Strategies for Success

• Keep a calendar
  • Identify your most productive times of day; plan the most academically challenging tasks for these times.
  • Enter all activities, from school responsibilities to recreation into your calendar. Stick to your calendar.
  • Avoid merely entering "study time" on your calendar. Be specific: list goals for each hour, such as the casebook pages you plan to read or problems you plan to complete.
  • Plan study breaks to reward yourself for study goal completion.
  • Weekly, if not daily, review your study plan and modify it in light of your accomplishments.
• Develop self-discipline in your personal life and seek ways to let that discipline extend into your professional life.
• Work with a partner/mentor who will hold you accountable for the items entered on your schedule, especially for the first few weeks after you begin your schedule.

• Appreciate your learning preferences; adapt your study environment to your preferences.
• Appreciate the target of your learning: legal rule structures that are derived from legal concepts; know both the structures and their underlying concepts.
• Use the headings and subheadings in the casebook table of contents or course syllabus as a note-taking template for pre-class, during class, and post-class notes.
• Before you begin studying a topic, review what you already know about the topic.
• If the topic you are studying is foreign to you, consider pre-reading on the topic in secondary sources such as Examples and Explanations or Gilbert Law Summaries before reading about the topic in the case book.
• See the notes listed below under Building Reading Comprehension for suggestions on how to actively engage in the material you are reading.
• During class, listen attentively. Avoid trying to transcribe every word; participate in the discussion.
• During class, take notes on the following:
  • Review points the professor makes from preceding classes.
  • Summary points the professor makes at the end of class.
  • Hypotheticals or other questions the professor poses during class.
  • Try to get a sense of how the professor defines the legal concepts and rule structures at issue.
  • Edit your case brief to reflect an accurate understanding of the case, its holding, and its significance.
• Review your pre-class and during class notes within 24 hours of class; identify 2-3 main ideas from the class experience.
• Review your notes on a weekly basis, synthesize material within topics. Synthesis should result in rule structures and/or concept development for each topic you study.
• As you complete the study of a topic, synthesize your pre-class, during class, and post-class notes into a workable outline.
• Outlines have many forms, including charts, graphs, tables, flowcharts or time lines, as well as the traditional numerically developed outline; use an outline form that best captures what you need to know from the information.
• Consider creating flashcards for concept or case retention.
• After you have outlined a topic, check your understanding with practice questions (essay and multiple choice).
• Utilize a study group to check your understanding and progress with material.
• Meet with your professors regularly to address questions.
• If possible, get written feedback on at least one essay response from each professor administering an essay exam; revise the response until it is of highest quality.
• If you are an auditory learner, consider using audio-based bar review materials.
• If you are a verbal kinesthetic learner, work with other students to voice what you have just learned.

Build Reading Comprehension

• Knowing the context of your reading will build comprehension.
  • Appreciate that you will generally read material to build understanding of legal rule structures or legal concepts. Make such understanding the target of your reading.
  • Gather context from the casebook table of contents, the course syllabus, notes that precede cases you will read and notes that follow the cases you will read.
  • Know what you should gain from your reading; if you are reading cases, consider what purpose the cases should serve before you start reading them. If you are reading excerpts from law review articles or other sources, prior to reading them, anticipate how the sources will add to your understanding of legal rule structures or legal concepts.
• Actively engage in your reading.
  • If you highlight, paraphrase in the margin what you have highlighted.
  • Analogize the text to other materials you have read.
  • Pose questions of the text; seek answers from the text.
  • Make predictions about the text; validate those predictions as you read.
  • As you read connect the text with your purpose for reading the text.
  • Evaluate the author's conclusion in light of your knowledge and experience.
  • Anticipate questions your professor may ask about the material.
• Use a case briefing strategy to capture, summarize, and retell the essence of the text.
• Attempt to reduce any case you have read to a holding statement of the case that captures the rule and dispositive facts that are relevant to your purpose for reading the case.
• If you read a line of cases on a single topic, after you have reduced each case to a holding statement, compare and contrast the case holdings; if possible synthesize the cases; look for what they cumulatively state about the legal topic you have studied.

Build Working Memory

• Once you have outlined a legal topic or rule structure and tested your knowledge with practice problems, commit the topic to memory.
• Use chunking or grouping, mnemonics, and rehearsal to assist in your memorization of the material.
• Studies show that as you broaden the capacity of your working/short term memory, you also deepen your ability to solve problems. Actively memorize information needed for class.

• Exercise
  • Get at least 20 minutes of aerobic exercise three times weekly
• Eat right
  • Seek a balanced diet; moderate sugar and caffeine intake
• Sleep right
  • Stick to a regular sleep schedule; shoot for 6-8 hours nightly
• Anticipate and prepare for stressful situations
  • On a daily basis, practice relaxation techniques, such as meditation, deep breathing, self-talk, and visualization
  • Make such techniques part of the regular routine of your day
• When you find yourself in a stressful situation
  • Employ the relaxation technique you have practiced at least several hours before the event.
  • If exams are stressful situations for you, once you are in the exam room, before beginning the exam, employ a relaxation strategy. If you cannot gain control over your thoughts, consider leaving the exam room for 1-2 minutes and getting some breaths of fresh air; consider some brief aerobic exercise (jumping jacks, sit ups, push ups) to help you mentally focus. Then return to the exam room and get started.
• Keep a healthy perspective
  • Do not allow grades to define you; do not allow the expectations of others to define you.
  • Develop a support network of friends or family members that are not in the legal community.
  • Develop a support network of friends that are in the legal community. For example, seek mentor relationships with individuals who teach or practice in areas of law you are interested in.
  • Find ways to give back to your community, through church, civic, or other organizations.