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[romothesavior]

thoughts on googling cases for a brief before/after you read them?

That's pretty much the extent of my prep for property.

[Stanford4Me]

thoughts on googling cases for a brief before/after you read them?

I take some notes in my book, then look up a brief to fill in the stuff that's not 100% essential (facts, proc. pos.), and then maybe I'll throw some rules that I found in the case in there too to make it my own. Saves time.

[traehekat]

good, glad im not the only one lol.

[romothesavior]

good, glad im not the only one lol.

So much of it just depends on the profs. Everyone said that before LS and I have found it to be SO true. My profs are just so wildly different in every meaningful way... personalities, ages, teaching styles, backgrounds, preferences, exams, etc. As such, I prep and study for their classes differently, and I imagine the way I prep and study for their exams will differ wildly as well.

So for torts, I read every word and focus closely on facts, because our prof is a stickler and will tear students apart in class if they are off-base. For property, our prof will accept just about any rational string of words that comes out of a student's mouth as the correct answer, so I don't feel like prepping for his class is a big deal (I just Google the cases in case I get called on and I read the supplement so I understand the material).For Ks, my prep falls somewhere in the middle... I do the readings because we have weekly quizzes, but I just skim and get the main idea because he assigns a shitload of pages each night.

Bottom line: do what works for you in each class. As long as you feel like you can follow along during the class period and you're getting the material, you'll be fine. Don't feel like you've gotta "keep up with the Joneses," because what works for your peers may not work for you and may end up being nothing but added work.

[stocksly33]

wow. tonight we had our reading on joinder, pleader, etc. We had like 15 rules to read along with assigned reading. The intro bit generally stating what the rules do was cake... but after reading like the third actual rule (in their entirety), i started going cross-eyed and throwing shit. I'm hoping Glannon can work it out.

[Bustang]

wow. tonight we had our reading on joinder, pleader, etc. We had like 15 rules to read along with assigned reading. The intro bit generally stating what the rules do was cake... but after reading like the third actual rule (in their entirety), i started going cross-eyed and throwing shit. I'm hoping Glannon can work it out.

Glannon's bit on joinder of parties/claims (13, 14, 18, 19, 20, 24) is very helpful.

The State Farm case I just read about interpleader (Rule 22) makes me want to shoot my face, however.

[Melkaba]

good, glad im not the only one lol.

So much of it just depends on the profs. Everyone said that before LS and I have found it to be SO true. My profs are just so wildly different in every meaningful way... personalities, ages, teaching styles, backgrounds, preferences, exams, etc. As such, I prep and study for their classes differently, and I imagine the way I prep and study for their exams will differ wildly as well.

So for torts, I read every word and focus closely on facts, because our prof is a stickler and will tear students apart in class if they are off-base. For property, our prof will accept just about any rational string of words that comes out of a student's mouth as the correct answer, so I don't feel like prepping for his class is a big deal (I just Google the cases in case I get called on and I read the supplement so I understand the material).For Ks, my prep falls somewhere in the middle... I do the readings because we have weekly quizzes, but I just skim and get the main idea because he assigns a shitload of pages each night.

Bottom line: do what works for you in each class. As long as you feel like you can follow along during the class period and you're getting the material, you'll be fine. Don't feel like you've gotta "keep up with the Joneses," because what works for your peers may not work for you and may end up being nothing but added work.

WUSTL Section D or F student, I see.

But yeah, I do agree. It really comes down to the teaching styles of your professors and exactly how much they want you to get out of each lesson. Since I have not bought a supplement yet, however, I go by the approach of close-reading + briefing + google/Lexis brief as a refresher or as an intro. While it's not required by any means to closely read the cases for two out of three of the main courses due to how the professors don't look for such close interpretations in students, and it's definitely not required to brief all of them, I feel like this method works for me. I personally treat finding all the nuances as a kind of game (even though it mostly results in a lot more time spent than otherwise, but I'm fine with this method). If one simply just searches for briefs of google, then that's no better or worse than other methods if it works for you.

Edit: Instead of double-posting, I do have something to contribute to the entire stress part.

Man, contracts quiz was kinda of a de-moralizer. I felt pretty awesome going into it, under the presumption that the stuff covered will be from the previous quiz up to the stuff we had to prepare for the current class. ... But half of the questions were stuff covered on like the first and second day of class (and one question was a massive trick question; funny in hindsight, but also funny for the fact that almost the entire class exclaimed "...WHAT?!" when the professor read the answer. Given how badly I bombed (and seemingly a fair amount of people, but I shouldn't use that as an excuse for my poor performance/lack of preparation/whatever caused me to misstep), this is actually the first time where I felt absolutely frustrated and hopeless with something in LS. I know it's just a quiz, but man.

Eh. This is definitely going to be a night filled mostly with video games to relieve frustration.

[MURPH]

thoughts on googling cases for a brief before/after you read them?

Google before reading the case. Don't bother even looking at the whole brief. Just read the Rule or rule of law or whatever they call it. After reading about five or six of them, write down a summary of what you think makes sense. Then read it. After reading it double check to make sure the rule makes sense. Then add the rule to your outline.
This is the most efficent way to study in my opinion.

[romothesavior]

WUSTL Section D or F student, I see.

Perhaps. Do you feel the same with respect to how different our professors are? I think it also sucks that none of the 2Ls or 3Ls have had them, meaning we are kinda on our own.

And do we know each other?

Man, contracts quiz was kinda of a de-moralizer. I felt pretty awesome going into it, under the presumption that the stuff covered will be from the previous quiz up to the stuff we had to prepare for the current class. ... But half of the questions were stuff covered on like the first and second day of class (and one question was a massive trick question; funny in hindsight, but also funny for the fact that almost the entire class exclaimed "...WHAT?!" when the professor read the answer. Given how badly I bombed (and seemingly a fair amount of people, but I shouldn't use that as an excuse for my poor performance/lack of preparation/whatever caused me to misstep), this is actually the first time where I felt absolutely frustrated and hopeless with something in LS. I know it's just a quiz, but man.

I doubt you did as bad you as you think you did. I'm guessing 6 or so was the median. And keep in mind that he drops our lowest score and we have plenty more quizzes to go. But yeah, he was definitely looking to trip people up. Which one in particular were you referring to? Question 5 really made me , mostly because I knew the answer but I didn't stop and really think about what the question was getting at. Also, WTF was up with question 2? I got it right but it was a pure guess... I had no idea WTF was up with that one.

I feel I was well-prepared, but for me it just came down to getting tripped up by his wording or rushing to a conclusion after reading the question. I don't feel like I need to beat myself up for how I did... I just need to slow down and focus on the questions.

[Oban]

Yeah my section at Wustl sounds completely different. The amount of work per professor varies widely though, along with their teaching styles. In K i have pages of notes, kind of in an outline form. In property i just keep writing down "policy" in my class notebook.

[traehekat]

Probably can ask the professor this, but I'll ask you guys too. We didn't talk much about defense of a third person in torts, and we really just have the Restatement to go on, which is the "reasonable belief" approach, which comes into play with mistaken defense of other problem. Glannon notes there is a minority view that, regardless of reasonable belief, the actor steps into the shoes of the third party and can only use ... blah blah blah. Question is, given that we haven't discussed this minority view and it wasn't part of any assigned reading, should I include it in my outline?

[Melkaba]

Perhaps. Do you feel the same with respect to how different our professors are? I think it also sucks that none of the 2Ls or 3Ls have had them, meaning we are kinda on our own.

And do we know each other?

Yeah, it definitely feels like our sections are kinda at a disadvantage in this regard. I guess some part of that ambiguity is mitigated simply due to how the professors for property and torts are at least fairly straight forward with everything. Contracts is another beast entirely, at this point.

And as for the other question, perhaps, but maybe not. PM me about that one.

I doubt you did as bad you as you think you did. I'm guessing 6 or so was the median. And keep in mind that he drops our lowest score and we have plenty more quizzes to go. But yeah, he was definitely looking to trip people up. Which one in particular were you referring to? Question 5 really made me , mostly because I knew the answer but I didn't stop and really think about what the question was getting at. Also, WTF was up with question 2? I got it right but it was a pure guess... I had no idea WTF was up with that one.

I feel I was well-prepared, but for me it just came down to getting tripped up by his wording or rushing to a conclusion after reading the question. I don't feel like I need to beat myself up for how I did... I just need to slow down and focus on the questions.

I guessed for the second question. I got it right, but I still don't understand why that's the case even after searching through the notes. Yeah, I definitely could have saved myself on at least two of the questions if I slowed down a little bit and not allow myself to get caught up in his wording (for instance, I'm sure I could have gotten the illusionary promise question right if I had noticed the "you" part of the question). Question 5 (which I'm assuming was the reliance and consideration question) was evil. I pretty much thought to myself "Well... this case was decided through estoppel and not consideration.. but why in the world would he put consideration in quotations and why would he include 'sufficient'?" For a quiz that requires really close reading, putting consideration in quotations or not like that really changes the entire meaning of the question. The main problem here is separating tricky and precise wording from mere grammatical mistakes that the prof makes from time to time.

[GATORTIM]

I hope at least 75% of my section is fkn up civ pro worse than I am

[beach_terror]

Crim midterm on Wednesday. Holllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllly crap.

Working my ass off for it though.

[TTH]

Anyone else have a hard time focusing in their last class of the day? I have Civ Pro four days a week at 3:55 and I swear most times I wind up playing flash games. I hate it, but it's like I completely fog over and am incapable of paying attention.

[beach_terror]

Man, it feels good finishing up an outline that you've been obsessive in writing/re-writing over and over to include everything that seems important.... and then manage to memorize pretty much all the important points of law in the process.

Now, to the practice tests (and possibly another read through GTM).

[inchoate_con]

thoughts on googling cases for a brief before/after you read them?

Google before reading the case. Don't bother even looking at the whole brief. Just read the Rule or rule of law or whatever they call it. After reading about five or six of them, write down a summary of what you think makes sense. Then read it. After reading it double check to make sure the rule makes sense. Then add the rule to your outline.
This is the most efficent way to study in my opinion.

Why not just read the head notes in westlaw(next)? Nice succinct summaries with links to the relevant discussion in the opinion. Wish I knew that before spending way too much on supplements.

[Stanford4Me]

I just found out people in my section have started memorizing the U.C.C. . . . umm . . . yeah.

[romothesavior]

thoughts on googling cases for a brief before/after you read them?

Google before reading the case. Don't bother even looking at the whole brief. Just read the Rule or rule of law or whatever they call it. After reading about five or six of them, write down a summary of what you think makes sense. Then read it. After reading it double check to make sure the rule makes sense. Then add the rule to your outline.
This is the most efficent way to study in my opinion.

Why not just read the head notes in westlaw(next)? Nice succinct summaries with links to the relevant discussion in the opinion. Wish I knew that before spending way too much on supplements.

Westlaw headnotes are good, but they're not that helpful for preparing for class. They usually hit on a couple of different issues and can be way too specific for prepping for class. Online casebriefs and Wikipedia are much better because they focus in on the main reason the case was assigned to you for that specific class.

[inchoate_con]

Short on time, I got burned using a single case from a Google search, so now, I use the casenote briefs. However, as I've become more proficient at reading the cases, headnotes are working comparably from review. I'm such a slow fucking reader, I thought I was retarded for awhile. Anyhow, the obvious answer to whomever asked the question, "use what works for you."

[Amy wineBerry]

Anyone else have a hard time focusing in their last class of the day? I have Civ Pro four days a week at 3:55 and I swear most times I wind up playing flash games. I hate it, but it's like I completely fog over and am incapable of paying attention.

I feel your pain. I have contracts at 2:30 on MW and although I like the subject and class, at 3 o'clock, my brain checks out.

[Melkaba]

I just found out people in my section have started memorizing the U.C.C. . . . umm . . . yeah.

That's.... pretty intense.

[inchoate_con]

I just found out people in my section have started memorizing the U.C.C. . . . umm . . . yeah.

That's.... pretty intense.

and a giant waste of time...

[Ersatz Haderach]

I just found out people in my section have started memorizing the U.C.C. . . . umm . . . yeah.

That's.... pretty intense.

and a giant waste of time...

I felt gunnerish importing it into Onenote...why memorize it?

[romothesavior]

I am aware that the UCC exists, and I think that is probably all I need to know about it for purposes of my Ks class.