Creating the Active l earner: A Model for Paralegal Courses
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2000
Abstract
Paralegal courses provide a unique opportunity to use a variety of active learning exercises. Advocacy papers, mock trials, hypothetical problems, and opinion writing exercises advance the educationally admirable goals of involving students in their own education, developing their legal analysis skills, and furthering their understanding of how lawyers and judges reason and make decisions. These exercises may be inserted in an otherwise lecture-based course. They may also be an element in an active learning experience composed of an integrated set of learning resources and activities keyed to student and course evaluation criteria. This article explores the latter approach in terms of the learning resources and activities used in a civil liberties course, the means used to evaluate students as active learners, and the means used to evaluate the course as an active learning experience.' In sum, this article outlines an active learning model that may be used in paralegal courses.
Recommended Citation
Journal of Paralegal Education and Practice, Vol. 16, No.1, 2000, 23-47.