Kaplan Bar Review Hangout - July 2015 Exam Forum

[LAW813FL]

I could be wrong, but I thought the mbe practice q book is actual, previous mbe questions and the qbank is Kaplan created questions.

Nope. All questions are created by Kaplan.

So then does anyone know why there is a qbank and an mbe practice hardcopy book? And why they split the assignments up through them?

I believe the justification is to prepare for test day by practicing with paper/pencil. I find that rationale somewhat suspect. I mean, at this point, if you haven't figured out how to properly bubble a scantron...

I would much rather have all the questions available on QBank - though I suppose it's helpful if you're somewhere without internet?

Maybe I'm weird, but I actually prefer the hardcopy. I seem to be able to focus better and have one less distraction (the PC).

With that said, I'd chime in that the quality of questions between the two does seem to be slightly different. I'm grading higher on the book MBE's, but this could just be because it's easier for me to focus.

I agree that it is easier to focus on the hardcopy questions. I do think they are the same types of questions, even though the QBank questions seem to be short novels sometimes. I guess it bodes well for the actual MBE that we focus better on the hardcopy tho, we won't be straining our eyes looking at computer screens all day.

Exactly--haha. Are you taking the FL bar then?

Yup, so even more MCQ's

[shintopig]

How are people scoring on these MBE questions? I'm scoring in the 65 - 75% area. Are these decent percentages at this point?

Nah, you really wanna be in the 95% - 100% at this point.

For real though, 65% is the goal they say you should be able to pass the MBE with.

From their intro/explanatory videos, Kaplan says most people will be scoring 40-50% correct on the MBE Qbank questions, which is apparently normal.

They must be harder than others.

[Geaux12]

Florida taker here.

1) I'm really far behind. Just starting the first essay workshop today; still have to plow through Torts. Anyone have advice/tips/tricks on playing catchup, other than "sit the fuck down, shut the fuck up, grind it out"?

2) Fuck Kaplan for giving us FL Civ Pro on day 1, but delaying FL/Fed Crim Pro and Fed Civ Pro until weeks later. This isn't fucking workable, seeing as the FL QBank questions have one topic called "Florida Procedure" mixing Civ & Crim Pro together. There isn't nearly enough granularity. I'm holding off on doing any of these questions until we cover the topics, because getting a Crim Pro question at this point would simply be a waste of a question - I never took Crim Pro, and have no fucking clue what it's about.

3) CriticalPass flashcards are awesome, if you take the time to personalize them.

[robinhoodOO]

Florida taker here.

1) I'm really far behind. Just starting the first essay workshop today; still have to plow through Torts. Anyone have advice/tips/tricks on playing catchup, other than "sit the fuck down, shut the fuck up, grind it out"?

2) Fuck Kaplan for giving us FL Civ Pro on day 1, but delaying FL/Fed Crim Pro and Fed Civ Pro until weeks later. This isn't fucking workable, seeing as the FL QBank questions have one topic called "Florida Procedure" mixing Civ & Crim Pro together. There isn't nearly enough granularity. I'm holding off on doing any of these questions until we cover the topics, because getting a Crim Pro question at this point would simply be a waste of a question - I never took Crim Pro, and have no fucking clue what it's about.

3) CriticalPass flashcards are awesome, if you take the time to personalize them.

CrimPro is cake (IMO) and mixed with CrimLaw with Kaplan's Cali class. I have absolutely no idea why they'd mix it with CivPro there. Is it just for review that they're mixed or for the lectures, etc.? It's apples and oranges, regardless.

CrimPro is pretty much more or less Constitutional law applied to the criminal procedure. All about when a search is lawful, whether a warrant is lawful, when the two aspects of Miranda kick in, etc., etc. all related to the Constitution. Literally nothing to do with CivPro.

[robinhoodOO]

Exactly--haha. Are you taking the FL bar then?

Yup, so even more MCQ's[/quote]

I'd prob prefer more multiple choice. We get 6 essays (like 14-15 potential subjects), two performance tests, and 200 MBE's (18 hours in total).

Kaplan keeps repeating this "minimum competency" line, but we all know it's bullshit--haha

Anyway, another rag on Kaplan: Why are they giving me cross-over essays with torts and real property when we (CA) haven't covered torts? Of course I'm going to blow the essay review when I completely forget nuisance is broken into public and private--haha. What's the point in getting it graded if it's going to almost be a guaranteed 55 even if I nailed every real property issue???

Beginning to really dislike the ebb and flow of the course

[LAW813FL]

Florida taker here.

1) I'm really far behind. Just starting the first essay workshop today; still have to plow through Torts. Anyone have advice/tips/tricks on playing catchup, other than "sit the fuck down, shut the fuck up, grind it out"?

2) Fuck Kaplan for giving us FL Civ Pro on day 1, but delaying FL/Fed Crim Pro and Fed Civ Pro until weeks later. This isn't fucking workable, seeing as the FL QBank questions have one topic called "Florida Procedure" mixing Civ & Crim Pro together. There isn't nearly enough granularity. I'm holding off on doing any of these questions until we cover the topics, because getting a Crim Pro question at this point would simply be a waste of a question - I never took Crim Pro, and have no fucking clue what it's about.

3) CriticalPass flashcards are awesome, if you take the time to personalize them.

CrimPro is cake (IMO) and mixed with CrimLaw with Kaplan's Cali class. I have absolutely no idea why they'd mix it with CivPro there. Is it just for review that they're mixed or for the lectures, etc.? It's apples and oranges, regardless.

CrimPro is pretty much more or less Constitutional law applied to the criminal procedure. All about when a search is lawful, whether a warrant is lawful, when the two aspects of Miranda kick in, etc., etc. all related to the Constitution. Literally nothing to do with CivPro.

I'm really just focusing all on MBE right now and worrying about essays for July. Im still doing daily sets of FL Procedure questions and a few Florida evidence questions. I still watch the workshop videos, but Im not really practicing writing any yet.

Florida Procedure is the most important subject for Florida cuz its guaranteed on there.

If I were you, I would just keep going as planned, as long as you get all your MBE subjects in by June 26 for the midterm you should be fine.

[SiRR]

Almost blew a gasket working on a Civ Pro "Pre-trial Procedure" quiz on QBank. Many items were either not covered, or not covered as extensively. It's 10p here, I'm going to shut it down before it gets any weirder.

Also, I think I read above that someone said they were scoring demonstrably better on book questions, as opposed to QBank. +1

[robinhoodOO]

Almost blew a gasket working on a Civ Pro "Pre-trial Procedure" quiz on QBank. Many items were either not covered, or not covered as extensively. It's 10p here, I'm going to shut it down before it gets any weirder.

Also, I think I read above that someone said they were scoring demonstrably better on book questions, as opposed to QBank. +1

Yes on both counts here.

Also, I got 90% on their little post-lecture CivPro quiz and then did 33 MBE's covering all areas of CivPro and got like 58%, with at least 20% of the Q's being unfamiliar to everything I'd watched and read.

[despina]

Is it annoying anyone else that the bar notes are formatted totally differently for each subject?

Also, count me as another person who is finding the MBE book questions much easier than the online QBank. And count me as another person sick of learning new material from the answer explanations in the checkpoint quizzes.

[robinhoodOO]

Is it annoying anyone else that the bar notes are formatted totally differently for each subject?

Also, count me as another person who is finding the MBE book questions much easier than the online QBank. And count me as another person sick of learning new material from the answer explanations in the checkpoint quizzes.

Yup; Extremely annoying. There seems to be no uniformity with Bar Notes, which must be a case of them just letting their lecturers loose to do what works for them, as opposed to what might work for students. I've stopped using the BarNotes and I'm only doing my own outlines entirely. I'll review Bar Notes and borrow helpful examples, etc., but that's it.

Another issue is the extremely spotty essay "grading." I've turned in 3 and it seems to be a crapshoot. I got a 70 where I nailed the issues on one and a 50 where I nailed all the issues on another. The 50 grader claimed I missed three issues (which I did not--they were clearly laid out). Vagueness, overbreadth and the individual standing requirement for showing association standing in a ConLaw question. I got the notice of it being graded at 12:30 AM, though, so maybe she graded it super late and wasn't able to comprehend what was going on...Either way, not acceptable.

I'm actually very disappointed so far and I wouldn't recommend Kaplan. I can't rely on Bar Notes, I can't rely on their lecturers (and to some extent their outlines) to cover what they're testing you on, I can't rely on their essay grading, and QBank seems like a crapshoot. What's left? Should I even rely on anything else if the primary stuff isn't up to par? Come on, Kap.

Time to take the reins from Kap and do what works for me (i.e. self-grading and comparing my essays to the chosen model answers, etc.).

For those that are enjoying it (or getting help from it), what's working for you?!

[smaug]

I like the focus on the MBE because who really cares about the essays.

[despina]

Oh man, I haven't turned in a single essay yet... was planning on doing my first one tomorrow.

For those that are enjoying it (or getting help from it), what's working for you?!

I've found the Ask an Expert service to be helpful so far.

And I like how the ConLaw lecturer spells out exactly what to look for in MBE questions.

[Geaux12]

The torts lecturer is the least helpful human I've ever interacted with. Sometimes for comical relief I put him at 1x speed - it's fucking incredible, like a seriously cannot credit, that any human can speak that slowly. And he started off by saying he wasn't going to just read the outline...that's what he's doing, and he still manages to skip some blanks.

I'm still four days behind. Fuck my ass. Haven't turned in a single essay. I need to get caught up ASAP.

[SiRR]

For those that are enjoying it (or getting help from it), what's working for you?!

I find the Checkpoint Quizzes and Flashcards to be really helpful. They help me figure out what to put on my review sheet (or one-sheet or whatever). The questions/cards are much more substantive, good for memorizing elements and tests.

[westphillybandr]

The torts lecturer is the least helpful human I've ever interacted with. Sometimes for comical relief I put him at 1x speed - it's fucking incredible, like a seriously cannot credit, that any human can speak that slowly. And he started off by saying he wasn't going to just read the outline...that's what he's doing, and he still manages to skip some blanks.

I'm still four days behind. Fuck my ass. Haven't turned in a single essay. I need to get caught up ASAP.

Same. Although I'm still trying to do everything while catching up. I think I'll need to cut corners to catch up - there is just too much stuff. I may skip a couple lectures and just review the outline for them.

[Geaux12]

The torts lecturer is the least helpful human I've ever interacted with. Sometimes for comical relief I put him at 1x speed - it's fucking incredible, like a seriously cannot credit, that any human can speak that slowly. And he started off by saying he wasn't going to just read the outline...that's what he's doing, and he still manages to skip some blanks.

I'm still four days behind. Fuck my ass. Haven't turned in a single essay. I need to get caught up ASAP.

Same. Although I'm still trying to do everything while catching up. I think I'll need to cut corners to catch up - there is just too much stuff. I may skip a couple lectures and just review the outline for them.

I'm 1/3rd of the way through the second torts lecture and I'm serious considering giving up on this guy. I'll get the filled in bar notes from a friend, and say fuck it. He's not good, and wasting so much time is giving me a goddamn panic attack (which is melodramatic 40+ days out from test day).

[robinhoodOO]

Oh man, I haven't turned in a single essay yet... was planning on doing my first one tomorrow.

For those that are enjoying it (or getting help from it), what's working for you?!

I've found the Ask an Expert service to be helpful so far.

And I like how the ConLaw lecturer spells out exactly what to look for in MBE questions.

The Conlaw guys was good. I haven't used the ask an expert service. Would that be a way to point out how they have completely botched the essay review? haha; I kid...

[robinhoodOO]

For those that are enjoying it (or getting help from it), what's working for you?!

I find the Checkpoint Quizzes and Flashcards to be really helpful. They help me figure out what to put on my review sheet (or one-sheet or whatever). The questions/cards are much more substantive, good for memorizing elements and tests.

Checkpoint quizzes are fine. I usually nail them, and, like you said, they're good for beefing up rule statements in outlines. I'm just having a hard time finding other redeeming qualities...Reminds me, I'm debating shutting the counter off. It's like a death clock

[despina]

Reminds me, I'm debating shutting the counter off. It's like a death clock

Killed it dead. Never looked back.

[westphillybandr]

I just realized I've been doing worse on the "big ticket" items in my MBE quizzes. I wish Kaplan tracked this sort of thing.

[Geaux12]

I just realized I've been doing worse on the "big ticket" items in my MBE quizzes. I wish Kaplan tracked this sort of thing.

I can't believe BarBri does this and Kaplan does it. Maybe I'm just being mid-bar-study pessimistic...but man I wish I had just taken BarBri.

[kakaa001]

So glad to see that I'm not the only one fucking frustrated with the lectures, inconsistent bar notes formatting, making us write state law essays without teaching any of it, and the MBE quizzes testing shit we haven't covered in lectures.

Also, whoever said Chris Fromm should teach everything? 100% agree.

I find the MBE outline book (or pdf! download it if you can) is much better to track through than the damn lectures. They actually include some of the more nuanced rules/exceptions/examples that are graded on in the MBEs.

Is anyone actually doing the onesheeters? I find that even between rule statements and filling in the sheet, it takes more than 2 hours and isn't near complete. Used the time to review my law school class notes instead and that seems to be going okay.

[Geaux12]

So glad to see that I'm not the only one fucking frustrated with the lectures, inconsistent bar notes formatting, making us write state law essays without teaching any of it, and the MBE quizzes testing shit we haven't covered in lectures.

Also, whoever said Chris Fromm should teach everything? 100% agree.

I find the MBE outline book (or pdf! download it if you can) is much better to track through than the damn lectures. They actually include some of the more nuanced rules/exceptions/examples that are graded on in the MBEs.

Is anyone actually doing the onesheeters? I find that even between rule statements and filling in the sheet, it takes more than 2 hours and isn't near complete. Used the time to review my law school class notes instead and that seems to be going okay.

Whoa whoa where are you finding a PDF of the book? If I can find a way to avoid these goddamn lectures, I'm going to jump at it. I spend more time reformatting the shit bar notes than actually learning (the actual technical formatting of the bar notes is such a clusterfuck; random hard-locked capital letters, unformatted outline structures, etc. etc. etc.).

I like the Contracts guy from Texas (probably gay, Seinfeld references, so awesome). I like Fromm. Otherwise, it feels like we have the "B team" of bar prep lecturers.

[kakaa001]

So glad to see that I'm not the only one fucking frustrated with the lectures, inconsistent bar notes formatting, making us write state law essays without teaching any of it, and the MBE quizzes testing shit we haven't covered in lectures.

Also, whoever said Chris Fromm should teach everything? 100% agree.

I find the MBE outline book (or pdf! download it if you can) is much better to track through than the damn lectures. They actually include some of the more nuanced rules/exceptions/examples that are graded on in the MBEs.

Is anyone actually doing the onesheeters? I find that even between rule statements and filling in the sheet, it takes more than 2 hours and isn't near complete. Used the time to review my law school class notes instead and that seems to be going okay.

Whoa whoa where are you finding a PDF of the book? If I can find a way to avoid these goddamn lectures, I'm going to jump at it. I spend more time reformatting the shit bar notes than actually learning (the actual technical formatting of the bar notes is such a clusterfuck; random hard-locked capital letters, unformatted outline structures, etc. etc. etc.).

I like the Contracts guy from Texas (probably gay, Seinfeld references, so awesome). I like Fromm. Otherwise, it feels like we have the "B team" of bar prep lecturers.

When you login, click on Manage My Course and Payments then click the link for Access Digital Books (under Course Details).

[Geaux12]

So glad to see that I'm not the only one fucking frustrated with the lectures, inconsistent bar notes formatting, making us write state law essays without teaching any of it, and the MBE quizzes testing shit we haven't covered in lectures.

Also, whoever said Chris Fromm should teach everything? 100% agree.

I find the MBE outline book (or pdf! download it if you can) is much better to track through than the damn lectures. They actually include some of the more nuanced rules/exceptions/examples that are graded on in the MBEs.

Is anyone actually doing the onesheeters? I find that even between rule statements and filling in the sheet, it takes more than 2 hours and isn't near complete. Used the time to review my law school class notes instead and that seems to be going okay.

Whoa whoa where are you finding a PDF of the book? If I can find a way to avoid these goddamn lectures, I'm going to jump at it. I spend more time reformatting the shit bar notes than actually learning (the actual technical formatting of the bar notes is such a clusterfuck; random hard-locked capital letters, unformatted outline structures, etc. etc. etc.).

I like the Contracts guy from Texas (probably gay, Seinfeld references, so awesome). I like Fromm. Otherwise, it feels like we have the "B team" of bar prep lecturers.

When you login, click on Manage My Course and Payments then click the link for Access Digital Books (under Course Details).

Thank you very much. Do you use the proprietary Adobe software to read them? Doesn't seem note-friendly.