Article of the Month
August 2010
Roberto Corrada, A Simulation of Union Organizing in a Labor Law Class, 46 Journal of Legal Education 445 (1996).
A lot has been written about using simulations in law teaching. In this intriguing article, Professor Corrada explains his whole class simulation model. Instead of creating a series of mini-simulations, Corrada made his entire labor law class a union management simulation in which he was management, his students were the workers, and the students were expected to unionize so they could negotiate the terms of the class.
This approach not only adds authenticity but also gives students a reason to invest in learning what they are studying in the course. Students who might otherwise see labor law as some sort of ancient relic of a time gone by learn first hand the power and efficacy of unions. The approach also is consistent with adult learning theory because the resulting union is able to successfully influence the contours of the professor's syllabus.
[Read fulltext (831 KB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, The Association of American Law Schools, © 1996; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
June 2010
Vernellia R. Randall, Increasing Retention and Improving Performance: Practical Advice on Using Cooperative Learning in Law Schools, 16 Thomas M. Cooley Law Review 201 (1999).
Professor Randall provides a thorough introduction to the whys and hows of cooperative (small group) learning in law school. She reviews the extensive literature (over 700 studies) that establishes the benefits of cooperative learning, including student mastery of complex concepts, development of problem solving and thinking skills, positive attitudes toward the subject, closer relationships among students, and respect for diversity.
Professor Randall articulates seven elements for the design of effective cooperative learning activities and applies them to legal education:
1. Instructional objectives - the teacher clearly articulates the objectives (which could include knowledge, attitudes, and skills) of the activity.
2. Set up groups - the teacher decides group size, membership (heterogeneous or homogeneous), and the method for selecting members.
3. Positive interdependence - each student feels part of a team, responsible not only for her own learning, but for the learning of other group members as well.
4. Promotive interaction - students engage in face-to-face interaction to explore issues and to work toward achievement of instructional goals.
5. Individual accountability - each student is accountable for contributing a fair share to the group's success.
6. Group social skills - students get to know one another, communicate accurately, support one another, and resolve conflicts constructively.
7. Group processing - students reflect on group processing and give one another feedback on individual and group effectiveness.
Professor Randall's article is an excellent resource for law teachers new to cooperative learning and those who want a refresher to improve their students learning via small group methods.
[Read fulltext (4.6 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Thomas M. Cooley Law Review, © 1999; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
May 2010
Leah Christensen, Enhancing Law School Success: A Study of Goal Orientations, Academic Achievement and the Declining Self-Efficacy of Our Law Students, 33 Law & Psychology Review 57 (2009).
Do students who focus on mastering their law school material rather than on grades do better in law school? Does believe in oneself predict success in law school? This article asks and offers the results of a carefully-constructed study as a start to answering these important questions.
Interestingly, even though law schools place a huge emphasis on grades, generally assigning lower grades than all other graduate schools and often ranking students from first to last on a semester-by-semester basis, the most successful law students have a mastery rather than a grade focus. This result has very interesting implications not only for future studies but also for reforming how law schools train their students. Studies in other settings show that students can be trained to develop mastery goals; future studies can and should explore whether training students to choose to adopt mastery goals can have similar effects. Regardless of the results of such studies, this paper makes it clear that law schools may be able to improve student performance by altering their emphasis on grades and focusing more on mastery.
The study also reveals that mastery orientation trumps LSAT scores as a predictor of law school success. That piece of data should haunt law schools.
Equally interesting is Christensen's data showing that the high performing, mastery-oriented students are more likely than their peers to doubt their academic abilities. In other words, it appears that law schools manage to make even their best performing students feel bad about themselves.
[Read fulltext (2.1 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Law & Psychology Review, © 2009; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
April 2010
Ellie Margolis, Closing the Floodgates: Making Persuasive Policy Arguments in Appellate Briefs, 62 Montana Law Review 59 (2001).
Teaching students to properly develop, cite, and advance policy arguments continues to be challenging for most professors. The arguments are typically not supported by authority and, as a result, usually lack persuasion. Further, professors teach students to find and understand a law's policy as it applies to a particular set of facts. However, policy arguments are also needed to convince a court to apply a rule to a new situation. This is usually not taught in most legal writing programs or in most doctrinal classes. To complicate matters, most textbooks used by legal research and writing professors provide cursory mention of this type of policy argument.
This article not only establishes the importance of teaching policy argumentation as a skill, but more importantly, it also explains the nature and types of policy arguments. Professor Margolis divides policy arguments into four categories: judicial administration arguments, normative arguments, institutional competence arguments, and economic arguments. In addition, the article provides a very succinct way to teach students to find support for their policy arguments, a skill with which students often struggle. Any professor who reads this article will learn solid ways to discuss the types of policy arguments and solid ways to help students support their policy arguments.
[Read fulltext (1.7 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Montana Law Review, © 2001; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
Gonzaga University School of Law
February 2010
Patrick Longan, Teaching Professionalism, 60 Mercer Law Review 659 (2008).
Law schools are challenged to teach professionalism in Educating Lawyers and Best Practices for Legal Education. The American Bar Association accreditation standards require law schools to teach rules of professional conduct as well as the history, goals, structure, and values of the profession. In this article, Professor Longan describes Legal Profession, a required first-year course at Mercer that responds to these challenges and mandates.
The classroom portion of the Legal Profession course addresses four professionalism lessons: (1) what professionalism means and why it is important to lawyers and the public; (2) what pressures lead lawyers to engage in unprofessional conduct; (3) how the expectations of profession are encouraged and enforced; and (4) how professionalism connects to students' sense of fulfillment as lawyers.
Several reflective and experiential elements of the course help students connect what they are learning in the classroom and their own professional identities with the reality of the legal profession. Students engage in reflective writing via essays and blog posts throughout the course. Prominent legal professionals speak to the students about meaningful law practice, the development of professional identity, substance abuse, and virtue and spirituality in law practice. Students read and discuss a biography of a famous lawyer. Finally, students conduct an oral history of a lawyer or judge.
For his work on the Legal Profession course, Professor Longan received the 2005 National Award for Innovation and Excellence in Teaching Professionalism from the American Bar Association Standing Committee on Professionalism, the National Conference of Chief Justices, and the Burge Endowment for Legal Ethics.
[Read fulltext (2.6 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Mercer Law Review, © 2008; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
January 2010
Alice M. Thomas, Laying the Foundation for Better Student Learning in the Twenty-First Century: Incorporating an Integrated Theory of Legal Education into Doctrinal Pedagogy, 6 Widener Law Symposium Journal 49 (2000).
Why do you teach the way you teach? In this provocative and extremely useful article, Professor Alice M. Thomas of Howard University School of Law carefully explains a wide variety of learning and teaching theories, calls upon all law professors to develop their own teaching and learning theories, and offers her own theories for our consideration. She argues that, as professionals in our field (education), we should not only be familiar with the literature she so effectively describes but also have developed our own understandings of how our students learn and what constitutes effective teaching. Her article asks a lot of us, but her articulation of existing and her own theories is worth the effort.
[Read fulltext (4.7 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Widener Law Symposium Journal, © 2000; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
December 2009
Jay Feinman, Simulations: An Introduction, 45 Journal of Legal Education 469 (1995).
Simulations are an effective method to help students achieve core goals of legal education, including deep understanding of doctrine, acquisition of skills, and appreciation of professional values. In this classic, short article, Jay Feinman identifies the wide spectrum of simulations available to law teachers, including single experience exercises (draft a complaint), extended exercises (interview a client, negotiate an agreement, and draft the agreement), and entire courses built around lawyering activities. The article then provides a simulation-design primer, including advice on goals, facts, roles, collaboration among students, products of the exercise, time, assistance from adjuncts and teaching assistants, preparation, reflection, and evaluation. This little gem of an article is followed by four articles discussing simulations in first-year and upper-level courses.
[Read fulltext (834 KB PDF)]
November 2009
Robin Boyle and Rita Dunn, Teaching Law Students Through Individual Learning Styles, 62 Albany Law Review 213 (1998).
As teachers, we all feel frustrated when our students don't learn, and it's tempting to blame the students: "They can't deal with ambiguity." "They don't work hard enough." "They aren't able to think abstractly." In this excellent article, Professor Robin Boyle of St. John's, and her collaborator, Dr. Rita Dunn, also of St. John's, offer alternative explanations for students' failures to learn based on the research on learning styles. They studied the learning styles of students attending St. John's and found what learning style experts would expect-- the students varied greatly in their learning styles. They advocate that law professors assess their own students and adapt their teaching to better reach a broad spectrum of students.
[Read fulltext (469 KB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Albany Law Review, © 1985)
October 2009
Paula Lustbader, Construction Sites, Building Types, and Bridging Gaps: A Cognitive Theory of the Learning Progression of Law Students, 33 Willamette Law Review 315 (1997).
In this incredibly useful article, Professor Paula Lustbader of Seattle
University School of Law re-conceptualizes legal education as a
developmental process and identifies and explains the steps in students'
progression from novices to legal experts.
[Read fulltext (3.2 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Willamette Law Review, © 1985)
September 2009
Kent Syverud, Taking Students Seriously: A Guide for New Law Teachers, 43 Journal of Legal Education 247 (1993).
As a new school year begins and we meet a new group of students, we can benefit from grounding ourselves in fundamental principles of teaching and learning. Kent Syverud offers timeless advice for new and experienced teachers on the importance of establishing positive relationships with students. "First: Your students will know whether you like and respect them, and if they know that you do not, you will fail as a teacher." "Second: if your students know that you like and respect them, they will forgive a great deal in the classroom." Dean Syverud then sets out a boatload of practical ideas to help us establish an effective teaching/learning environment in our classrooms.
[Read fulltext (762 KB)]
(Reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
August 2009
Barbara Glesner Fines, The Impact of Expectations on Teaching and Learning Law, 38 Gonzaga Law Review 89 (2002/03).
This article by Barb Glesner Fines builds on the decades of research establishing the effect of teachers' expectations on students – high expectations lead to high student performance, low expectations lead to low student performance. Professor Glesner Fines then translates that research into practice, addressing barriers to high expectations and offering helpful ideas for law teachers to avoid excessive demands while maintaining rigor.
[Read fulltext (1.7 MB PDF)]
July 2009
Jay Feinman and Marc Feldman, Pedagogy and Politics, 73 Georgetown Law Journal 875 (1985).
In this classic article, Jay Feinman and Marc Feldman offer a wealth of great course design ideas that also have implications for the design of first-year curricula, describe their efforts to implement formative and summative assessment in their teaching, and describe the grading process in a way that resonates with anyone who has ever read an exam and explained, "But I said-- three times-- not to do that in class!"
[Read fulltext (4.6 MB PDF)]
(Reprinted with permission of the publisher, Georgetown Law Journal, © 1985; reprint courtesy HeinOnline.org)
June 2009
Sophie Sparrow, Describing the Ball: Improve Teaching by Using Rubrics - Explicit Grading Criteria, 2004 Mich. St. L. Rev. 1.
Carnegie and Best Practices emphasize the importance of assessment. In this excellent article, Sophie Sparrow explains how detailed, written grading criteria describing what students should learn and how they will be evaluated should be a central part of law teachers' assessment plans. The article details how rubrics can improve law student learning, and contains both detailed, step-by-step directions on creating rubrics and examples of rubrics from many different law school courses.
[Read at HeinOnline]
