Even if students are practicing a lot, typically they hate to evaluate their own work. Why? Well, because it is kind of a miserable experience! Who likes to beat themselves up about the things they did wrong? Not me (and I am sure not you either).
But it is important. Each time you do practice, you need to be thoughtfully evaluating your work as you go and after you are done.
Why else is this self-evaluation important? Because you won’t have someone there on test day to tell you whether you did it right. You are the only one who can help you. So it is important to think through your work and decide whether it is good or not. Because on test day, you are all you have got to rely on!
What do I mean by self-evaluation?
If you are working on an essay exam . . .
When you are done with a question, ask yourself the following (and also compare your answer with the sample answer).
- How long did this essay take you? If you went over time, why?
- Did you plan your essay before you wrote it? Did your planning help you write your answer?
- Compare your answer with the sample answer:
- How was your issue spotting?
- How was the format of your answer (did you use IRAC, if required)?
- Was your essay easy to read?
- Was your essay organized correctly?
- Did you know the law well enough?
- Did you learn anything from this essay that you will apply to the next one?
If you are working on a performance test . . .
When you are done with the performance test, it is important to immediately review your answer so you can remember your thought process as you put the answer together. Similarly, you want to ask yourself the following questions (and again review the sample answer).
- How long did this PT take you? If you went over time, why?
- Did you plan your answer before you wrote it? Did your planning help you write your answer?
- Compare your answer with the sample answer:
- How was your organization?
- How was the format of your answer (did you use IRAC, if required)?
- Did you include the correct rule statements?
- Is your PT easy to read and professional?
- Did you learn anything from this performance test that you will apply to the next one?
If you are working on practice MBE questions . . .
Students often think that they can’t really do a self-evaluation of a practice MBE question, but I think this is just not true! Each time you do an MBE question you should check the answer and make sure you understand why you got it right (if you got it right) and why you got it wrong (if you got it wrong). This will help you pinpoint and focus your studying. If you got it wrong because you don’t know the law, well, then you need to study that law. If you got it wrong because you misread the facts, then you need to work on how you read an MBE question.
Evaluating your work helps you study smarter and more efficiently because you can identify what is good and what you need to keep working on. And who doesn’t want to do that?
Should you self-evaluate work graded by someone else?
Yes! You absolutely should. Because you want to make sure that your evaluation matches that of the expert who is grading your work. If you don’t understand the comments or don’t notice the issues the expert found with your work, that is a problem. You want to get to a point where you know if you are producing quality essays and performance tests so you can do the same on exam day.
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Did you find this post helpful? Check out some of our other articles for more great study tips!
- Establish a Bar Exam Routine
- Do I Need to Make my Own Study Materials?
- Develop a Rock Star Study Schedule
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