Themis Bar Review Hangout - July 2015 Exam Forum

[Underoath]

I'm focusing on the long outline and condensing that to memorize as my study aid. Will report back in to let you know which MBE questions I get, which probably will be when you are LONG on real property and onto the next subject haha

Hey...have you memorized your study aid though as best you can or are you just moving on to real property? When will you come back to memorizing contracts

For me, I'm not trying to get everything 100% memorized as soon as I hit the subject. I know that even though I start property tomorrow, there are still Contracts essays and MBE questions mixed in going forward. I'm not as good at writing, so I'm concentrating on learning the wording on the essays for BLL. My process for doing that right now involves hand-writing flashcards of the major topics I'm not 100% familiar with from the attack outline, then as I go through the practice MBE questions, if I get one wrong, I copy the "rule" that I didn't know from that question into another document and later make flashcards from those too. Then over time I'll get more and more memorized. (My last MBE session was over 10% higher than the previous one for example.) It seems that I assumed a decently tested topic would be in either the lectures or attack outline. I guess I'll try making my flashcards from the long outlines then. I'll try that process for real property and see how that goes.

I'm afraid I'll burn myself out trying to get 100% of contracts in my head before going to the next subject. I plan to just keep slowly adding more to the mix over time, and to make sure I concentrate on how to state the BLL on the major topics for the essays. I'm a beast when it comes to multiple choice questions, but the essays make me nervous.

Ok, thank you. This def helped me out because I was too focused on mastering Ks before I moved on. I am about to head to bed here shortly, I'm still working on my study aid for Ks. zzzz

[MarcZero]

I'm focusing on the long outline and condensing that to memorize as my study aid. Will report back in to let you know which MBE questions I get, which probably will be when you are LONG on real property and onto the next subject haha

Hey...have you memorized your study aid though as best you can or are you just moving on to real property? When will you come back to memorizing contracts

For me, I'm not trying to get everything 100% memorized as soon as I hit the subject. I know that even though I start property tomorrow, there are still Contracts essays and MBE questions mixed in going forward. I'm not as good at writing, so I'm concentrating on learning the wording on the essays for BLL. My process for doing that right now involves hand-writing flashcards of the major topics I'm not 100% familiar with from the attack outline, then as I go through the practice MBE questions, if I get one wrong, I copy the "rule" that I didn't know from that question into another document and later make flashcards from those too. Then over time I'll get more and more memorized. (My last MBE session was over 10% higher than the previous one for example.) It seems that I assumed a decently tested topic would be in either the lectures or attack outline. I guess I'll try making my flashcards from the long outlines then. I'll try that process for real property and see how that goes.

I'm afraid I'll burn myself out trying to get 100% of contracts in my head before going to the next subject. I plan to just keep slowly adding more to the mix over time, and to make sure I concentrate on how to state the BLL on the major topics for the essays. I'm a beast when it comes to multiple choice questions, but the essays make me nervous.

Ok, thank you. This def helped me out because I was too focused on mastering Ks before I moved on. I am about to head to bed here shortly, I'm still working on my study aid for Ks. zzzz

Yeah, check the schedule. There are still practice MBE sessions and practice essays for older subjects to do later on while you're learning new subjects. My schedule shows that on Saturday I watch Property lectures 1-8, review the property outline, review the contracts outline, and do a 1-hour Contracts MBE section.

For me at least, this whole process is not a pie-eating contest where I have to finish the entire pie before I get the next one. This is more like spinning a bunch of plates at the same time. Once you start spinning, you have to keep checking back to keep it going.

[Underoath]

I'm focusing on the long outline and condensing that to memorize as my study aid. Will report back in to let you know which MBE questions I get, which probably will be when you are LONG on real property and onto the next subject haha

Hey...have you memorized your study aid though as best you can or are you just moving on to real property? When will you come back to memorizing contracts

For me, I'm not trying to get everything 100% memorized as soon as I hit the subject. I know that even though I start property tomorrow, there are still Contracts essays and MBE questions mixed in going forward. I'm not as good at writing, so I'm concentrating on learning the wording on the essays for BLL. My process for doing that right now involves hand-writing flashcards of the major topics I'm not 100% familiar with from the attack outline, then as I go through the practice MBE questions, if I get one wrong, I copy the "rule" that I didn't know from that question into another document and later make flashcards from those too. Then over time I'll get more and more memorized. (My last MBE session was over 10% higher than the previous one for example.) It seems that I assumed a decently tested topic would be in either the lectures or attack outline. I guess I'll try making my flashcards from the long outlines then. I'll try that process for real property and see how that goes.

I'm afraid I'll burn myself out trying to get 100% of contracts in my head before going to the next subject. I plan to just keep slowly adding more to the mix over time, and to make sure I concentrate on how to state the BLL on the major topics for the essays. I'm a beast when it comes to multiple choice questions, but the essays make me nervous.

Ok, thank you. This def helped me out because I was too focused on mastering Ks before I moved on. I am about to head to bed here shortly, I'm still working on my study aid for Ks. zzzz

Yeah, check the schedule. There are still practice MBE sessions and practice essays for older subjects to do later on while you're learning new subjects. My schedule shows that on Saturday I watch Property lectures 1-8, review the property outline, review the contracts outline, and do a 1-hour Contracts MBE section.

For me at least, this whole process is not a pie-eating contest where I have to finish the entire pie before I get the next one. This is more like spinning a bunch of plates at the same time. Once you start spinning, you have to keep checking back to keep it going.

Nice analogy. Can't wait until this exam is over.....haha

[sdphill]

Checking in! CA Resident studying for IL Bar! Fourth day tomorrow.. This is so fun...

[psteele99]

I used Themis for WA bar and passed the first time in February. Don't try to memorize and master a subject now. It made me nervous when my advisor told me that, but you really should be shooting for about 50% correct. Then in the last few weeks you start "mastering".

[djh10]

I used Themis for WA bar and passed the first time in February. Don't try to memorize and master a subject now. It made me nervous when my advisor told me that, but you really should be shooting for about 50% correct. Then in the last few weeks you start "mastering".

Thanks for the tip! If you don't mind sharing your experience, did you find the lectures and handouts helpful?

[sd5289]

I used Themis for WA bar and passed the first time in February. Don't try to memorize and master a subject now. It made me nervous when my advisor told me that, but you really should be shooting for about 50% correct. Then in the last few weeks you start "mastering".

TYFT.

I'm still working through K's now (started on Wednesday). For the most part I'm understanding everything and doing fine on the assessment questions after the lectures (didn't "master" one section because I was getting a little tired and didn't read the questions closely). All this talk about flashcards and memorization had me doing this:

[zor]

Biggest frustration so far is that the MBE practice questions have a ton of auction related questions on there, but no coverage of auctions in either the lectures or outlines. We never covered auctions in my 1L Contracts class so those practice questions are the first time I'm seeing the relevant rules.

I'm doing the NY bar, not the CA bar, but it looks like auction doesn't appear in K & Sales but in "Advanced Sales" for us--so it's there, it's just not in the intro material, you learn it a few days later.

[Pleasye]

All this talk about flashcards and memorization had me doing this:

Same.

What's everyone doing for the MBE questions they get wrong? I did the first set of practice Q's (only one auction q, btw) and got quite a few wrong ha. Should I make flash cards of the ones I got wrong? Flash cards for the corresponding rules? Thoughts?

[teeshtee]

Nvm

[MarcZero]

All this talk about flashcards and memorization had me doing this:

Same.

What's everyone doing for the MBE questions they get wrong?

For the questions I got wrong (or correctly guessed) I'm copying the "rule" from the explanation and putting it in a word doc. Then I'll make some flashcards from those later. That's what I'm doing at least and it seems to help fill in the gaps.

[sdphill]

Did anyone find their first set of MBE Questions EXTREMELY difficult? I only got a little over the goal of 50%.

[zot1]

Checking in. First time taker. UBE. Starting tomorrow. Excited and terrified.

[Pleasye]

Did anyone find their first set of MBE Questions EXTREMELY difficult? I only got a little over the goal of 50%.

Yeah I got 11/17

But it's just the beginning! We haven't memorized anything or practiced questions yet.

[sdphill]

What do you all do after you have completed all of the Themis tasks for the day? Do you make flashcards, review the material, relax or what?

Currently, I don't do anything extra with the material outside of what is on my to-do list for the day; I try not to look at the material... I'm trying to have a balanced life where I watch TV and relax after studying, but I don't want to be doing anything that is going to bite me in the butt later on...

My mentor, who used Themis to pass the July 2014 New York Bar, said I shouldn't worry about memorizing, making flashcards, and creating an attack outline, until week six or so. But I don't trust him... He's a little genius. (He didn't start studying until June 15th last year after taking an extended vacation.)

[djh10]

What do you all do after you have completed all of the Themis tasks for the day? Do you make flashcards, review the material, relax or what?

Currently, I don't do anything extra with the material outside of what is on my to-do list for the day; I try not to look at the material... I'm trying to have a balanced life where I watch TV and relax after studying, but I don't want to be doing anything that is going to bite me in the butt later on...

My mentor, who used Themis to pass the July 2014 New York Bar, said I shouldn't worry about memorizing, making flashcards, and creating an attack outline, until week six or so. But I don't trust him... He's a little genius. (He didn't start studying until June 15th last year after taking an extended vacation.)

I had the same concerns as I have been ahead of schedule since the beginning. This has allowed me to basically watch TV and chill out every night without even thinking about the bar, which was nice. Yesterday I e-mailed the PA Themis director telling him and he told me the first 2 weeks are a little light so I can feel free to either relax after my daily tasks are completed like I have been or keep studying in the hope it will lighten the load and maybe give me a day off later in the summer.

[texlaw]

Did anyone find their first set of MBE Questions EXTREMELY difficult? I only got a little over the goal of 50%.

Yeah I got 11/17

But it's just the beginning! We haven't memorized anything or practiced questions yet.

10/17 here. I also went ahead with the first set of Civ Pro questions (because I'm stressing about that subject). Got 9/17.

[GULCPerson]

What do you all do after you have completed all of the Themis tasks for the day? Do you make flashcards, review the material, relax or what?

Definitely just relax. Go for a run, watch baseball, do anything except thing about bar stuff. I know the workload ramps up so for now I'm just enjoying actually being done by 4:00 every day.

[zot1]

How long do you guys spend reading the outlines prior to watching the lectures? I feel like it's taking forever

[sdphill]

How long do you guys spend reading the outlines prior to watching the lectures? I feel like it's taking forever

It takes a VERY, VERY long time... But I did find out that the sent us summary outlines in your inbox that you can review instead of the longer ones.

[sd5289]

Just got through week 1 here (basically all of K's and the NY distinctions). Tomorrow it's telling me to "review" my K notes and handouts, and then on Sunday I'm supposed to read the advanced sales outline. Today was pretty light compared to Wed and Thurs, and it took me maybe 3(ish) hours to get through the NY distinctions outline and the lectures + assessment Q's. I've been a little ahead because I did all the intro stuff the week before the schedule started b/c I had other stuff to do at the beginning this week.

Does "review" mean actually just reviewing and reading over all of this, or starting to create a condensed outline of this roughly 75(ish) pages of handouts? I was the type of student who used the outlining process to actually learn the material during law school.

[zot1]

How long do you guys spend reading the outlines prior to watching the lectures? I feel like it's taking forever

It takes a VERY, VERY long time... But I did find out that the sent us summary outlines in your inbox that you can review instead of the longer ones.

It took a long time alright. I basically skimmed through it towards the last part, specially on topics that I was already familiar with. I kept thinking that the long outlines will only be read once fully per subject, so I decided to suck it up.

[MarcZero]

Just got through week 1 here (basically all of K's and the NY distinctions). Tomorrow it's telling me to "review" my K notes and handouts, and then on Sunday I'm supposed to read the advanced sales outline. Today was pretty light compared to Wed and Thurs, and it took me maybe 3(ish) hours to get through the NY distinctions outline and the lectures + assessment Q's. I've been a little ahead because I did all the intro stuff the week before the schedule started b/c I had other stuff to do at the beginning this week.

Does "review" mean actually just reviewing and reading over all of this, or starting to create a condensed outline of this roughly 75(ish) pages of handouts? I was the type of student who used the outlining process to actually learn the material during law school.

I agree that "review" is pretty vague. I'm personally making flashcards for the things in either the attack outline or the wrong question rules from MBE practice sets that I don't just know well enough and then reviewing those. After doing a few sets of the MBE questions and essays, you'll just "know" certain things and (for me at least) I don't want to waste my time during "review" just to look at those things again. I just want to read about the stuff I don't have down cold yet.

[lacrossebrother]

is the speed up thing not working? I feel like if it is, it's going to like 1.1 speed max. Tried chrome firefox and IE.

[GULCPerson]

is the speed up thing not working? I feel like if it is, it's going to like 1.1 speed max. Tried chrome firefox and IE.

Working fine for me on Chrome, Windows 7. You can hear a noticeable difference when you speed it up to 1.5X or 2.0X, and the timer ticks faster. I wish it displayed the speed on the status bar or something instead of only briefly at the top when you first change it though. I get too complacent at 1.5x, start thinking I'm at 1.0, speed up to 2.0x and then it's all just gibberish, back to 1.5x, lose a couple minutes to my stupidity once an hour.