One of the most frustrating challenges for legal writing professors is preparing detailed feedback on a student’s draft, only to see the same problems pop up again in the rewrite. Not just similar problems.

Introduction

While my Spring semester of Lawyering Skills primarily focuses on transitioning from predictive to persuasive analysis, my first unit of the year is entitled “Reflection and Revision.” I take advantage of the fact that we have just “celebrated” the New Year’s holiday,[1] when many students are already reflecting and making resolutions. First, I ask students to reflect on their progress thus far in the course, as well as in law school.

In the summer of 2025, I was given the opportunity to create a new legal writing curriculum for the University of Hawaiʻi Richardson School of Law’s fully online J.D. program. In addition to developing materials used in the 1L Lawyering Fundamentals courses, I now teach in the program. The process has proven to be the most rewarding in my 23 years as a legal writing professor.

Introduction

I have taught legal writing for a long time. Some things I “got right” early on, and I use those teaching approaches perennially. Some things I have created and improved and tweaked over time. And some things I create in the moment to make class more effective for a specific group of students.[1] What follows are three recent “in the moment” teaching tips that I now share with you.

Introduction

Seeking student feedback in a tangible manner during the semester has inherent value.[1] Ongoing student feedback can help a professor gauge what is (and what is not) working in the classroom.[2] The professor can take the temperature of the class and get a decent read on how things are going.[3]

Have you ever wished that you could more deeply assess the efficacy of a new teaching exercise you developed, an innovative pedagogical method that you tried, or a novel course you taught? Too often, standardized course evaluations do not capture the data necessary to determine the success (or failure) of a pedagogical experiment.

My jaw dropped.  She nailed it.  She explained to our class not just where—but how—this 1L’s memo could be more synthesized, more precise, and more logical.  I could not have done it better. 

But remarkably, she was herself only a 1L.  In fact, she was the 1L who authored the memorandum only a week earlier.  And even more remarkably, several of her colleagues did the same thing with their own work in that same session, only a few weeks into the semester.

Each year growing up, my family did the same thing for Thanksgiving. We’d invite a group of families over to our house, everyone would bring the same set of dishes (candied sweet potatoes!), we’d have a Kids Table and a Grown-Ups Table (Kids Table was always more fun), and then, after dinner, we’d play games.