How to Study Essay Subjects? Forum

[lawschoolwoohoo]

I'm taking the bar in Georgia in a couple weeks. I've been doing Barbri + Adaptibar + Critical Pass and getting decent scores on the MBE (75% on Adaptibar, 138 on Barbri Practice MBE) but am wondering if anyone had any suggestions on preparing for essay/MPT? I've been trying to keep up with Barbri's schedule of sample essays, but am falling behind. There's a lot in one day. I have been making flash cards for the essay subjects, but it's taking a long time and causing me to fall behind.

I've also been trying to do a practice MPT every other day so I can get those scores on pace.

Georgia is 50% MPE, 25% MPT, 25% essays. Anyone have any suggestions for learning the essay subjects beyond just practice essays? I feel if I try to do flashcards for all the subjects as I have been, I'll run out of time. Should I just read the CMR? I've already made outlines for all the essay subjects on my own. I'm starting to get burned out, but I'm doing my best to power through. I have a job I like a lot lined up and I only get one shot at the bar to keep it (public interest).

[ironbmike]

I'm taking the bar in Georgia in a couple weeks. I've been doing Barbri + Adaptibar + Critical Pass and getting decent scores on the MBE (75% on Adaptibar, 138 on Barbri Practice MBE) but am wondering if anyone had any suggestions on preparing for essay/MPT? I've been trying to keep up with Barbri's schedule of sample essays, but am falling behind. There's a lot in one day. I have been making flash cards for the essay subjects, but it's taking a long time and causing me to fall behind.

I've also been trying to do a practice MPT every other day so I can get those scores on pace.

Georgia is 50% MPE, 25% MPT, 25% essays. Anyone have any suggestions for learning the essay subjects beyond just practice essays? I feel if I try to do flashcards for all the subjects as I have been, I'll run out of time. Should I just read the CMR? I've already made outlines for all the essay subjects on my own. I'm starting to get burned out, but I'm doing my best to power through. I have a job I like a lot lined up and I only get one shot at the bar to keep it (public interest).

I've got the same question. Just doing them doesn't seem to do much. I think it's actually helpful to answer them open book, because it helps to learn the rules. But there's just so much material, it's too much to flashcard. I'm just reading through the lecture notes and trying to read as many essays as possible, and then read and digest the answer.

[rcharter1978]

I'm taking the bar in Georgia in a couple weeks. I've been doing Barbri + Adaptibar + Critical Pass and getting decent scores on the MBE (75% on Adaptibar, 138 on Barbri Practice MBE) but am wondering if anyone had any suggestions on preparing for essay/MPT? I've been trying to keep up with Barbri's schedule of sample essays, but am falling behind. There's a lot in one day. I have been making flash cards for the essay subjects, but it's taking a long time and causing me to fall behind.

I've also been trying to do a practice MPT every other day so I can get those scores on pace.

Georgia is 50% MPE, 25% MPT, 25% essays. Anyone have any suggestions for learning the essay subjects beyond just practice essays? I feel if I try to do flashcards for all the subjects as I have been, I'll run out of time. Should I just read the CMR? I've already made outlines for all the essay subjects on my own. I'm starting to get burned out, but I'm doing my best to power through. I have a job I like a lot lined up and I only get one shot at the bar to keep it (public interest).

It sounds like you'll be fine. You're doing fine on the MBE, which should give you an idea of how much BLL you know for the essays. I think doing the essays is the best way to practice. But if you have a good strategy in place for the MPT and you're doing well on the MBE -- you may not need to focus as much on absolutely killing the essays, but just aiming for doing....good enough.

Does the act of making flash cards help you? If so, keep doing it, if not I would think you may want to shift to using your critical pass flashcards/CMR and do more practice essays. Or just issue spotting if doing full essays is burning you out. In fact, issue spotting may help with the burnout because you can issue spot much faster than you will write out a full essay.

[lawschoolwoohoo]

Thanks everyone! Between essays and Barbri's horrifying referesher MBE, it's been a rough couple days. I'll use those tips going forward.

[Startled Rabbit]

How much study time is necessary for MPTs? They seem pretty straightforward, so I'm wondering if maybe I'm missing something.

[fauxpsych]

How much study time is necessary for MPTs? They seem pretty straightforward, so I'm wondering if maybe I'm missing something.

I'm also curious since I've put minimal effort into practicing them since I got the graded assignment back. It's also the first thing we do right? So It's not like I'll be too fatigued to read a "library".

[Mr. Archer]

If your real MBE score is consistent with the Barbri practice, you shouldn't have anything to worry about. As far as GA essays, I wouldn't worry about making flash cards. I just read outlines last year when I took the GA bar. Make sure you're familiar with the most tested GA essays: torts, crim, contracts, GA civ pro, and to some extent family law. You can look at the last few exams and see if any of those weren't hit because that topic might be due. The GA civ pro essays (it was one whole question and half of another) was the most difficult for the July 2015 exam.

If you're getting burned out, you can just try outlining a few essays. Just making sure you can spot the issues and write down the rule statements goes a long way for practice. As for the MPTs, those are easy opportunities to increase your score, so you should do a few. Make sure you're familiar with any headings that go with specific documents. You can look at basic formats for documents, although the prompt will probably tell you a lot about that. MPT practice is really about getting the timing down and learning how not to get bogged down by either reading too slow or writing about irrelevant information that you're given. Running out of time is probably the biggest issue people face on the MPT.