MPT Timing + General Tips Forum
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Anonymous posting is only appropriate when you are sharing sensitive information about bar exam prep. You may anonymously respond on topic to these threads. Unacceptable uses include: harassing another user, joking around, testing the feature, or other things that are more appropriate in the lounge.
Failure to follow these rules will get you outed, warned, or banned."
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maroon175
- Posts: 158
- Joined: Wed Dec 04, 2013 11:46 pm
MPT Timing + General Tips
Could anyone share any helpful tips from taking the MPT portion of the bar exam with respect to timing? I'm really struggling in that area and haven't been able to complete any of my practice MPTs without going 45-60 minutes over.
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justanotheruser
- Posts: 181
- Joined: Mon Dec 14, 2015 10:57 pm
Re: MPT Timing + General Tips
This was big for me. I passed the CA bar for 2/18, but I might have passed the 7/17 bar if I had managed my time better for the Performance Test.
My goal the final time around was to be done reading + outlining in no more than 45 minutes. The thing that I struggled with in past exams was overdoing the outline. I always thought it made sense to outline AND write as you go, but I found that this muddled everything up and made everything more complicated. To put it another way, I was wasting time because outlining/writing as I went created more work for me to edit/organize/etc. Incorrect outlining led to bloated notes to sort through.
Big change for me was that I kept my outline super simple -- as a basic roadmap. I didn't even bother outlining/highlighting as I read through the library + files either -- I'd end up forgetting about them anyhow. For each legal issue, I'd quickly note the basic law, notable exceptions, and key/ambiguous facts in the library. For me, I didn't waste time getting into the weeds of the case file -- the graders don't care about how well you organize or regurgitate the cases if you're not doing any analysis or highlighting the facts in the library. Instead, just finding the key parts in the cases allowed me to spend more time going through the library and finding/weaving facts into my outline as I began writing.
Good luck!
My goal the final time around was to be done reading + outlining in no more than 45 minutes. The thing that I struggled with in past exams was overdoing the outline. I always thought it made sense to outline AND write as you go, but I found that this muddled everything up and made everything more complicated. To put it another way, I was wasting time because outlining/writing as I went created more work for me to edit/organize/etc. Incorrect outlining led to bloated notes to sort through.
Big change for me was that I kept my outline super simple -- as a basic roadmap. I didn't even bother outlining/highlighting as I read through the library + files either -- I'd end up forgetting about them anyhow. For each legal issue, I'd quickly note the basic law, notable exceptions, and key/ambiguous facts in the library. For me, I didn't waste time getting into the weeds of the case file -- the graders don't care about how well you organize or regurgitate the cases if you're not doing any analysis or highlighting the facts in the library. Instead, just finding the key parts in the cases allowed me to spend more time going through the library and finding/weaving facts into my outline as I began writing.
Good luck!
