1L Contracts, the blog: a new educational tool

My law school starts class next week. For my Contracts course, I’ve decided to maintain a blog, 1L Contracts, to givethe class an opportunity to explore the course subject matter in greater depth than 3 hours a week of class permits and the the ways the issues arise every day in everyone’s lives. The initial posts are concerned with, among other things, emphasizing the enormity of the project the students are embarking upon and the proper ways to read case law.

I first used a blog for a class during the 2008-09 academic year. It was a more effective way of getting my students engaged in class subject matter  than few things I’d ever done. That blog, What is Fair Use?,  also garnered some attention in the academic world. People get excited when technology is used in new ways in the classroom. But in the case of that blog, the excitement wasn’t merely a matter of fascination with technology. The blog really made a difference to the level of the student’s engagement with the subject matter. It also happened to be the first forum in which I wrote about copyright and fair use in depth.

And I’m deeply gratified by the kind words about the new blog written by Stephanie West Allen — a lawyer, author, law professor, and expert on the neuroscience of learning — on her terrific law blog, idealawg.

If you’re interested in contract law and in the difficulties of the first year of law school, please read along there too.