My original post was below and not immediately relevant; so I thought I'd add this hopefully helpful prologue. I don't mean to pile on to the OP with anything below the quote, though hopefully he (next semester) and others can learn from his mistakes.
DF's advice is good. Follow it. That's basically how I spent this last two weeks of 1L, albeit with my own (group-made) outlines and my own notes. Also, Nony's advice is also good re tabbing. By each exam, my outline was well-tabbed (my 3M tab budget was probably $20-30/semester).
A finals/dead-week non-exam day for me typically looked like:
Campus by 8:30
Outline an answer to Practice exam question or 2 (not a full exam)
Review model answer and outline as to issues raised by question
Review outline one time through
Lunch
Repeat (possibly with another subject depending on if this was a few days out or the day before the exam, and how I felt about it)
Home by 7:30
Dinner & TV
Look over outline once more
Bed
The morning of each exam, I'd go through my outline one more time and I'd gone through it so many times that if there was some minor detail I couldn't remember (like one element or something), I could have found it within 10 seconds even without the tabs, and could probably tell you where on the page it appeared. I know a lot of people say they never look at their outlines and that if you look at your outlines you're failing, but I often would open my outline to the appropriate page even if I knew the answer. I rarely looked at it other than a quick glance to make sure I'd used the right words or test if there was a similar one that I might confuse it with (e.g. "same transaction or occurrence" vs "same set of operative facts"), but as I was typing it was there and ready.
If you need a study break, consider spending it tabbing (but not too far out, otherwise you might want to modify and reprint your outline); it's a good seemingly mindless way to spend some time, and it actually sneaks some info in.
And as DF said, you likely won't study much in the evening after an exam. That said, if you do feel up to looking at something after a proper cooling off period after an exam, make sure it's another subject! Don't waste any time going back over the subject you took an exam on to see if you got something right. It doesn't matter and takes brain time away from subjects you can actually do something about.
barkschool wrote:To: everyone saying they never read all semester
What have you been doing all year, and did you actually not read anything?
I understand the people who are way behind on the readings. I don't understand the people who never go to class (even 2Ls and 3Ls). What else do you have to do? Reasons I would skip included illness, interviews, or birth of a child (for which I missed 3 classes, 4 classes, and an entire week, respectively, over my 3 years -- I concede that I benefited from good health, compact class schedules, and interviewing locally). Even if I was going to be late, I would still attend class.
This, though I'd add that when I didn't understand what was happening in class, just a followup question after class or that week's office hours always solved it.
flawschoolkid wrote:However, I've never skipped a class if I wasn't interviewing (which my school will generally podcast the class in liue of), and that has generally been enough for me. I've found that 99% of profs don't hide the ball in class - they actually make the ball screaming obvious. If you've paid attention in class and you can't predict what your professor things makes a good exam answer (on the margins that is, no replacement for basic IRAC), then IDK waht the hell you were doing.
Looking a little forward, though, next semester attend class and take notes; IMO this is far more important than keeping up with the reading (although it would benefit you to at least google the cases from the reading before class). Like Nony, my notes were always in outline form. Personally, I used (and still use, for that matter) Word in "Outline" view (not notebook view -- aside from recording, that is worthless). While my outlines were from scratch, large chunks were a pared-down cut-and-paste from my notes.
tl/dr: Follow DF and Nony; and go to class/take notes next semester.