Dear 1L: What Does “Outlining” Mean in Law School?

Dear 1L,

You’re likely hearing about “outlining.”

Various schools of thought exist on when you should start, and the answer may differ for each of you.

I typically think you should wait to outline until you have a complete topic to outline—and at least until you’ve figured out how to deal with the newness of everything else during these initial few weeks.

That said, you should start right away doing these 2 things:

1️⃣ Retype your daily class notes so that you can read and understand them, come exam-prep time.

2️⃣ Type up and marry into your class notes all of your pre-class notes (from case briefs, reading notes, and notes from supplements).

—> The end-product should be the start of one master document that is organized by topic, rather than by class date.
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🔸 Essentially, you want all the content you need to know on a topic together, in one neat place.

📍 The point is to fill in any gaps in your notes, delete anything repetitive from multiple sources, and create “final notes” that you can study from, and eventually memorize.

▫️ Doing at least the above two steps also will facilitate the process by which you learn the content.

▫️ You can then start to practice applying the content to new hypothetical fact patterns. (We’ll talk more about practice tests, too.)

Please reach out with any questions.

* * *
2Ls, 3Ls, 4Ls, and Lawyers: What did you do, those beginning weeks of law school, to set yourself up for success?

Fondly,

💌 Amanda