Have you ever left class wondering what your professor was even talking about? The Feynman Technique will help you learn material faster and at a level where you will remember the concept for years to come. Professor Richard Feynman was a Nobel prize winning physicist who had the nickname “the Great Explainer.” By following four steps, you will learn a topic well enough to remember it on the final exam and the bar exam.
Step 1
Step one: write the name of the concept you want to learn at the top of a page (try to handwrite as much as possible; see this video for why handwriting your notes during class is better). As the semester progresses, come back to the document every time you need to add more knowledge related to that topic. For example, if you’re having problems understanding proximate cause, write that down. You might start off with the unforeseeable manner of injury, and then later in the semester come back to the unforeseeable intervening event.
Step 2
Step two: pretend you are teaching the topic to someone else, preferably a high school student. This means that you must make it simple enough for them to understand, including word choice and sentence structure. All too often, a law student will copy a rule verbatim from a case. While the rule statement may be accurate, how likely are you to remember antiquated language from the early 1900s or earlier? For example, when you take Business Associations you will likely read Benjamin Cardozo’s classic case Meinhard v. Salmon. Your professor will certainly focus on these words for establishing the standard of care:
Joint adventurers, like copartners, owe to one another, while the enterprise continues, the duty of the finest loyalty. Many forms of conduct permissible in a workaday world for those acting at arm’s length, are forbidden to those bound by fiduciary ties. A trustee is held to something stricter than the morals of the market place. Not honesty alone, but the punctilio of an honor the most sensitive, is then the standard of behavior.
That is some of the best legal prose I’ve ever read, but do you really understand what Cardozo is saying? Let’s take that language and make it simpler. Teach it to that high school student by stating it in modern English: “Partners owe to each other the highest standard of behavior.” And there you have it folks, a long phrase converted into ten simple words. When you are working on this step, make sure to explain the rule as simply and briefly as possible. And for some cool information on why teaching a subject will help you learn it better—and why oldest children, on average, are smarter than younger siblings—see this article on the protege effect.
Step 3
Step three: When you get stuck or are shaky on one of the concepts, go back and study more. This means looking at your books, doing more research, and talking to your professor. If you have multiple choice questions, work through those as well. Remember, if you can’t teach the material to a high schooler, you don’t know it well enough.
Step 4
Step four: Go back to step 1 and repeat the process. In other words, the Feynman Technique is about the process, not the end product. This is because we all understand material better when we teach it. I understood torts at a much deeper level when I taught it, and you will understand something better when you teach it. If you see a technical term, try to simplify it. Will that high school student really understand, without additional explanation, the terms “consideration by estoppel” or “negligence per se?” As you simplify the concept, you will begin to understand the material in a much deeper way that will help you not only remember it on the exam, but will also help you with issue spotting and multiple-choice bar exam questions.
Ultimately, if you’ve tried everything you can but are still having problems, consider looking for a law school tutor. There is no shame in asking for help, especially for something as important as your education.
