The MBE is what scares me the most. Like many law students I have very poor choices, I can usually narrow it down to two. But I always choose the wrong one. This is something I know I have to stop working on every day to be successful at the bar. Here are some tips I’ve come up with to help you get through.
Do an MBE every day. Try to do at least 20 to 25, increasing to 30-50 in the last few weeks of research. People say you have to do 40 or 50 a day, I don’t think it’s necessary. I think you should do 15 or 20 things and review them first. Then tried to bundle some MBEs and didn’t really look at them.
Which brings us to the fact that you need to look at all of them well, doing a lot of MBEs and not reviewing them. Or indifferent review is not good check even what you get. Yes, you’re right, Bar/Bri (the leading bar review course) provides a small explanation of the correct answer to each question. Also why the other options are wrong. Sometimes I get the right answer for the wrong reason I guessed right, or it’s just the best of four answers. Almost all the MBEs I got came first. You need to look at them to see why the answer you chose is correct.
Do it all at once. If you don’t select multiple options, try NTS Mcqs one by one and check. This is a job that requires persistence. But the question is fresh in your mind when you consider it. You won’t worry about the other 10 people you just made and how to deal with them. As July approaches, I gradually increase my MBE to triple, then 5, then 10, then 15 to 20 max. Mock exam but make sure you practice 100 pieces at least twice at a time. The real test looks like this. To introduce you to many questions that come to you and you do not know the subject. There will be some questions at the bar where you can never be sure you know what you’re talking about (Evidence? You have to get used to it when it happens.
Easy, medium and hard. Which one should you do? Bar/Bri divides most MBEs by difficulty. Simple is simple. The middle is difficult and the difficult is impossible. Barry/Bree doesn’t define anything simple. I guess they think you’re in trouble if you have to. The task was surprising but it is really useful. They check the basic rules. But you still need to know these rules. So I learned something. And the definitions are good to write on flash cards. It also boosted my confidence as I scored in the 80s in easy assessments. However, you don’t have a lot of time to waste on all the easy stuff, so use a mix of medium and hard for the barre class. Your big (if you can handle maybe try a simple one in the spring of your 3L, just to make the ball understand the rules and how MBE works). From my learning, Bar/Bri has a long list of questions that take a long time. I find this funny because I can’t remember a single MBE longer than half a page on the actual strip, though it might help me mentally. Because Bar reading is relatively short.
Flashcards As you go, make flashcards for the person who made the mistake. And the right condition, if you will, for good measure. Put the rules you missed on one side and the keywords on the other. Organized by topic, time-consuming but useful when the same rules appear again a month later. Don’t bother with flashcards about rules you’ve never heard of this obscure sound. Super custom and select don’t waste your flashcards and your brain on them. As a rule, this only happens occasionally on difficult questions. Go into this question with confidence if it happens at the bar. It’s okay to guess and move on.
Allow yourself half a minute for short or simple questions. And in about two minutes for long or difficult questions, that’s right, you should generally be able to get through evidence and criminal law questions faster than property or criminal procedure questions. Practice under time pressure from the start because time is where people get drunk on MBE. You must complete your MBE on the day of your bar exam. So always practice with quick movements.
Know the rules. The more COLD rules you remember, the better your MBE score will be. But because you don’t have to remember simple rules. Until the end of June, MBE can be a little frustrating at times, but MBE helps you make it.