exam. The authors offer experience and insight to the tasks of coming up with teaching objectives, choosing your book, crafting your syllabus, and creating a classrom atmosphere that is conducive to learning. The day-to-day teaching techniques in this primer for new (and not so new) professors will prepare you to successfully field students' questions, teach legal analysis, and make the most of today's pedagogy and technology to support your teaching.
Legal Reasoning, Research, and Writing for International Graduate Students, Fifth Edition, helps international students understand and approach legal reasoning and writing the way law students and attorneys do in the United States. With concise and clear text, Professor Nedzel introduces the unique and important features of the American legal system and American law schools. Using clear instruction, examples, visual aids, and practice exercises, she teaches practical lawyering skills with sensitivity to the challenges of ESL students. New to the Fifth Edition: Streamlined presentation makes the material even more accessible. Chapters are short, direct, and to the point. Five chapters on reasoning and writing, including exam skills, office memos, and rewriting. Full chapters on contract drafting and scholarly writing. New flowcharts provide a concise, visual overview for each chapter. Citation coverage updated to new 21st edition of The Bluebook. Simplified examples and exercises. Three thoroughly revised chapters on legal research, including non-fee legal research and technological changes in the practice of U.S. law. Professors and student will benefit from: Comparative perspective informs readers about the unique features of American law as compared to civil law, Islamic law, and Asian traditions. Explanations of practical skills assume no former knowledge of the American legal system. U.S. law school necessary skills explained immediately: case briefing, creating a course outline, time management, reading citations, and writing answers to hypothetical exam questions. Short, lucid chapters that reiterate major points to aid comprehension. Clear introductions to writing hypothetical-based exams, legal memoranda, contract drafting and scholarly writing. An integrated approach to proper citation format, with explanation and instruction provided in context. Discussion of plagiarism and U.S. law school honor codes. Practical skill-building exercises in each chapter. Research exercises are primarily Internet-based Charts and summaries that are useful learning aids and reference tools
With 54 essay questions and accompanying sample answers, The PPE: The Skill of Analysis is the ideal study tool for law students because it provides the most utility for the money spent. First-year students nationwide benefit from this book because they do not need to purchase six different supplements to practice their skills because The PPE includes nine questions for each of the core subjects of Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Contracts, Criminal Law, Real Property, and Torts. The PPE also ensures students can effectively use the book throughout the semester. Most supplements randomly combine topics for each subject and students must wait until reading week to practice their exam-taking skills because the questions include topics from the beginning and the end of the course. The PPE strategically pairs commonly tested topics and presents the topics in the order they often appear on the syllabus. Finally, the book avoids overwhelming students by focusing on a specific learning objective. Instead, the goal is to improve analysis, one of the most important skills in the legal profession, with concrete steps on how to execute the book's advice in real-life situations. The PPE includes a legal-analysis template, active-learning worksheets that walk students through the three-step process of analysis, and sample answers that use IRAC, headers, and paragraphs to mirror what the students should strive to achieve on their exams.
If you: - Feel overwhelmed by the breadth of law tested on the bar exam...- Think there isn't enough time to get it all done...- Are unsure whether you should hire a tutor, use a commercial prep company, or self-study...- Don't know what you should be doing...- Worry you're not doing enough...- Want to find the easiest way to pass the bar...- Have decision fatigue about choosing between all the bar prep companies, workshops, tools, books, cheat sheets, outlines, etc. to choose from...- Hemorrhage money to buy all things bar prep...- Never see your family or friends...- Feel alone in your struggle...- Think you'll never learn it all...- Feel like there's never a moment where the weight of the bar exam isn't bearing down on you...- Have constant anxiety about what hangs in the balance of you passing the bar exam...- Struggle to juggle bar prep and everything else in life...- Worry about failing...- Worry about failing, AGAIN...This is the book I wish someone had written when I was where you are right now. In short, this book is for you
Legal Analysis: 100 Exercises for Mastery: Practice for Every Law Student offers 100 paced exercises to sharpen students' legal analysis skills. Professors will find: * A bank of 100 legal analysis exercises at the ready, whenever students' analysis skills need attention or refinement * Exercises adaptable to any paradigm, that increase the depth of students' writing * Varied assignments that contain thoughtful sample answers and helpful annotations * Learning objectives and outcomes for each chapter * Assessment and grading rubric for each chapter * Go-to material ready for any class period * 100 exercises that can be used as is or expanded to fit professors' preferences * Sample annotated answers for 50 of the exercises that their students can use to assess their own performance * A Teacher's Manual for professors with sample annotated answers for the remaining 50 exercises and helpful variations on exercises * Online resources for ready access to authority Students will receive: * Tools students need to develop a keen understanding of rule-based and analogical reasoning
Peter T. Wendel has taught academic success workshops at over thirty-five law schools throughout the country. In Deconstructing Legal Analysis: A 1L Primer, he provides a variety of time-tested techniques-including a unique model for visualizing legal analysis-to teach students how to think like lawyers and take law school exams. Deconstructing Legal Analysis: A 1L Primer features: a unique, visual pedagogical method that illustrates a relational analysis of facts, rules, and public policy an interactive approach that consistently encourages students to write down their answers to carefully guided questions a great teaching case, Pierson v. Post, showing how a layperson reads a case as compared to how a lawyer would read the same case useful templates and methods for legal analysis and essay-exam writing, such as IRAC and IRRAC exam-taking tips and guidance that emphasize flexibility, rather than a formulaic approach If experience is the best teacher, then Deconstructing Legal Analysis is an essential for academic success in law school.
