Hitting the Books

It's the end of the semester!  Time to start really hitting the books.  Here are my top 7 BEST study tips.  I'm sharing only because I like you.  (Yes, just you.  There.  Reading this.)

  5.   Location, Location, Location:  Think about where you want to study.  By the time finals came around, I was sick of the library.  So then I had to think about where else I could study.  I wanted people around, but I wanted to be able to plug my computer in so that I could listen to music without draining my battery.  My favorites?  Panera and Einstein’s Bagels.  Free coffee refills, bagels, soup, and they won’t kick you out.  I also studied in other parts of school (that nice little alcove on the second floor or the big heavy wooden tables of the seventh floor), and in my own room.*  By the time the end of the semester came around, I avoided the library like the plague.


4.  Use other people’s outlines:  Many have come before you, many will come after you.  Use other people’s outlines to explain what you didn’t understand, or show you a point of law you’ve missed entirely.
  

     3.  Make your own outlines!  (Or heavily edit someone else’s):  You don’t understand anyone’s language quite like your own, and the whole point of the outline is to put the law in your own words.  But don’t ask me HOW to make an outline.  I did it differently than everybody else.  Which is to say, wrong.**
    

           2.  Study in Frequent Short Bursts:  You can’t study non-stop, you’ll go crazy.  Study often, but not for very long.  Revise and memorize that outline for 45 minutes, take a ten minute break.  Every 3 cycles make a half hour phone call, go get food, watch TV.  Something to take you away from the work.  Don’t take too long to relax, though, or you’ll find it really hard to get back to work.
    

           1.  Don’t go overboard.  Figure out the major themes, and what cases define those major themes.  You studied the cases you studied FOR A REASON.  And that reason was to illustrate an important rule in the law, NOT to know an obscure fact or detail.

What are your well-guarded study secrets that you’re willing to share for the good of all?  Help a friend in the comments!

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*Not very often though.  Studying in my room is far too distracting.

**Not that doing it wrong didn’t work out.