As I mentioned a few posts ago, I have my midterm examinations in October. Exam week started this week, Monday 24th October 2011, and my first exam was for ‘Legal Skills A’. I completed assignments for this class each week and had revised for the exam, however I do not feel too confident after sitting the three hour examination.
Before the exam I was inevitably nervous, but I felt prepared. I had completed all of the reading and had revised so I felt comfortable. Yet as soon as I was handed the exam paper in the examination hall, my confidence soon deserted me… The exam was not what I had expected, or prepared for, and I spent the first ten minutes or so just staring at the exam paper.
I had been given an English case, which was about twenty pages long, and an answer sheet with nine questions; some questions had multiple parts. I had three hours – which I thought would be my saviour. I started by quickly skimming over the important parts of the case, just to get a basic understanding. There was no clock in the exam room, or at least none that I could see, which for me was quite unusual. Starting with question one, I started to formulate an answer, remembering to refer to lines in the case. I skipped question two, with the intention of coming back to it later. I worked on the rest of the questions and came back to questions two and four. I answered two, but four was a little hazy. I could not find the relevant part of the text, so I just noted down what I had in my head at that time.
A lot of the questions also asked for the reasoning of the court, and asked us to explain why they reasoned that way. This was definitely a hard point, although I had revised methods of interpretation and reasoning, it is very hard to apply it to such a large case.
After handing in the exam paper and leaving the building, I felt relieved that the test was over, but I immediately felt that I would have to re-sit the exam in January 2012. I will not get my results for at least a week, but I have already prepared myself for the worst; that way anything better is a bonus.
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