I finally have a workable outline for Civ Pro. You hear law students talk a great deal about their outlines, which are basically summaries of all the law they had to learn in a course. They can range from maybe as few as 10 pages to as many as 200. Depends on the student and how much they feel they need in the outline versus how much they feel they already know by heart. It basically serves as your study guide for final exams. In theory, if you know your outline, you know all the law you need to know to do well on your final, which is the only graded assignment in most classes.
Civ Pro gave me a lot of trouble, but only because I might as well have been cranking a music box and making a monkey dance all semester. Really, I just didn't have a clue. Once you understand the framework, it's not so bad, but it's like they taught all the elements and then at the end, you're just supposed to understand how they all work.
Sort of like if you took a class on the anatomy of an elephant without ever having seen one (or any similar animal) before. Maybe one day, they start with what an eye is. The next day they describe the hooves. The next day they describe the ears. They finally get done describing all the parts, but what is it? Does it look like a kangaroo? A babboon? What was missing from Civ Pro was an explanation of what the thing looks like from the macro-level. Literally, the class consisted of the rules. Every day, we'd learn a handful of rules with an overall theme of, say, "discovery".
Now, I have an outline. Now, after sitting in the class for over 3 months, I finally feel like I can START to learn the material. Time is ticking away, though.
This was, by far, the worst of my subjects. That's why I tackled the outline first. I honestly think that in my other classes, putting together my outline might be a 2 or 3 hour task. This one? All told, I probably have 20 hours into it and I still don't know it. I just have it all mapped out.
I also probably could have done 3 outlines in the time I spent, but I kept starting, stopping, stepping back, trying to find a better integrating perspective, going back to something I'd worked on previously. This was a mess. Not sure how I could have done better other than getting a good commercial outline on day one and using it. Who knows. I doubt I'd have used it, though. I needed the looming spectre of a final exam to make me sit down and try to internalize all this.
Contracts is the next one. It's not going to be easy, but I have a good outline, there. Just need to learn it. Love the prof. Love his method for teaching it. Both the prof and the method are a little crazy, but then, so am I.
The outline for Property will be not too bad. A few holes to fill in for the outline, but the subject is straghtforward.
Torts, that's been by far my easiest class.
Spent the weekend going through LEEWS again and kicking myself for not doing this before my final memo. It would have given me what I needed to address all the shortcomings that I know are in that thing. If I get a B on it, I'll be amazed.
Now, though, the time crunch is on. I can literally count the remaining full days I have to study. I have Wednesday, but a chunk of that day will be spent getting things in order for the trip to Disney I'm taking Logan on.
I'll have time to study on the plane out and the plane back. I might have some time to study in the park. I'm thinking of just taking my law in a flash cards to study while waiting in lines. Thursday and Friday it's just me and him in at Disneyland. Saturday, the family will be there. Might see if I can fob him off on one of them and find a place to sit down and study. I'd still be in the park and still sorta move with the swarm, but might not wait in line for rides if he has somebody else he can wait with. Then, Sunday, return trip. Again, time to study on planes and during layovers.
After that, school on Monday and Tuesday, then the semester is over. 5 days off (Wed thru Monday) and then the Contracts final. A day off and the Civ Pro final. 4 days off then the Property final and 1 day off and the Torts final.
Generally speaking, the finals will go from hardest to easiest for me. That gives me almost two week's worth of full days off plus whatever studying I can do over Thanksgiving break. (Probably just law in a flash.) Full days of studying generally involve a lot fewer hours than I'd like. I wish I could get in maybe 12 or 14 hours, but in reality, it almost always ends up being only 4-6. Usually closer to 4.
Right now, I have it mapped out that I'll use 5 or 4.5 days to keep blasting out Civ Pro. 3 or 3.5 to tie down Contracts. 3 for Property. 2 for Torts. Combined with studying after school a little here and there, studying on vacation, I think that should be able to get me through this.
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