Legal Commentary

The semester-interregnum is the period of grading, planning for next semester, and (hopefully) doing a little writing, as well as whatever holiday and family festivities we have. It also is a good time to look back at the prior semester, figure out what we did right and wrong, and think about how to carry those lessons into the next semester and to the next time we teach that class (often a year later).

Once again, my biggest problem last semester was the pacing of my classes. In Fed Courts, we got through jurisdiction, 11th Amendment, justiciability (although not Political Question Doctrine), and abstention (but not Rooker-Feldman). I did not get to jurisdiction stripping, Boumedienne and the War on Terror, or congressional control over the courts--the fun, theoretical stuff that I save until the end. In Civil Rights, we basically had about 1/2 a class of lecture on civil rights injunctionsThe last time I taught civ pro in a single semester (spring 2007), I was able to do only one day on the basic principle of Erie and I am trying to figure out how not to repeat that mistake next semester.

My problem is that I do not organize my courses by days--we will do one day on this topic, two days on this topic, etc. Instead, I organize by topic. And we stay on a topic until I get them the information and detail I want them to have and until they "get it" (or at least until there is no one left raising her hand and saying "I don't get it"). The inevitable consequence is that we spend a longer period on the material early in the semester and rush through (or do not reach) some stuff towards the end. And this has gotten worse as I have become more "Socratic" (danger quotes intentional) the more times I teach a course. When material leads to free-wheeling discussions, we stay on a topic that much longer--and I confess to not being very good at cutting off or reining in discussions.

So I would like to hear about how folks control the pace and coverage of courses. Any thoughts and suggestions?