BarBri Bar Review Hangout - February 2016 Exam Forum

[storge]

feeling stupid, but where is the Donovan v. Bargain Mart prompt?

Hope you found it by now, but if not, the thin orange CPT book (pg. 149).

[MrMustache]

Just finished Evidence II with Gold (missed a few days after getting sick), and found it surprisingly helpful. Pretty much every issue I remember struggling with while answering Themis MBE questions last summer was covered by him with examples. Now I'm looking forward to BarBri's MBEs to destroy my confidence.

[atcushman]

Im doing things a little out of order, but want to take advantage of graded essays---We are supposed to do the ones out of the orange MEE Testing book correct, so when it says Contracts question 5 I go to Writing Program-Contracts Question 5?

[UnfrozenCaveman]

Im doing things a little out of order, but want to take advantage of graded essays---We are supposed to do the ones out of the orange MEE Testing book correct, so when it says Contracts question 5 I go to Writing Program-Contracts Question 5?

. That's what I did.

[gtg]

Am I the only one who hates the StudySmart for giving instant answers? I get 2-3 wrong in a row and I have trouble concentrating for the rest of the questions..

[MrMustache]

Am I the only one who hates the StudySmart for giving instant answers? I get 2-3 wrong in a row and I have trouble concentrating for the rest of the questions..

My problem is that I like instant answers a little too much, so that when I'm answering a lot of questions in a row using the book, I get this uneasy feeling of wanting to know how I'm doing as soon as possible.

[rinkrat19]

Am I the only one who hates the StudySmart for giving instant answers? I get 2-3 wrong in a row and I have trouble concentrating for the rest of the questions..

My problem is that I like instant answers a little too much, so that when I'm answering a lot of questions in a row using the book, I get this uneasy feeling of wanting to know how I'm doing as soon as possible.

Me too. The suspense of not knowing is annoying.

[lawst_]

Am I the only one who hates the StudySmart for giving instant answers? I get 2-3 wrong in a row and I have trouble concentrating for the rest of the questions..

My problem is that I like instant answers a little too much, so that when I'm answering a lot of questions in a row using the book, I get this uneasy feeling of wanting to know how I'm doing as soon as possible.

I had this problem too. I loved seeing the answers immediately, so upon doing book exams I could only focus for 10-15 questions before having to stop and check the answers. I think this led to problems with timing on the actual bar exam and part of why I didn't do well on the MBE.

[fadedsunrise]

Am I the only one who hates the StudySmart for giving instant answers? I get 2-3 wrong in a row and I have trouble concentrating for the rest of the questions..

I'm with you on this one, its distracting and discouraging when I've spent 2 minutes on a question, get it wrong, then proceed to get the next one wrong. (I'm looking at you, Torts...)

[not guilty]

I don't agree. I'm still in the process of learning and when I have to go back and review 25 incorrect questions an hour(s) later I forget what my mindset was when answering that question. I like to go one question at a time.

[not guilty]

Is there a search function on Barbri? If I want to find the Torts lecture, what is the fastest way to do that? I've just been going week by week.

[BVest]

Is there a search function on Barbri? If I want to find the Torts lecture, what is the fastest way to do that? I've just been going week by week.

I don't have access anymore, but you should be able to pull up all assignments and then sort them by type (I think videos are under "Online Activity" or something) or by subject (but sometimes that wasn't the best way to do it because it would have a word in front of the actual subject). I did this because I went back and watched a couple of lectures over.

[UnfrozenCaveman]

For those of you outlining and NY: the criminal law lecture notes are pretty sufficient as an outline in and of itself. I stopped outlining halfway through when I realized I was largely just copying the lecture notes word for word.

Note: I am outlining the MBE topics in a way similar to how I outlined law school classes before a final.

[fadedsunrise]

For those of you outlining and NY: the criminal law lecture notes are pretty sufficient as an outline in and of itself. I stopped outlining halfway through when I realized I was largely just copying the lecture notes word for word.

Note: I am outlining the MBE topics in a way similar to how I outlined law school classes before a final.

Same for the CA crim law/crim pro lecture handouts. I still re-outlined because I'm a kinesthetic learner and it's the typing as much as the actual outline that helps, but I'm loving the materials as it is.

I gave up on watching each of the essay approach videos They take so long and he's basically reading the outline out/doing a review...I think I'll substitute reading my own outline and skimming his before taking any essays. Anyone else?

[barprepblues]

so behind. just finish crim pro and realized i forgot everything about property and torts already. my little dot hovers between 60% and 75% depending on the subject, and that's only when i remember the material. this is not going to end well

[jackbauer10]

I gave up on watching each of the essay approach videos They take so long and he's basically reading the outline out/doing a review...I think I'll substitute reading my own outline and skimming his before taking any essays. Anyone else?

Yeah, this is about where I am. They take up an hour of my study time, and I'm not sure how much they're really helping. I haven't noticed a substantial difference in my essay performance with or without them. I don't know whether to stick with them or not. On the one hand, I want to be able to say I completed all the assignments. On the other hand I want to make sure I'm actually PRACTICING, both essays and MBEs/MPQs. Other thoughts?

[UnfrozenCaveman]

I gave up on watching each of the essay approach videos They take so long and he's basically reading the outline out/doing a review...I think I'll substitute reading my own outline and skimming his before taking any essays. Anyone else?

Yeah, this is about where I am. They take up an hour of my study time, and I'm not sure how much they're really helping. I haven't noticed a substantial difference in my essay performance with or without them. I don't know whether to stick with them or not. On the one hand, I want to be able to say I completed all the assignments. On the other hand I want to make sure I'm actually PRACTICING, both essays and MBEs/MPQs. Other thoughts?

I don't feel like hitting certain progress points that BarBri suggests is all that valuable. Especially if you are just doing it to to able to mark it as done. I've only watched one essay video and that was the general lecture about writing NY bar essays. Essentially, though, NY essays feel like law school essays with more black letter law and you'd be better off knowing more BLL than sitting there strategizing essays.

[jackbauer10]

I don't feel like hitting certain progress points that BarBri suggests is all that valuable. Especially if you are just doing it to to able to mark it as done. I've only watched one essay video and that was the general lecture about writing NY bar essays. Essentially, though, NY essays feel like law school essays with more black letter law and you'd be better off knowing more BLL than sitting there strategizing essays.

You're likely right. At this point my time will be better spent learning/memorizing/writing BLL than strategizing how to approach the essays. From the ones I've watched, the gist is as follows: Have a brief checklist to go through in your head to make sure you're discussing all relevant issues (e.g. if "what crimes have X,Y,Z committed," then make sure to go through all inchoate crimes, crimes to person/property, accomplice liability, then defenses with an intro about actus reus, mens rea, causation). Other than that, it's BLL and IRAC over and over. From here on out I'll just skip to the ends and watch the last ten minutes to walk through the given examples.

[lawst_]

Hey guys, I'm struggling a bit and I was wondering if anyone could help me out.

I've had a hard time getting a solid study schedule because of work and various life happenings, plus plenty of my own lack of motivation. My motivation is fueled by the realization that I don't have as much time as I'd like to study, making everything seem fruitless. I know this negative thinking isn't serving me well whatsoever. So I pulled myself up and decided this would be the week that I catch up and get back on track.

My question is this: as a first time taker, I found the lectures to be useless, but I did them anyway because everyone else was. As a second time taker, I figured I'd only watch the MBE lectures and really focus on MBE since that was where I did very poorly on the July exam. However, even watching only the MBE lectures, I'm spending much less time doing practice questions and essays. Does anyone have thoughts on completely skipping all lectures, taking my own notes based on CMR, and then just powering through as many MBE questions as possible, while taking extra time to read and learn explanations?

Seriously, any help is appreciated.

[THE_U]

Hey guys, I'm struggling a bit and I was wondering if anyone could help me out.

I've had a hard time getting a solid study schedule because of work and various life happenings, plus plenty of my own lack of motivation. My motivation is fueled by the realization that I don't have as much time as I'd like to study, making everything seem fruitless. I know this negative thinking isn't serving me well whatsoever. So I pulled myself up and decided this would be the week that I catch up and get back on track.

My question is this: as a first time taker, I found the lectures to be useless, but I did them anyway because everyone else was. As a second time taker, I figured I'd only watch the MBE lectures and really focus on MBE since that was where I did very poorly on the July exam. However, even watching only the MBE lectures, I'm spending much less time doing practice questions and essays. Does anyone have thoughts on completely skipping all lectures, taking my own notes based on CMR, and then just powering through as many MBE questions as possible, while taking extra time to read and learn explanations?

Seriously, any help is appreciated.

I'm retaking the MBE and the extent that I am using my Barbri stuff from the summer is pretty limited to the CMR.

For my own learning style, I found most of the lectures to be pretty worthless and the lecture notes to be similarly bad. While the lecture notes have some good hypos, they were poorly organized (at least for me personally), making it difficult to get a framework of that subject in my head. I mean my property lecture outline was like 120+ pages alone.

Rather than doing the lectures this time around, I have started off by reading through the CMR for each subject before getting to the questions. For my weaker subjects, I have really taken my time, sometimes spending 3 days just going through that outline and hand-writing out my own "outline" for that subject. Doing that makes these rules and fact patterns stick in my head much better than furiously filling in blanks for 4 hour blocks.

When I have gotten to the questions after reviewing a particular subject in the CMR, the amount of times that I am thinking "wtf is this? I don't remember this in the lecture" has been greatly reduced. I'm now scoring practically the same % in my "weak" subjects as I am in my "strong" subjects. I'm sure that a lot of this is due to simply being exposed to this material already, but I do think that the CMR-only method might work better for some people.

I've been having waaaaay more success this time doing the method above, than I did in July by pretty much following Barbri. It almost is night and day.

[NY_Sea]

Hey guys, I'm struggling a bit and I was wondering if anyone could help me out.

I've had a hard time getting a solid study schedule because of work and various life happenings, plus plenty of my own lack of motivation. My motivation is fueled by the realization that I don't have as much time as I'd like to study, making everything seem fruitless. I know this negative thinking isn't serving me well whatsoever. So I pulled myself up and decided this would be the week that I catch up and get back on track.

My question is this: as a first time taker, I found the lectures to be useless, but I did them anyway because everyone else was. As a second time taker, I figured I'd only watch the MBE lectures and really focus on MBE since that was where I did very poorly on the July exam. However, even watching only the MBE lectures, I'm spending much less time doing practice questions and essays. Does anyone have thoughts on completely skipping all lectures, taking my own notes based on CMR, and then just powering through as many MBE questions as possible, while taking extra time to read and learn explanations?

I've been having waaaaay more success this time doing the method above, than I did in July by pretty much following Barbri. It almost is night and day.

This. I realized quickly even in July that the lectures were a 3 hour time suck for me, but foolishly kept going because it was drilled into my head to "trust the plan". I will admit, BARBRI did get me ready for the essays (I think BARBRI is the best program for essays, period), but taking up 3 hours of my day to do a lecture, then waste another 2 or so typing those notes into an outline pretty much equaled 5 hours a day where I wasn't actively trying to commit to memory or understand. How I've been approaching it this go around is that wherever I see "X Lecture", I read that outline at least once. It's helped immensely.

Where BARBRI drops the ball, and the first area I addressed after getting results for NY, was the MBE. Not only are a good chunk of the problems just made up by BARBRI, but I personally think there weren't enough assigned to get good practice for the MBE. If you haven't yet, get something to supplement BARBRI's questions with real MBE questions.

[THE_U]

Hey guys, I'm struggling a bit and I was wondering if anyone could help me out.

I've had a hard time getting a solid study schedule because of work and various life happenings, plus plenty of my own lack of motivation. My motivation is fueled by the realization that I don't have as much time as I'd like to study, making everything seem fruitless. I know this negative thinking isn't serving me well whatsoever. So I pulled myself up and decided this would be the week that I catch up and get back on track.

My question is this: as a first time taker, I found the lectures to be useless, but I did them anyway because everyone else was. As a second time taker, I figured I'd only watch the MBE lectures and really focus on MBE since that was where I did very poorly on the July exam. However, even watching only the MBE lectures, I'm spending much less time doing practice questions and essays. Does anyone have thoughts on completely skipping all lectures, taking my own notes based on CMR, and then just powering through as many MBE questions as possible, while taking extra time to read and learn explanations?

I've been having waaaaay more success this time doing the method above, than I did in July by pretty much following Barbri. It almost is night and day.

This. I realized quickly even in July that the lectures were a 3 hour time suck for me, but foolishly kept going because it was drilled into my head to "trust the plan". I will admit, BARBRI did get me ready for the essays (I think BARBRI is the best program for essays, period), but taking up 3 hours of my day to do a lecture, then waste another 2 or so typing those notes into an outline pretty much equaled 5 hours a day where I wasn't actively trying to commit to memory or understand. How I've been approaching it this go around is that wherever I see "X Lecture", I read that outline at least once. It's helped immensely.

Where BARBRI drops the ball, and the first area I addressed after getting results for NY, was the MBE. Not only are a good chunk of the problems just made up by BARBRI, but I personally think there weren't enough assigned to get good practice for the MBE. If you haven't yet, get something to supplement BARBRI's questions with real MBE questions.

Yep, felt the same way about the lectures.

And yeah, I'm using Adaptibar primarily this time around (I found out about it in the last few weeks of July, but it was too late to do enough questions by then), and supplementing with Barbri when I feel like/when I run out of Adaptibar questions. Barbri's questions are horrible and were like nothing I saw on the real MBE in July. Adaptibar's questions weren't exactly the same either, but seemed much closer. I do plan on taking Barbri's simulated MBE again, though, mostly for timing practice.

Oh as a sidenote: I love how Barbri's philosophy was "don't worry about memorization now, it will come..." Total bullshit IMO.

[lawst_]

Hey guys, I'm struggling a bit and I was wondering if anyone could help me out.

I've had a hard time getting a solid study schedule because of work and various life happenings, plus plenty of my own lack of motivation. My motivation is fueled by the realization that I don't have as much time as I'd like to study, making everything seem fruitless. I know this negative thinking isn't serving me well whatsoever. So I pulled myself up and decided this would be the week that I catch up and get back on track.

My question is this: as a first time taker, I found the lectures to be useless, but I did them anyway because everyone else was. As a second time taker, I figured I'd only watch the MBE lectures and really focus on MBE since that was where I did very poorly on the July exam. However, even watching only the MBE lectures, I'm spending much less time doing practice questions and essays. Does anyone have thoughts on completely skipping all lectures, taking my own notes based on CMR, and then just powering through as many MBE questions as possible, while taking extra time to read and learn explanations?

Seriously, any help is appreciated.

I'm retaking the MBE and the extent that I am using my Barbri stuff from the summer is pretty limited to the CMR.

For my own learning style, I found most of the lectures to be pretty worthless and the lecture notes to be similarly bad. While the lecture notes have some good hypos, they were poorly organized (at least for me personally), making it difficult to get a framework of that subject in my head. I mean my property lecture outline was like 120+ pages alone.

Rather than doing the lectures this time around, I have started off by reading through the CMR for each subject before getting to the questions. For my weaker subjects, I have really taken my time, sometimes spending 3 days just going through that outline and hand-writing out my own "outline" for that subject. Doing that makes these rules and fact patterns stick in my head much better than furiously filling in blanks for 4 hour blocks.

When I have gotten to the questions after reviewing a particular subject in the CMR, the amount of times that I am thinking "wtf is this? I don't remember this in the lecture" has been greatly reduced. I'm now scoring practically the same % in my "weak" subjects as I am in my "strong" subjects. I'm sure that a lot of this is due to simply being exposed to this material already, but I do think that the CMR-only method might work better for some people.

I've been having waaaaay more success this time doing the method above, than I did in July by pretty much following Barbri. It almost is night and day.

This has already been tremendously helpful. I'm reading/outlining CMR during my lunch break now instead of listening to lecture. I've accomplished twice as much in half as much time. And I feel like I'm understanding it better. Thank you!

[NY_Sea]

This has already been tremendously helpful. I'm reading/outlining CMR during my lunch break now instead of listening to lecture. I've accomplished twice as much in half as much time. And I feel like I'm understanding it better. Thank you!

This is where it's kind of mysterious how to handle a BARBRI-type course... The course is clearly geared towards what they think (and very well may be... I'm sure they have a lot of money invested in research on that) is how most students learn. I've known for a long time that's not how I learn, but what else are you going to do besides just read the CMR in lieu of going to the lectures?

I'm learning way more than I did the first go around by reading the outlines I made this summer and then practicing MBEs... Where I also went wrong with the MBEs in the summer is not reading explanatory answers. Stupid, and it ended up making me fail by 10 points with a kinda low 126 MBE. So, whether you're a repeater or a first-timer... READ THE EXPLANATORY ANSWERS. And don't skim them either... Really read them and know why you got the answer wrong before you move on. I can't tell you how beneficial that's been for me.

[lawst_]

This has already been tremendously helpful. I'm reading/outlining CMR during my lunch break now instead of listening to lecture. I've accomplished twice as much in half as much time. And I feel like I'm understanding it better. Thank you!

This is where it's kind of mysterious how to handle a BARBRI-type course... The course is clearly geared towards what they think (and very well may be... I'm sure they have a lot of money invested in research on that) is how most students learn. I've known for a long time that's not how I learn, but what else are you going to do besides just read the CMR in lieu of going to the lectures?

I'm learning way more than I did the first go around by reading the outlines I made this summer and then practicing MBEs... Where I also went wrong with the MBEs in the summer is not reading explanatory answers. Stupid, and it ended up making me fail by 10 points with a kinda low 126 MBE. So, whether you're a repeater or a first-timer... READ THE EXPLANATORY ANSWERS. And don't skim them either... Really read them and know why you got the answer wrong before you move on. I can't tell you how beneficial that's been for me.

Yup definitely on board with you here. I'm a second time taker and my MBE was low. I didn't practice MBE nearly enough, and frankly, I skipped the explanations. I know it was to my detriment, but once they showed me the right answer I'd maybe read the first sentence of the explanation and be like oh okay got it but in reality I didn't. I was trying to hurry through and just do a ton of questions rather than doing them methodically and taking time to review.

I think all along my downfall has been lack of review. First time around I would do a lecture, fill in the outlines, and then not touch it again. I *tried* to make flashcards, but once I made them, I rarely used them. Same with MBE and not reviewing answers.

So anyways, my plan is to read CMR, outline CMR, practice the hell out of MBE questions, definitely review explanations, and then outline a lot of essays just to issue spot and engage myself in rule recall, while writing full essays a few times a week in my weaker areas.