Law Professors, Law Schools

‘Tis The Season To Chill Out And Focus, 1Ls

Law school exams are mental challenges. This is how you can defeat them.

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There comes a time in the course of a 1L’s life in which things get pretty intense. We’ll call that period finals time, first semester. Finals time, much like the December holiday season, starts in mid October and carries on through December. At the end of finals time, much like the end of the holidays, students exhaustedly put their books, flashcards, and notes away, getting ready for the new year.

Handling the season isn’t easy. There are some traps students fall into that are not helpful for studying. For example, you might listen to what peers are telling you about the great things they are doing by way finals prep. For them, what they are doing might be good, or it might be bad. However, one thing will be certain: You will panic. You will feel you aren’t doing enough to study. No good will come out of this conversation.

Or you might talk to people outside your study group who are trying very hard to learn the material by “teaching it” to you. Of course, it COULD be a trap. It could be the student really doesn’t know what he or she is talking about.   Students understand things differently. Some students, trying to clear their heads about a concept by explaining it to you, may in fact get a firmer grip on the material all the while confusing you. Their learning may evolve, but you’ll be stuck with their last pronouncement.

Or you might buy two tons of study materials, then decide you’re too stupid because you can’t assimilate all the information in all the books you’ve purchased.   But learning is not by osmosis.   Many times, students buy materials as security blankets when what they really need to do is go carefully over the material assigned in class. More is not necessarily better.

Finally, all the overwhelming stress and frustration about all this will manifest in negative self-talk. I’m going to fail. All the while, you try to study with that thought in your head. You have now become your own worst enemy on the final exam.

These are all practices that will dog you, taking away from the emotional energy you need to prepare for finals. Instead, take a positive, non-fear-based approach to finals.

    1. Talk to your professor about course expectations. Professors grade differently, although we are testing for certain things. See this interview with me about grading. See what your professor believes to be a good exam. If he or she posts sample answers, scour them. If you can’t figure out why they are good, ask the professor.
    2. Write your own outline of the course. As I mentioned in this post on how to study, you have to put the course together in your own mind. Using some else’s outline doesn’t do that, nor does accessing commercial outlines. It isn’t just the reading of the material, it is the writing and articulation that instills that knowledge into your brain.
    3. Take any and all practice exams. The difference between practice exams and memorization is the difference between being told how to do something and doing it. Here, let me tell you how to hit a home run in baseball. Okay, you’ve read all the material? Good, now go up to bat and hit that home run!   Yeah, it doesn’t work that way in baseball, and there is no reason you should think that it works that way in law. If your professor has old exams on file, walk through them, treating each like a real life exam. Practice makes permanent. Practice perfects. Practice makes for habit. Most importantly, practice increases your confidence when you’re taking the real thing.
    4. Take 5 when you’re getting freaked out. If you’re fighting anxiety, don’t think that you can just power through. All those “what ifs” will come in your head and you won’t be able to focus on the material, which will increase your anxiety even more. If you start hearing those “what ifs,” or feel other signs you’re panicking and not focused, take a break. Go for a walk. Exercise. Meditate. All those things will help kill your anxiety.
    5. Don’t spend 20 hours in the library. Just because your library has late hours doesn’t mean you need to keep the librarians company. While I love books, it’s kind of depressing. You need air. You need sunlight. You also need to stay the heck away from your peers, who will tell you those harrowing stories of staying the night in the library and using the bathroom sink to shower.
    6. Be mindful of what type of exam it is, and adjust your studying accordingly. For example, if you have a closed-book, closed-notes exam, you might spend more time memorizing than you would on an open-book exam. You might make some flashcards and otherwise commit rules of law to memory. In an open-book exam, you just need to be able to remember where to access the rule. In BOTH cases, you need to know how to apply the rule.
    7. When you get the exam, READ IT. Did you read it? Good. READ IT AGAIN. And AGAIN.   When you read material, you learn it in layers. Sometimes your brain might fill in things that aren’t really there. Thus, you have to be careful to see what is really in the exam, and not what your brain is filling in. Most important is that you answer the question fully. Many times, professors will ask you a specific question, and students will launch into the issue-spotting fun normal to essay exams, never answering the question. That can be frustrating.
    8. Watch what you eat and drink.   For example, when I was studying for the bar exam, I didn’t even notice that I could fall fast asleep after a triple espresso. The reason was that I was sucking down so much caffeine I was becoming immune. That pretty much meant my plan to caffeine up before the exam was doomed to failure, and I was exhausted through most of it. Similarly, there are some stress-reducing foods you should think about eating. Sugaring up is a bad idea during exams, because you’ll crash. The same is true of drinking too much caffeine. Also, you might be increasing the chances of you getting sick.
    9. Make your studying count. If you’re in a study group, keep distractions down to a minimum. Often times study groups can transform into complaint sessions, gossip groups, or other unhelpful (and toxic) activities. If studying in a group, have an agenda. Maybe assign problems that everyone will go over together. The benefit of a study group is to learn from each other.
    10. If you have test anxiety, prepare for that. Get to the exam room early. Familiarize yourself with the room. Avoid talking to people. Meditate so your mind can be calm. If you find yourself panicked about being stuck, take a moment, take a deep breath, and then approach the problem again. For example, if you’re trying to remember, but can’t, whether to take the gun and leave the cannoli or leave the gun and take the cannoli, then you need calm yourself in order to successfully access that memory.
    11. Exercise and sleep. Not at the same time.   Exercise will help you stay physically at your best. Sleep is when all that information gets processed in your brain. It is important to get sleep not only on the night before the exam, but throughout the entire time you’re studying.

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Law school exams are mental challenges. They do not just assess whether you can master a subject matter. They assess if you can master your own inner demons, be patient with yourself, and deal with stressful circumstances. The practice of law can be very stressful.

Lastly, remember my mantra: This too, shall pass.

LawProfBlawg is an anonymous professor at a top 100 law school. You can see more of his musings here and on Twitter (@lawprofblawg). Email him at [email protected].

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