First Year Students - How To Do Better This Semester: Look To Some Friends In High Places; Part II.

The best way to beat (or, best) an exam is to sit down and actually take a practice exam. Someone penned the phrase that "Proper Planning Prevents Poor Performance." I cannot take credit for this moniker, but I can take credit for doing what I have done since learning. Planning to take a series of practice examinations now, does, I believe, prevent poor performance on a final examination later. You will be fortunate to learn just a lot about yourself and how you react under testing or testlike conditions.

There are a lot (and, I mean a lot) of things we worry about when deciding whether to sit for a few practice exams. It is true. Some of those things should give us pause for concern. Most of the things that students' give as a reason why they don't write practice examinations are not important. Not at all.

Let me try to defray those fears, initially.

1. Sentence Length: You may actually write a few, run-on sentences in the answer, but it will still be an answer. It may not be grammatically correct, but you are not entering an English contest; you are writing to properly and adequately convey a message to one person in an audience multiplied by five (5) classes).

2. Abbreviations: Yes, of course you can abbreviate. Do you really think that your professors believe that you are deficient, or care that you abbreviated something, especially, "Daniels Chicken, Seafood, Biscuits, Chips, & Bacon Grease." You are worried about points in the wrong category.

3. Spacing: If you are typing the "practice" examination, and, as most law schools, now, you are typing the final, then you are provided instructions regarding typing. I believe that your work is double-spaced. If you fail to turn in a written product that is not double spaced (eg., single or triple spaced), I doubt very seriously whether the professor erases more than a point or two, if any for typewritten work that is single spaced. It is still typewritten, after all, isn't it.

4. Knowledge of the law: I want to say that this is a sticky subject in which to make a comment, but, at the end of the day, it isn't. Many students say they don't "do" practice examinations because they don't know enough of, or, any law. They just don't feel right practicing a question when they don't know the answer. True, it is of the utmost importance for any lawyer to have a handle on the law, in general, and especially in one's practice area.

However, you are not always practicing the substance of the law when you sit down for a practice exam. You are practicing for what if, moments, too. Don't you want to know whether you freeze up, or slow down, or move faster, or don't move at all when you have, let's say, difficulty articulating a law-related concept?

Don't you want to have a backup plan and shouldn't you know what that plan entails? What better way to know your flaws and how to implement a Plan B, other than to take practice tests. The other benefit to taking practice examinations is that you are required to struggle to answer the questions. You have already struggled on some written assignments; why not add law school questions as an additional challenge to those circumstance in which you did not know the answer.

Give yourself the best possible opportunity to win a new grade, by practicing on old exams.

Thank you,

Prof. Smith