Thoughts From a 1L
Erecting a Monument to My Ineptitude One Class at a Time
Lindsay Bayer
Issue date: 8/29/06 Section: Columns
On my first day of law school, I arrived promptly 9:40am for my 10am class (which is roughly akin to showing up yesterday in my world), only to be informed by an older, wiser student that I was late and that all of the good seats would already be gone. When I looked shocked and dismayed, I was told, "Welcome to law school." I realized instantly that my first error was neglecting to bring my flask to class.
Class began exactly at 10am and not a moment later. The professor briefly introduced himself and the course, and then immediately used the Socratic method to begin the class discussion of the reading that was due today. The first student was interrogated for no less than twenty-five painful minutes. The professor began with a basic question, and let the student dig himself a deeper and deeper hole until the questions were near impossible and the student was near death. Each question was designed to force the student and everyone else present to examine just how fatally stupid the previous answer had been.
Naturally, I was the third person to be called on. In order to be heard from my seat, I also had the honor of standing during my interrogation, which lasted for close to twenty excruciating minutes. I began confidently, cracking a joke about Britney Spears when the microphone wouldn't work for me, and ended like a snowman melting miserably under the hot sun of the Sahara. Each question became more abstract and agonizing; at one point, I made the mistake of citing an excerpt from the text, only to be snidely asked, "Do you trust the writers of this book?" I murmured something about how I'd better be able to trust them, considering what I'd paid for the book, but that was, of course, the wrong answer.
After class ended, my classmates kept approaching me in the hallway and saying kindly, "It wasn't bad at all! You did fine!" which immediately reassured me that it had been as bad as I'd thought, if not worse. It's not even that I mind public speaking or being wrong in front of large groups of people. It was just distressing to realize as I was speaking that absolutely nothing of value was coming out of my mouth, and that my nerves and my inability to use the English language fully masked my moderate understanding of the subject matter. By the time my turn to speak ended, I was unable to correctly answer questions even as simple as, "What is your name?" and "Are you having fun yet?"
Class began exactly at 10am and not a moment later. The professor briefly introduced himself and the course, and then immediately used the Socratic method to begin the class discussion of the reading that was due today. The first student was interrogated for no less than twenty-five painful minutes. The professor began with a basic question, and let the student dig himself a deeper and deeper hole until the questions were near impossible and the student was near death. Each question was designed to force the student and everyone else present to examine just how fatally stupid the previous answer had been.
Naturally, I was the third person to be called on. In order to be heard from my seat, I also had the honor of standing during my interrogation, which lasted for close to twenty excruciating minutes. I began confidently, cracking a joke about Britney Spears when the microphone wouldn't work for me, and ended like a snowman melting miserably under the hot sun of the Sahara. Each question became more abstract and agonizing; at one point, I made the mistake of citing an excerpt from the text, only to be snidely asked, "Do you trust the writers of this book?" I murmured something about how I'd better be able to trust them, considering what I'd paid for the book, but that was, of course, the wrong answer.
After class ended, my classmates kept approaching me in the hallway and saying kindly, "It wasn't bad at all! You did fine!" which immediately reassured me that it had been as bad as I'd thought, if not worse. It's not even that I mind public speaking or being wrong in front of large groups of people. It was just distressing to realize as I was speaking that absolutely nothing of value was coming out of my mouth, and that my nerves and my inability to use the English language fully masked my moderate understanding of the subject matter. By the time my turn to speak ended, I was unable to correctly answer questions even as simple as, "What is your name?" and "Are you having fun yet?"