Welcome to the TAMU Law bar-prep blog

Dear soon-to-be lawyers:

The bar exam is 81 days/12 weeks from today! Seems like forever, but it will be here before you know it. 

Every week during bar prep, I'll publish a blog post and put the link in GroupMe. The blog will cover what's happening in Barbri/Themis/Adaptibar, what you should be working on, study tips, exam-day strategies, and logistical information (like when it's time to register your laptop and announcements from the BLE).

This first post is much longer than most because it contains "how-tos" for Barbri, Themis, Adaptibar, and QBank. 

In the blog's navigation menu (the "pancake" button ≡ in the upper-left corner)>External Links, you will find links to resources like our MPT and MEE banks and the BLE's FAQ. The blog's home page contains our contact info, including mobile numbers and Calendly links to schedule on-demand meetings.

When should I start bar prep?

As soon as possible! The sooner you start, the less work you will have per day. Running out of study time is the #1 reason preppers fail the bar exam. Starting ASAP is the solution.

What should I do first?

Here's a checklist of the 7 top-priority tasks:

1. If you haven't enrolled in a bar-prep program, do so now! Based on the experience of thousands of A&M grads, I can recommend only Barbri or Themis. If you want to know why, send me an email, and we can chat about it.

2. The next step is to order your bar-prep books. You have to pay a deposit, but it's refundable if you ship the books back after the bar exam.

3. If you're using Barbri, you need Adaptibar. Adaptibar (or AB for short) is a multiple-choice practice platform, and it has been instrumental in our graduates' amazing bar-exam success for the past three years. Use code "TAMULAWAB" and your @tamu.edu email address for a $50 discount.  The questions on Adaptibar are different from those in BArbri and comprise questions released by the NCBE--the people who write the actual bar exam.
   
   Themis has a competing product called "UWorld QBank" that comes free with Themis. It draws on the same pool of NCBE-licensed questions as Adaptibar. It has some features that Adaptibar lacks (like illustrated explanations for some questions and a built-in flashcard maker), but it lacks Adaptibar's adaptive algorithm that forces preppers to work on their weaknesses. If you're using Themis, QBank is probably good enough. I'm happy to discuss the pros and cons; just ask on GroupMe if you want more info.

4. Read and bookmark the BLE's FAQ page for the July exam. It's short now, but the BLE will add to it over time. And read the general FAQs on the same page. Read the "General Instructions," the list of permitted/prohibited items, and laptop information.

5. Create a study schedule. And stick to it! This Google Sheet's planning tool will help you budget enough study time every day and create weekly targets for  Barbri, Themis, Adaptibar, essays, and MPTs.
   
   

6. Talk to your family and friends about bar prep! They probably think that with graduation behind you, the bar exam is a minor speedbump on your journey to becoming a lawyer. Thank them for supporting you for the past 3 years--but ask them to support you for the next 3 months! Explain that bar-prep is like finals but goes on for 10 weeks instead of 2 ("Remember how stressed out, checked-out, and tired-out I was during exams? Well, I'm going to be that way until July! And if you thought I was hard to live with then . . . ."). We created a page on this blog specifically for family members--send them the link!
   
   

7. If you are working during bar prep, talk to your employer about bar prep and taking off at least all of July (and half of June, if possible). If you're working for a law firm and the firm wants you to get your license, the firm should understand your need for time off. Other employers may not understand the magnitude of bar prep; you'll have to explain it to them. If your employer (law firm or otherwise) is not receptive to the idea, let us know; we (and specifically Deans Ahdieh and Artie) may be able to persuade them.

Bar-Prep Q&A

Adaptibar 101

“Practice Questions” mode shows you one question at a time, then shows you an explanatory answer. “Exam” mode does not show you any answers until you answer all the questions in the set (however many questions you asked for). You should spend most of your time in "Practice" mode!

On the Practice Questions screen, select the topics you want to study (this should almost always be a mix of topics to leverage the “interleaving” effect) and make sure you check the “Exclude MBE Complete Practice Exam Questions/Exclude MBE Study Aid Questions” boxes:

The Complete Practice Exams and Study Aids are 4, 100-question sets that you will complete later in bar prep, and you do not want to see those questions before you are ready to answer those question sets.

“Exam” mode allows you to choose not only the broad topics you want to practice but also the subtopics within those topics:

This will be very useful later in bar prep when you want to do a little focused practice on a topic that you find particularly troublesome.

How do I know how many questions I should do on Adaptibar every day?

If you are wondering how many Adaptibar questions you should do per day while you are studying for the bar exam, you can use our patented (not really) Adaptibar calculator to help you find the answer. You should complete at least 1,300 Adaptibar questions (1,700-1,900 are better!) throughout your bar prep. In order to use the Adaptibar calculator, find your exam date on the spreadsheet and enter the number of questions you have already completed. The spreadsheet will tell you how many questions to answer per day to hit a 1,300, 1,700, or 1,900 target. The spreadsheet assumes you will do all four 100-question practice exams in Adaptibar. The questions-per-day on the spreadsheet are for every day except the days when you complete the Barbri or Themis simulated MBE and the Adaptibar practice exams (the CPEs and Study Aids).

UWorld/QBank 101

The first time you click the UWorld/QBank link at the bottom of the Themis navigation bar, You will need to input your password to link your Themis and UWorld accounts.

Here's what the QBank dashboard looks like:

Here's what it all means:

1. "Tutor" mode shows you one question, and then the answer and explanation, at a time. This is the mode you should be using most of the time! If you turn off "Tutor," you have to complete all the questions in the set before you see the answers--and that's not optimal for learning. Choosing "Timer" will display a countdown timer on the screen (it gives you the exam-time 1 minute, 48 seconds per question).

2. Under Question Mode, choose "Standard." After you've answered some questions, you can choose to revisit skipped or incorrectly answered questions by checking the appropriate boxes.

3. Under Subject and Chapters (or "topics" and "subtopics"), you can choose which topics you want to study. Most of your practice should be "mixed practice" from all the subjects. Later in bar prep, we'll do some "focused" practice on individual subtopics that you identify as weaknesses, but that's a ways off).

4. Under No. of Questions, enter the number of questions you want to enter for this session (duh). I recommend 10 at a time, then taking a break.

5. Click Generate Test to start. 

Be sure to pay close attention to the explanatory answer and contextualize the rules by looking them up in your outline. 

In QBank, you can create flashcards right from the explanatory answer, which is a cool feature. You can review the flashcards by clicking Tools>Flashcards on the UWorld main menu. The flashcards have an elaborate spaced-repetition feature that is beyond the scope of this how-to.

I'm fascinated by the neurology, neurobiology, and psychology of learning. Every week, this blog will include science-based study tips based on peer-reviewed research. The tips just might make bar prep more bearable--and improve your score on exam day.

This week's tip: Put your phone in another room when you study! You know your phone is a distraction. Maybe you're already taking steps to reduce it's distractive impact, like turning on "do not disturb" or putting it in silent mode. That may not be enough. Multiple studies show that having the phone in the room where you're studying--even if it's face down; even if it's turned off!; even if it's in your backpack!--reduces your cognitive capacity by 10%! That means your studying could be 10% more effective if you simply leave your phone in a different room. Seems that when our cell phones are nearby, our brains are constantly wondering, "Is there a message? Is there a message? I should check and see if I have a message!"

So: Consider putting your phone in a different room (r at least out of sight) during study sessions. Take a break every hour or ninety minutes. During the breaks, let your lizard brain feast on the 'net. Get that dopamine hit. Then put the phone in the other room and get back to bar prep! It's an easy, no-cost way to enhance your studying and maximize your odds of passing the bar.

Sources:

The Effects of Cell Phone Use and Emotion‐regulation Style on College Students' Learning  | Applied Cognitive Psychology (2017).
Brain Drain: The Mere Presence of One’s Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity | Journal of the Association for Consumer Research: Vol 2, No 2 (2017).
The Mere Presence of Your Smartphone Reduces Brain Power, Study Shows - UT News (utexas.edu)
E-Z Reader version: https://www.vice.com/en/article/7x9zmy/just-being-near-your-phone-makes-you-dumber

Question of the Week

Q: Prof. Murphy, I've been prepping since Monday. The daily assignments (everything Barbri/Themis told me to do plus my daily Adaptibar/QBank) are taking less time than I thought they would. Am I doing something wrong?

A: Nope. In the early days, you might finish early. That's no problem! I suggest that you start building up a "cushion" against future unforeseen events (e.g., you contract Covid like I did a couple of weeks ago) by doing an assignment or two from tomorrow's task list. Apart from that, when you're done, you're done!

That's all for this week. Feel free to reach out to me or Prof. Deutsch anytime.