Category: Strategies

Posted on - 1 Comment on How do Magicsheets and Approsheets fit into your other bar exam study materials?

How do Magicsheets and Approsheets fit into your other bar exam study materials?

There are a LOT of study supplements, resources, and outlines for bar prep. As time passes, more and more get added to your potential repertoire.

Sometimes, the sheer overwhelm causes bar takers to load up on all sorts of materials, attend every workshop, DM everyone offering something — spreading themselves so thin that they end up not using any of it!

The materials collect digital dust, and bar takers end up restarting at square one, exhausted. But “the great aim of education is not knowledge but action.” (Herbert Spencer)

I, too, offer study materials for the California Bar Exam and the Uniform Bar Exam. Here’s my answer to questions about them, including HOW to use them. This will be useful whether or not you use my material.

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Posted on - No Comments on What to Do for the July Bar Exam as a First Timer

What to Do for the July Bar Exam as a First Timer

Now that everyone’s here, maybe we stand a chance against the final boss.

You got your books, you announced on social media that you’re going to be super busy for the next 2-3 weeks, and you got your favorite pens and highlighters ready. How hard can it be, right?

But as a first-timer, it’s unclear what to even expect from bar prep. Let me show you a vision of the future and how you can change it, using 20/20 FORESIGHT.

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Posted on - No Comments on Should you forget about essays and just focus on the MBE (“auto-pass” with the MBE)?

Should you forget about essays and just focus on the MBE (“auto-pass” with the MBE)?

No, this approach has a few potential inaccuracies and dangers.

Below are four of the dangers and a better approach to take instead if you want to prioritize a few areas.

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Posted on - No Comments on Setting Up Clear Goals You Can Follow for the Bar Exam

Setting Up Clear Goals You Can Follow for the Bar Exam

When preparing for the bar exam, set up clear goals you can follow.

Say someone asks you what you want. You say that you want to pass the bar. Great, a north star that you can reach toward!

But the end goal itself doesn’t tell you what to do at any given moment. It often makes you feel good about the future end result, but it doesn’t mean you will do the needed things in between now and the desired result.

For example, a new year’s resolution like “I want to lose weight” gives you a nice self-affirmation and a burst of motivation.

However, 80% of such resolutions fail by February. There are many actions required, such as watching your calories and macros, exercising, and doing so consistently. Simply jumping in with a new gym membership is a recipe for your goal getting ghosted.

There are three main components to good goals…

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Posted on - 21 Comments on What’s the Best Way to Study for the Bar Exam WITH a Bar Prep Course?

What’s the Best Way to Study for the Bar Exam WITH a Bar Prep Course?

You know me. I’m a proponent of DIY studying without a bar prep course.

Not just me. Many retakers who pass come back to tell me that they wish they’d abandoned the bloated courses in the first place. I hear this every year. Many repeaters and even first-timers tell me their bar review course wasn’t working for them, so they turned to alternative approaches.

But that’s not the point of this article.

The point is, how do we use our course effectively and properly?

While going solo can be effective not just in terms of cost but by virtue of its emphasis on learning, it’s not for everyone. Sometimes we want everything laid out and be told what to do.

You understandably feel lost with seemingly no other option other than a bar review course when you first start out. Even repeaters wonder, “What’s the best bar review course?” It’s such an important exam that you want to do it right.

Most people start with a traditional commercial bar prep course like Barbri, Themis, Kaplan (if you’re a masochist like me), or BarMax — or even a smaller independent course like that offered by JD Advising, Studicata, SmartBarPrep, or many others.

In other words, there are many ways to study for the bar exam. They can all work. Instead of debating for days which program is the “best” and ending up undecided, worry about being a good student. 

Bar prep, at its core, is self-study. Courses and materials are merely there to support YOUR studies.

That said, let’s talk about how to pick a bar prep course and how to use it to move the needles that will help you learn.

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