Notes/Outlining Forum

[psyduckiscool]

Disclaimer: Curious 0L here. Not going crazy on 0L prep, just exploring a few things about LS in general.

Case briefs and notetaking in class seem pretty intuitive to me, but how do you turn that into outlined notes? From what I gather it's briefs/class notes->outlined notes-> condensed outline

How do you organize the case law/ class notes into an outlined format? is it just organizing the rules in a way that you gather from the notes in a way that makes sense? Are facts a part of this process as well?

[First Offense]

An outline is just your notes reorganized (and hopefully condensed) into a form that is makes the information easily accessible. There's no mystery here.

Also, briefing cases is a colossal waste of time after the first week.

[mephistopheles]

An outline is just your notes reorganized (and hopefully condensed) into a form that is makes the information easily accessible. There's no mystery here.

Also, briefing cases is a colossal waste of time after the first week.

to the first point, yes. it's literally just time moving the material around and deciding what's important.

to the second, i briefed every case 1L (and into 2L) because it just doesn't take that much time. i also did quite well. if you're reading it anyways and can type without looking, why not

[lawhopeful10]

Read these http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 3&t=123092. I never briefed or took notes before class. In class I would just write down what was important. Two weeks or so before finals I would condense it into something workable for the test and memorize it. You know what to write down by looking at your teacher's previous exams. Your thought process should be only right down what will be tested. Since you are still figuring it out first semester it is natural to be a little over inclusive.

[nick417]

There is no secret formula for outlining or preparing for class. What works best for you is what you should do. The most important thing for exams is being able to regurgitate what the professor said. So taking excellent class notes is extremely important. A good idea is to type your casebook into google and see if you can find an outline done by someone else. This will at least show you a good way to structure your outline. Another idea is to bring your outline to your professor and ask him/her to look at it and evaluate it.

I would suggest not relying on 2 and 3 L's outlines or using hornbook or study guide outlines because they are rarely helpful. All you need to know is what your professor specifically taught you, that is it.

[Crowing]

You just have to do what works for you. Some people transcribed classes, wrote 100 page outlines from those notes, then made shorter outlines from the long ones. I only made one set of (short) outlines based on my class notes which were rarely longer than 2-3 pages per class. It's all personal preference; don't worry about what other people are doing.

[banjo]

I usually started with a few old outlines for the same professor and added/subtracted as necessary. Sometimes I condensed their 70-page outline to 4 pages. Other times I copied and pasted entire sections into my own outline. I also culled material from E&Es, hornbooks, other outlines, other supplements, and TA handouts. The weirdest part of my approach was that I rarely took notes in class and also missed a bunch of classes.

[BVest]

I never briefed cases, but I did color highlight so that I could refer to the case in class quickly. It was something along the lines of:

Blue = Proc Posture
Pink = Facts
Green = Issues
Orange = Rule or Holding
Yellow = Important analysis

[psyduckiscool]

Thanks for the responses everyone! I understand that some of you aren't exactly in favor of hornbooks or commercial outlines, but if you are using those to supplement class notes, would you advise looking at them before or after the prof has gone over that respective section in class?

[mephistopheles]

the people who did best used a variety of hornbooks, though not to their full extent. i find them great to get wordings down and what not, but make sure that the view used by the author lines up with your professor.

as an example, i used my contracts hornbook incessantly. it was written by one of the CB authors and was basically the CB but condensed. i booked that class. talking with people afterwards, nobody knew the book existed.