CELL Blog | Center for Engaged Learning in the Law

As my previous (and only other) blog entry suggested an exercise for a first class in a Civil Procedure course, it seems fair for my second entry to describe how I typically conclude a course in Evidence.

For some years I have ended courses by bestowing my version of the Academy Awards on deserving students. Using a list of award categories that you can easily find on movie-related websites, I conduct a brief awards ceremony during which I bestow “awards” (if Tootsie Rolls and the like can be considered awards) on a few students whose classroom efforts merit them.

By way of example, here are a few awards I handed out at the end of my Fall 2007 Evidence course:

Student A received an award for Best Public Service Short Feature for starting one class with a riveting promo for a student organization’s upcoming activity.

Student B received an award for Best Foreign Language Short Story for remembering 2 of the 3 elements of res ipsa loquitur.

Student C received an award for Best Animated Feature for waving his arm in the air more often than any other student.

Student D received an award as Best Supporting Actor for reminding me on two occasions during the semester that I had not yet assigned a problem to him to discuss in class.

Students E and F received an award for Best Achievement in Sound Mixing for most in-class whispering.

The categories are of course fluid and they vary from course to course depending on classroom happenings and my ability to remember them. (Keeping track of award-worthy events as they happen is obviously a good idea, but apparently beyond my capacity.)

Last classes are generally poignant events for me. Our little community, artificial and brief as it may be, will never exist again. An awards ceremony is upbeat, and an enjoyable way to review some of what took place while sending almost everyone out of the classroom with a smile on their face.

In my last entry, I blogged about what self-regulated learning is and the evidence that supports my belief that law professors can teach their students to be self-regulated learners. In this entry, I hope to suggest how law professors can integrated self-regulated learning instruction in their regular teaching.

Let me start by noting that the research unquestionably demonstrates that students are much more likely to become expert, self-regulated learners if their instruction in these skills is integrated into their regular coursework. Stand-alone instruction in this area, if it isn’t reinforced in students’ regular courses, doesn’t work. Any guess why not?

So, here are four things law professors can do (I have more, but four seems like a good number for a posting):

(1) Explain to students what self-regulated learning is and have them do some reading about it so the students and the professor have a common lexicon for discussing students’ development of this skill set.

(2) Engage students in activities aimed at each of the three phases. For example, when giving students an assignment, ask them to set a mastery goal for that assignment and then to plan how they will achieve that goal. Similarly, one day in class, mid-discussion, startle the students and then ask them to write about what they were thinking the moment before you startled them. You can then link the fact that many of them were not thinking about the class discussion (sorry, folks, many were but many weren’t) to the idea that, during the implementation phase, students need to be consciously self-monitoring their own comprehension. Along a similar vein, if a student struggles in class to explain a case, you can ask what the student jotted down about that confusion and reinforce students who struggled but knew they didn’t understand (I often say to my students, “Good lawyers know when they don’t know.” Finally, after a practice test, graded paper or exam, you can ask students to reflect on why they did or did not do as well as they would have liked to do and how their results will influence their future learning efforts.

(3) Model reflection in your own work as a teacher. One easy way to do so is to openly acknowledge a mediocre class session and explain your role as the teacher in that outcome and how you will change in response. Another way to do so is to use classroom assessment techniques, such as asking your students (anonymously and in writing) o summarize the key ideas covered in class that day or to identify what has confused them in class so far. If you explicitly respond with an e-mail or short explanation that ties your reflections on their comments to your actions in adding additional instruction, students will see how reflection influences your work as a professional.

(4) Integrate learning strategies instruction in your teaching. Ask students to prepare for class using one or more strategies and discuss their responses in class. For example, have students create a hierarchy chart for one body of law and an outline of another and then reflect on which worked better for them. Another activity I have found to be very useful is to ask students to come to class with paraphrases of doctrine or with examples and non-examples of a concept (e.g., come to class with three statements a court unquestionably characterize as offers and three that are similar in all trivial respects but lack an essential feature of an offer); if students understand material well enough to paraphrase it or generate examples and non-examples, they understand the concept well.

Welcome to the first blog entry I’ve ever written.

One of my teaching habits when preparing for class is to try to view topics from my students’ perspectives- or at least what I think their perspectives are likely to be. My own experiences as a law student have been helpful, though increasingly too far back in the rear view mirror to be of much use.

For example, one semester a few years ago my law school faced a sudden and unexpected shortage of Civil Procedure instructors. I agreed to teach the course, the only time I’ve ever taught Civil Procedure or any first year course for that matter. As it happened, my class met on Monday mornings and thus would be the first law school class my students took.

As I thought about what to do, I remembered my own ill-informed reaction when I was a 1L. It ran along the lines of “This course is dull and unimportant. Who cares about these picky procedural details, give me real rules to think about.” Perhaps unfairly projecting this prejudice onto my students, I decided that I could get the course off to a great start by taking advantage of this mind-set.

So after a very brief hello, I adopted a grave visage and told my class that the Admissions Office had badly over-enrolled the entering class. As a result, three students from my Civil Procedure course would be among those 1L’s who would be terminated but allowed to enroll in next year’s entering class. I announced that after observing the students for a week, I would notify the three students who I had selected for dismissal and that my decision was final. Finally, I told them that I would give them a couple of minutes to write down anonymously any complaints they had about my plan, and I would pass them along to the Dean.

I could sense a bit of unease, to put it mildly. However, I said nothing, and after a few minutes announced that I wouldn’t collect their papers, but would instead call on them to tell me at once, in class, of any complaints they had.

As the students responded, I wrote their reactions on the blackboard in one of two columns. Though they didn’t realize it at the time, one column consisted of “substantive” complaints. This was a short column, consisting of variants of “it’s just not fair.” The second column was quite lengthy, and of course consisted of “procedural” objections: “It’s too late to dismiss anyone now.” “You shouldn’t have the power to decide all by yourself.” “Anyone who’s dismissed should have a chance to talk to the Dean.”

Finally I revealed what I was up to. We as a society care not only about what decisions are made, but also very deeply about the process by which they are made, and that this course is about how decisions are made in our formal system of justice.

I deemed the experiment a success. It made the point and I know I got their attention- many of the students reminded me about the exercise three years later, at graduation.

I recently had a Contracts II class session go particularly well. Afterwards, I reflected in my teaching journal on what went right. Here is the list of things I think helped:

1. The session focused on a particular skill, identifyimng contractual ambiguities, that law professors expect students to master yet seldom explicitly teach. By providing readings and exercises focused on developing that skill and disclosing the development of that skill as an objective, I allowed the students and me to focus on developing a skill I regardas crucial for practicing contracts lawyers.

2. I pre-disclosed each of the problems I wanted to discuss in class, and asked students to respond to these problems as part of their class preparation. This choice allowed me to use class time for students to work in their small groups on deepening their understanding of their analysis of the ambiguities.

3. I used established small groups so the students were familiar with working with each other, and I assigned explicit roles (each student rotated into a role as a presenter and as a reporter for one of the six problems while the rest of the students served as comentators). We went back and forth between group work on each problem and presentation by one or two reporters.

4. I found ways to take delight in my students’ insights, which was very easy because they did so well.

5. I used multiple methods of instruction, including small group, lecture, law school Socratic, students serving in a role as teachers, etc.

~Mike

As we know, “thinking like a lawyer” really means “analyzing complex law and facts in a concise, precise and organized way…. IN WRITING.”

When a guest speaker came to speak to all our first year students yesterday, he said that too many new lawyers don’t know to write.

What can we do to provide more opportunities to learn how to write well?

To help students learn to write, I often give them exercises to write in class or in preparation for class. Sometimes I’d have the students exchange papers with each other to read someone else’s perspective, and then I’d collect, comment and return.

This semester in Remedies I am trying something new – teaching students in teams. As part of that approach, students see many examples of each other’s work. Seeing each others’ writing has had remarkable and unanticipated beneficial consequences.

1. Immediacy. Feedback for students is crucial, and the sooner it is received the better. When students bring an assignment to class, and then immediately review their classmates’ writing, they get immediate feedback.The problem is fresh, they can appreciate others’ perspectives.

2. Modeling. The first time we did this, a few students did a terrific job. The second time students had to bring a written assignment to class they had the advantage of having seen high quality work, and most students performed at a higher level.

3. Efficiency. Because students had copies of each others’ writings, I could give feedback by suggesting they look at their classmates’ work. I could direct them to “look at Nathan’s work” and they could compare it to their own rather than reading my notes about what they could do differently.

4. Self-awareness. Mining their classmates’ responses to solving the same problem also showed students specific areas where they could improve. Every student had something of value in his or her writing that no one else had. During the class and small group discussions where they read writings from the class, students commented on what they learned from reading their classmates’ work.

5. Connection to practice. Even though I teach a legal writing course regularly, I was struck by how powerful it was for students to see each others’ work. Third year students commented how rarely this happened in law school, and how valuable it was for them to see the way someone else organized legal points and wove in policy arguments. This is, after all, what we do in practice.

Ingredients:

1. Written problem handed out in advance (have all students work on the same problem)
2. Clear directions for responding to problem

Steps:

1. Assign all students to prepare a written analysis of a problem.
2. Ask them to bring copies to class (or give you electronic or hard copy beforehand).
3. Compile, copy and distribute.
4. Give students time to read and discuss (in small groups). What would they include in the best written analysis?
5. Listen to discussion.

“There is no right answer,” we frequently tell students. “You have to articulate the reasoning.” It seems to me that what we really mean is that there are several ways to write an excellent answer to a final exam. And there are many ways to write not-so-excellent answers. But what are those many ways to write excellent answers? Giving students sample answers of excellent exams is one way to show them. Not just ONE answer, as that suggests that there is A right answer, but several. I ask students who have done well on final or midterm exams for permission to distribute their answers anonymously. No one has refused. I compile the answers and post them to the course website and email them to students. Students also receive scoring sheets for their essays, showing them how they earned the points for each exam answer. I offer to meet with any student who wants to go over their exam answers, but ask them to first compare their exam answer and scoring sheet with the sample answers. Does giving these samples and feedback ensure that students will learn how to improve their answers? No. But for those who are motivated and inclined to learn from the process, it can provide students with tangible information about what they learned, and what they need to work on.