Employing Active-Learning Techniques and Metacognition in Law School: Shifting Energy from Professor to Student

Authors

Robin A. Boyle, St. John's University School of LawFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Title

University of Detroit Mercy Law Review

Publication Date

2003

Volume

81

First Page

1

Abstract

(Excerpt)

Teaching a law school class, whether it is doctrinal or skills-based, can be a tiring experience. At the conclusion of class, law professors often experience fatigue, partly from coming to a calm after being on-stage and partly from expending excessive energy lecturing or engaging students with the Socratic method. Law professors who are exhausted after a sixty or ninety-minute class, while their students sit passively except for random one-on-one questioning, are overworking. Chances are the majority of the students are under-performing because they are probably similar in their learning-style to students at other law schools, who do not learn best by either lecture or the Socratic method. In addition to St. John's University School of Law, New York Law School and Albany Law School have assessed the learning styles of their students by using the same instrument, the Productivity Environmental Preference Survey (PEPS). (The PEPS is discussed infra Section II B.) The results of the PEPS administered at all three law schools indicate that law students are diverse in their learning styles.

Comments

Available at: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1114894