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Full-Text Articles in Legal History
"Thinking" In A Deweyan Perspective: The Law School Exam As A Case Study For Thinking In Lawyering, Donald J. Kochan
"Thinking" In A Deweyan Perspective: The Law School Exam As A Case Study For Thinking In Lawyering, Donald J. Kochan
Donald J. Kochan
As creatures of thought, we are thinking all the time, but that does not necessarily mean that we are thinking well. Answering the law school exam, like solving any problem, requires that the student exercise thinking in an effective and productive manner. This Article provides some guidance in that pursuit. Using John Dewey’s suspended conclusion concept for effective thinking as an organizing theme, this Article presents one basic set of lessons for thinking through issues that arise regarding the approach to a law school exam. This means that the lessons contained here help exercise thought while taking the exam — …
An Informal History Of How Law Schools Evaluate Students, With A Predictable Emphasis On Law School Exams, Steve Sheppard
An Informal History Of How Law Schools Evaluate Students, With A Predictable Emphasis On Law School Exams, Steve Sheppard
Steve Sheppard
This story of the evolution of legal evaluations from the seventeenth century to the close of the twentieth depicts English influences on American law student evaluations, which have waned in the twentieth century with the advent of course-end examinations. Seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English examinations given to conclude a legal degree were relatively ceremonial exercises in which performance was often based on the demonstration of rote memory. As examination processes evolved, American law schools adopted essay evaluations from their English counterparts. Examinees in the nineteenth century were given a narrative, requiring the recognition of particularly appropriate legal doctrines, enunciation of the …