Feeling lost in your law school classes? An easy but surprising tool for gaining confidence and calming that anxiety:
THE SYLLABUS
Here’s why:
Does it feels like returning home from somewhere feels faster than going?
On the way back you know how long it takes. You have meaningful expectations.
The same is true for a class. You can feel lost if you don’t know where the topic fits into the overall roadmap of the course.
The benefit is that the syllabus (and the textbook Table of Contents) can serve as that roadmap of where you are going.
Not only is every topic listed, the organization of those topics is made clear as well. What are the big themes?; what are the one offs?
Think about it this way. Every topic covered in a 1L class could be its own 13-week course. What makes intro classes great is they give you the 50K view of a topic. The hard part is you won’t be an expert even at the end.
So in the beginning of the semester you can create a table of contents of your notes from the syllabus. This may change but it helps you see the map of where you are going which can benefit in the form of lower anxiety and better big picture thinking.
TL;dr → use the syllabus!