How Do I Answer A Legal Essay Question?

Writing a strong essay in response to a legal topic can be daunting.

Having carefully researched the relevant statute and case law, it can be hard to know where to begin in crafting a strong answer to an essay question, that illustrates both your technical knowledge and your critical thinking abilities.

The biggest mistake I see students make when answering essay based questions is failing to formulate a clear argument and instead producing an interesting, but meandering summary of their knowledge on the topic.

When facing a legal essay question, it`s important to pause, take a step back and consider the question, rather than launching into an exposition of all your knowledge on the topic.

The key to a first class mark is taking the step beyond stating the facts and engaging critically with the question to generate an argument. Once you have your argument in mind, the process of structuring your essay to support that argument becomes much easier.

My tutoring sessions focus on helping law students to take that extra step, so that they can write with flair and clarity in response to essay based questions.