Workshop for Beginning Legal Writing Teachers - AALS

IV.
3.
4.
Providing Assignment Details to Students
• Assignment Sheet for Students
• Rubric
• Examples
Create an Assignment Notebook
• The Assignment Sheet
• The Facts
• The Law- Cases and Statutes, etc.
• An Outline
• Case Summaries
• Rubric
• Top Papers from Previous Semester, if available
• Citation List
• Local Rules, if applicable
Avoid Common Pitfalls
• Failing to Update Recycled Assignments
• The Imperfect or Incomplete Record
• Inappropriate Difficulty Level/ Too Long
• Pending Case is Decided
• Availability of Real Briefs
• Failing to Share the Rubric
• Forgetting About the Larger Audience
• Boring Subject Matter
• Ill-defined Issues
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Workshop for Beginning Legal Writing Teachers
Bibliography
• Commun. Skills Comm., ABA Sec. Leg. Educ. & Admis. to B., Sourcebook on Legal
Writing Programs (Eric B. Easton ed., 2d ed., ABA 2006).
• Lorraine Bannai, Anne Enquist, Judith Maier & Susan McClellan, Sailing Through
Designing Memo Assignments, 5 Legal Writing 193 (1999).
• Kenneth D. Chestek, Reality Programming Meets LRW: The Moot Case Approach to
Teaching in the First Year, 38 Gonz. L. Rev. 57 (2003).
• Phillip M. Frost, Using Ethical Problems in First-Year Skills Courses, 14 Persp.:
Teaching Legal Res. & Writing 7 (2005).
• Elizabeth L. Inglehart & Martha Kanter, “The Real World”: Creating a Compelling
Appellate Brief Assignment Based on a Real-World Case, 17 Persp.: Teaching Legal
Res. & Writing 128 (2009).
• Gail Anne Kintzer, Maureen Straub Kordesh & C. Ann Sheehan, Rule Based Legal
Writing Problems: A Pedagogical Approach, 3 Legal Writing 143 (1997).
Jan M. Levine,
• Designing Assignments for Teaching Legal Analysis, Research and
Writing, 3 Persp.: Teaching Legal Res. & Writing 58 (1995).