My blogging has suffered in the last couple weeks, and for that I am really, really sorry. With the holidays and finals all at the same time, there just aren’t enough hours in the day.
This week is “reading week” in my law school life. What’s that mean? Well, it means that my school was generous enough to give me an entire week off before exams to study.
Now, I’ll be honest. I don’t follow the traditional study method of law schoolers. Every law school book/professor/2L/3L out there will say that the only way to succeed on a law school exam is to outline… but outlines just don’t work for me.
I am really, really good at memorization. In fact, I kind of have a bit of a photographic memory (genetics are awesome, thanks Grandpa!). So in theory, yes, I could memorize an outline, probably pretty easily. The part that trips me up, though, is that when memorizing an outline, I would be memorizing it in order. Which doesn’t lead for such awesome recall on an exam, because I’d have to go through my entire outline in my head to find what I am looking for (this might not be true, but … I don’t want to risk it).
So what’s my solution? FLASHCARDS. Hundreds of them. Basically, my notes are already in an outline form. So I have been going through my notes, and putting all key terms/ideas/cases on flashcards and then going through the flashcards. Once I’ve got the flashcards memorized in their original order, I shuffle them up & make sure I know them out of order as well. I also have my parents and sisters help me by quizzing me on them. One of my sisters was even kind enough to do the “reverse” flashcard drills with me (ie: reading me the definition & having me tell what term/case it is).
Who knows if this method will work for me on finals or not. It worked pretty well on my midterm exams, so I am hoping for even better success since I am spending much more time actually studying for these bad boys. I’ve also got a killer study schedule laid out. My exams begin Monday (12/13) with Crim. Then I’ve got Civ. Pro. Wednesday (12/15), and Torts on Friday (12/17). Where is Property, you ask? Well. Property is Monday (12/20), which means I’ve got an entire extra weekend to study for my hardest class. Thankfully.
Check out my study schedule (if you care) after the jump.
READING WEEK:
Monday – Crim.
Tuesday – Civ. Pro. (which is open book, so Tuesday I spent all day reading my notes, doing flashcards, and filling in flow charts & definitions into the blank pages of my Rule Book, and tabbing all the appropriate rules.)
Wednesday – Torts
Thursday – Property
Friday – A little bit of everything.
Saturday – Day Off
Sunday – Crim.
EXAM WEEK:
Monday – CRIM EXAM. Civ. Pro. studying in the evening.
Tuesday – Study for Civ. Pro.
Wednesday – Civ. Pro. Exam. Torts studying in the evening.
Thursday – Study for Torts
Friday – TORTS EXAM. Break in the evening.
Saturday & Sunday – Property for 48 hours straight b/c by then I will still probably be completely lost.