1Ls: What are you changing for next semester? Forum

[apper123]

For those having issues with discipline (such as being on the internet in class):

This sounds so stupid, but it worked for me. Say I wanted to get up early on a Saturday and get to school by 9 AM to do some work or wanted to stay off the internet in class but didn't want to switch to pen and paper... I'd go to one of my roommates and hand him a 20 dollar bill. I told him if I am not at school by 9 AM or jump on the internet in class, he can keep the 20 dollars. I emphasize to him to not offer me back the 20 under any circumstances and to not feel bad if I tell him to keep it.

It's sad that I had to do that, but especially when it came to dragging myself out of bed early on a Saturday morning it was really, really effective. I never lost my 20 dollars.

My wife is my roommate and she already takes all of my money anyway.

Any other ideas?

-Give her a cattle prod.
-Tell her she gets to use it to wake you up if you aren't out of bed by 8 AM.
-Forget to do the dishes the evening before.
-?????????????
-Law Review

[Bankhead]

Next semester I plan to do well on the exams.

[Inygma]

For those having issues with discipline (such as being on the internet in class):

This sounds so stupid, but it worked for me. Say I wanted to get up early on a Saturday and get to school by 9 AM to do some work or wanted to stay off the internet in class but didn't want to switch to pen and paper... I'd go to one of my roommates and hand him a 20 dollar bill. I told him if I am not at school by 9 AM or jump on the internet in class, he can keep the 20 dollars. I emphasize to him to not offer me back the 20 under any circumstances and to not feel bad if I tell him to keep it.

It's sad that I had to do that, but especially when it came to dragging myself out of bed early on a Saturday morning it was really, really effective. I never lost my 20 dollars.

I'm scared of falling into browsing the web 24/7 during class. I do this every day/every class in Undergrad already.

My handwriting is horrible and I type way faster then I write, so I need to use my computer. I am thinking of just disabling my wireless internet while in class (I get my emails on my phone anyway).

[ihatelaw]

For those having issues with discipline (such as being on the internet in class):

This sounds so stupid, but it worked for me. Say I wanted to get up early on a Saturday and get to school by 9 AM to do some work or wanted to stay off the internet in class but didn't want to switch to pen and paper... I'd go to one of my roommates and hand him a 20 dollar bill. I told him if I am not at school by 9 AM or jump on the internet in class, he can keep the 20 dollars. I emphasize to him to not offer me back the 20 under any circumstances and to not feel bad if I tell him to keep it.

It's sad that I had to do that, but especially when it came to dragging myself out of bed early on a Saturday morning it was really, really effective. I never lost my 20 dollars.

I'm scared of falling into browsing the web 24/7 during class. I do this every day/every class in Undergrad already.

My handwriting is horrible and I type way faster then I write, so I need to use my computer. I am thinking of just disabling my wireless internet while in class (I get my emails on my phone anyway).

i found class to be surprisingly pointless about 95% of the time. the key is to learn how to hear when the 5% that matters starts so that you can switch from gchat/blog reader to onenote.

[macattaq]

Exactly. Of course, only grades will tell whether that is a successful tactic or not.

[stab master arson]

I learned too late in the semester to eat lunch at least 90 minutes before my afternoon class (property).

Full stomach + freehold estates and future interests = one month wasted catching up on all the stuff you missed while you were nodding off.

[lishi]

One piece of advice from someone who's been there, stay motivated! It sounds so easy but it's not. Every semester you'll lose a little bit of motivation and it can bring you down. You'll notice that most of the students in your class will stop doing certain study techniques or what not because they are just getting more lazy. Don't let that be you!!

[ezpar]

I finished up all of my class reading about 2 weeks before the semester ended. Also, finishing outlining early and focusing on practice exams was key (I hope - we'll see when grades come out).

After doing practice exams I saw how basically useless the hypos in E&E's etc. are. I'll definitely spend less time earlier in the semester trying to figure things out, since we have to re-learn it all (or learn it for the first time, ha) when outlining/studying. More time going out earlier in the semester. I'll try to fit in some sort of work out schedule.

[mac.empress]

For those having issues with discipline (such as being on the internet in class):

This sounds so stupid, but it worked for me. Say I wanted to get up early on a Saturday and get to school by 9 AM to do some work or wanted to stay off the internet in class but didn't want to switch to pen and paper... I'd go to one of my roommates and hand him a 20 dollar bill. I told him if I am not at school by 9 AM or jump on the internet in class, he can keep the 20 dollars. I emphasize to him to not offer me back the 20 under any circumstances and to not feel bad if I tell him to keep it.

It's sad that I had to do that, but especially when it came to dragging myself out of bed early on a Saturday morning it was really, really effective. I never lost my 20 dollars.

My wife is my roommate and she already takes all of my money anyway.

Any other ideas?

[yqsong]

sit in the first 2 rows for all my classes...
study in the library between classes..rather than mindlessly wander around the campus
get all the reading done during the weekend, so i can stop sleeping at 3 in the morning
and go to gym more often

[A'nold]

I'm going to work out a lot more, eat healthier like I was before the month before finals, and watch a crap load of the NFL on Sundays. In essence, for the first half of the semester I will try to find and enjoy more free time.

[KLW12]

I will do a hell of a lot more relaxing the 1st month of the semester. I started the semester acting like a maniac and trying to read everything I could get my hands on. Not only was this a massive waste of time, but when writing assignments were due and crunchtime hit in late-oct and early november, I was totally exhausted and was about 90% sure I was going to drop out for about a week.

OLs, I would recommend taking a five or six day break in mid-october if you can before things get really busy. Profs fall behind, assignments will be due soon, and exams come quickly. Rest up before the final push in November. Late Oct and November are a bitch...seriously.

I stayed about a week ahead in my reading and reviewed the briefs before class. I will try to stay about 10 days ahead this semester. By staying ahead you have a lot more time at the end of the semester to work on outlines and do practice exams and problems while everyone else is trying to keep up with the reading for the next day. I think this will be really important this semester because I wont have a huge break at the end of this semester to prepare for exams and finish up my outlines. We basically go from class into exams in late-April and early-May.

I'll start outlining about a month into the semester; trying to outline earlier is useless b/c you have no law to outline for the first four or five weeks.

OLs, do not waste you summer reading E&Es, Chirlestein and all of the other stuff out there. You will not remember anything and you will not have an advantage by the end of the semester. You may feel a bit more comfortable for the first two weeks of class but that's it. Additionally, anything you thiink you understand you probably do not or your prof will quickly crush your understanding of it. Moreover, you will only cover a fraction of what is in the E&E, which means you are wasting the last few weeks of freedom. Trying to understand UCC 2-207 and its application before the semester starts is completely retarded. The thought of reading property or con law for next semester has not even been a consideration over winter break. I would recommend reading the Delaney prep books (exams and legal reasoning) and perhaps GTM.

[Mulliganstew]

I'm not waiting until the very end of the semester to crack open my supplements. I should have used them during the semester to... SUPPLEMENT my readings. Ugh.

[Marmot]

Visit the gym more often.
Visit the bar less often.
Read ahead more often.
Start doing practice questions earlier, particularly for the classes with finals scheduled toward the end of the exam period.

[macattaq]

I'm going to do both a Westlaw and Lexis search for every case we read. I want that Calphalon cookware!

[thesealocust]

I'm going to do both a Westlaw and Lexis search for every case we read. I want that Calphalon cookware!

You only get points for one search/day

[Irongirl]

I am going to get reliable outlines from 2L's that have taken my classes and did well and use their outlines from the very beginning of the semester. Instead of taking my own notes in class, I will refine their outlines and make them my own. I started doing this the last few weeks of school and it saved an unbelievable amount of time and I was able to retain the information much better. Outlines are always up to date leaving plenty of time to take practice tests. Also, professors don't change their teaching style often so it also helps to know what important concepts they will focus on before getting to class.

I will still continue to do all of my reading but I will only book brief - waste of time to take notes as well.

Workout more - super unhealthy last semester.

[LoriBelle]

Well, I haven't received my grades yet. With that caveat, however...

Things I'm not changing:
I'm still not going to brief cases. It is a colossal waste of time.

I'm still not going to get involved with a study group (aka breeze-shooting, time-wasting group) until late in the semester, when the group will actually be studying.

I'm still going to read cases closely, highlighting to high heaven.

I'm still going to take Sundays off from school completely.

I'm still going to read my Civ Pro hornbook recommended readings.

Things I am changing:
I plan to outline at each "stopping point" in each class (in the Farnsworth Contracts casebook, for instance, this would be at the end of each chapter). I may also, at each stopping point, make the flash cards I will use later in the semester to force myself to recall BLL. This worked surprisingly well in the fall semester, with help from my spouse.

I will take fewer, but more relevant, class notes. My class notes from the first month or so of class were pretty useless, because I had no idea what I was doing or what was relevant information. I may decide to take notes directly into my outline, but as of now, I'm not sure.

I will get ahead as far as I can in the readings. Our graded LRW is a pain, assignments come due with shocking speed and frequency, and juggling class readings and a LRW deadline is a recipe for chaos and disaster. However, it's not possible to do the whole semester's reading at once, because my professors only give assignments a week or two in advance and skip around in the casebooks.

I will focus less on LRW because I naturally do well in it, it has a tendency to gobble up time that belongs to other pursuits, and it is not worth as much to my GPA as my other courses.

I will eat better. This means a snack and lunch from home at school every day. I gained probably 10 pounds in the fall semester. Chips and dip, pizza, and ramen noodles are easy, but weight loss is not. Also, I feel like my brain works better when I'm eating, you know, vegetables.

In the same vein, I plan to exercise more and take a multivitamin every day.

I plan to start volunteering. Now that I have a clue about school, I'm not as scared about giving some of my time to something.

I plan to socialize/network more. This has been difficult for me because I don't drink, smoke, do drugs, etc. I'm not comfortable with the let's-go-out-and-get-drunk atmosphere that seems to pervade our school. Many of the fresh out of ugrad folks still seem to be in frat party mode, and that's fine for them...but I'm kind of over it, and I know I'm not the only one
(others have expressed the same kind of frustration with it). Still on the lookout for solutions to this one.

[vanwinkle]

I'm going to enjoy life more.

[JazzOne]

I'm going to work harder. Same plan, but more work.

[prezidentv8]

More CALI, more hornbooks, less obsessing about cases.

Yeah I need to study smarter, not more. Probably more E&E's too, and figuring out how to answer policy questions halfway decently.

[kimber1028]

I'm going to work harder. Same plan, but more work.

+1. I was efficient during the week, but I took the weekends off for the most part. This term I'll probably still take Saturdays off, but work all day Sundays.

[prezidentv8]

Buying a car should open up considerably more time for me.