Mastering the Ontario Bar Exam: The Brickam Strategy

Preparing for the Ontario Bar Exam can feel like facing your last, formidable barrier to becoming a lawyer, and it's daunting. But we at Brickam Solutions have discussed what worked and what didn't, and have distilled the essential tips from our discussions into the strategies below. The theme here at Brickam is that we emphasize pragmatism; you’ll learn how to use your study time to maximize efficiency and boost your exam performance, and how to best prepare for the actual exam experience. As well, we have some resource suggestions for you to use in order to feel as confident as possible going into your Barrister or Solicitor exam.

The Big Picture: Reading Vs. Practice

One of the central lessons from our own journey (and what we emphasize repeatedly) is that the long, drawn-out process of reading every single detail isn’t where the magic happens. While skimming the Law Society of Ontario (LSO) Bar materials is important to build a general familiarity with the legal concepts and facts being tested, the actual exams are designed to test your ability to quickly search for, understand and apply legal principles under pressure.

It might seem like you need to read every detail of the materials, but our experience shows that, while familiarizing yourself with the materials is important, real progress is made when you practice. With that said, we do recommend reading, even if it's just a quick skim of the materials. Having read will allow you to snap to the right place more quickly after jumping to a section from the detailed Table of Contents (ToC) or even clue into the section of the materials that you need to look in, as it will not always be obvious from the question. As well, and more importantly, having read will help you answer a small number of questions quickly and comfortably without having to look them up, saving valuable time. So, if you have enough time to both read and practice sufficiently (2-3 weeks for a few hours per day per exam), do it.

Before beginning your reading, we highly recommend trying out some practice questions. This is because going through the process of flipping through the materials to try and answer questions will give you an idea of what type of information you need to locate in the materials, helping you identify the important information to hone in on during your reading. The fact of the matter is that not all types of information in the materials are useful for answering Bar exam questions, so it is better to learn what to focus on in the materials by practicing a little bit before you even begin reading.

We also recommend that you take some breaks during your reading process to practice a few questions to remind yourself of the information that is important for answering questions, as well as to give yourself a nice break from reading. There are many free questions to try out online for this initial stage of your studying, such as on the LSO's website or our very own sample questions.

Navigating the Materials: Mastering the ToC and Indices

A key skill for success on the Ontario Bar Exam is quickly finding relevant information within the dense text of the materials. There are two primary ways to do so:

• Start with the Table of Contents (ToC):
  Begin your first practice sessions by using the detailed ToC to pinpoint the sections of the materials you need to sift through to answer questions. This method is going to be your bread and butter for the actual exam, as it allows you to find relevant sections of the materials even when you don't know the actual concept or key term to search for. Using the ToC will also help you build initial confidence in navigating the structure of the materials because you will be constantly looking at the hierarchical division of the sections of the materials.
  
  As you practice with the ToC, be sure to annotate it when you find that a certain subtitle should have been listed in the ToC to guide you to a specific section of the materials. And of course, add tabs to it for each subject area, so that you can more quickly flip to it. You may also consider tabs for the materials as well, but we opted not to as we got used to navigating by page number.
  
  
• Integrate the Indices:
  As you become comfortable with the ToC, start incorporating indices into your question-searching routine. Many companies offer their own indices for purchase, but we recommend asking around for access to the University of Toronto indices, a wonderful free resource created every year by collaborative student effort.
  
  While indices might seem to take a long time to scan through, they allow you to locate a specific key term and immediately jump to the page that discusses it, rather than have to guess where it could be based on the ToC. If you know the exact term you're searching for, the indices are probably the best place to start looking for the information needed to answer a question; if you only have a vague idea of the relevant legal concept, look through your ToC. Don't worry, you'll get the hang of it once you start playing with both for a while!
  
  
• Choose key charts or summaries to reference:
  In addition to your main tools, charts can be very helpful for quickly answering particular question types. If you are unfamiliar with this term, it refers to structured cheatsheets (sometimes in a graphical format) of a category of information from the materials that are intended to be quickly referenced during the exam. For example, a question may ask how many days an applicant has to file a certain application and you can use a chart with a grid of all application filing timelines in order to answer the question in record time. Again, the UoT indices team includes charts (and the summaries mentioned below) on their drive, so we recommend those as well. Of particular use to us were the filing timelines, appeal routes and calculation charts, but feel free to experiment and see which are most useful to you.
  
  Some examinees recommend using summaries as well, but we did not find them particularly useful for actual exam-taking. They take up a lot of space on the desk (which is more limited than you think in the exam room) and we believe that any essential information from them is better included in your charts. But again, they have helped some examinees succeed so feel free to try them out if you have time!
  

Mastering these tools will save you precious minutes during the exam and improve your ability to retrieve vital information quickly, so be sure to take the time to familiarize yourself with them. 

How to Practice

As mentioned above, we recommend practicing a little bit using free materials before and during your reading. Once you have completed your reading, you will ideally have 5-10 days to focus on practice questions. 

• Start slow:
  Begin your first practice sessions without timing yourself, as navigating the materials and becoming familiar with Ontario Bar exam-style questions takes time. If you time yourself right away and rush, you will struggle to identify issues with your approach and get demotivated.
  
  Give yourself a chance to build some confidence by answering questions untimed and getting a bit of experience with each section/subject of the exam. We recommend doing 20-40 practice questions per subject before moving on to timed practice. Brickam Solutions offers 80-question packs for each subject of the Barrister and Solicitor exams.
  
  Optional: If you wish, feel free to try a timed mini-exam or small question set at the very beginning just to get a feel for the pace of the exam, before starting your untimed practice. However, if you think that your score on this could bother you, then feel free to skip this step. No pressure (yet)!
  
  
• Time yourself, but not for every session:
  Once you feel comfortable with your untimed practice (or if you've already spent half of your time available to practice on untimed drilling), we recommend interspersing some timed practice as you keep practicing. 
  
  At this stage, go ahead and try a mini-exam or a mixed question pack and timing yourself, which will provide you with timed practice without the exhaustion of a full practice exam. After completing one, note the difference in performance compared to your untimed practice, but do not fret about the difference. Simply assess where you rushed, where you could have gone faster, and keep these errors in mind as you do some more untimed practice to iron those out. Then another timed mini-exam, then back to untimed, etc. 
  
  
• Try a full-length practice exam:
  Once you feel comfortable with timed practice and are approaching a plateau in performance, or if you only have 3-4 days left before the exam, you should try your first full-length practice exam. This will be taxing, but it is an essential step in proper preparation for the actual exam. Even if you do not perform as well as you hoped, keep in mind that simply completing this step is quite an achievement!
  
  After your full-length practice exam, this is your chance to identify any remaining flaws in your answering approach and iron those out for the final stretch. At this point, you should kick it into high gear and focus on timed practice. We recommend doing a second full-length practice exam 1 or 2 days before the actual exam, with some timed practice in between each full-length.
  
  If you think that doing an extra full-length will burn you out, feel free to skip it, but make sure to do at least one to get a feel for the full experience. In our opinion, taking two full-length practice exams is perfect. If you want to try one that closely reflects the actual exam's question distribution, take a look at our Barrister and Solicitor practice exams.
  
  

Simulating the Exam Environment

It’s crucial to recreate the real exam conditions during your practice sessions, especially when doing timed practice. This helps you build speed and endurance while familiarizing yourself with the pressure of exam day.

• Practice with a Printed Scantron and Timesheet:
  Use a printed scantron (any free online pdf from a secure site will do) to mimic the actual test-day format, as circling in does take a bit more time than using non-scantron methods such as simply circling the answer (if your exam sitting uses tablets, feel free to ignore this aspect). As well, we recommend creating a timesheet that lists target question numbers to reach at certain points during the exam (e.g. reach question 80 by 2h15 left on the clock) to ensure that you keep pace, as it is easy to lose track of time.
  
  
• Desk Item Placement:
  Be sure to set up your materials as close as possible to how you will place them on your desk on the big day. PR on the left with the ToC, the current question book on the right, timesheet up above, extra pencil and calculator in between, etc. We even recommend accounting for your snack and water placement as well. Getting used to a particular setup that you can replicate exactly on exam day will calm your nerves and also help with your efficiency in managing all the documents on your desk throughout the exam.
  
  
• Timed Practice:
  Stick to the exam’s exact time limits when practicing, or to the proportional amount of time you've given yourself if doing a shorter set of timed questions. If the exam has 160 questions to do in 4h30, put your pen down and stop when time runs out. Do not pause time at random points during your practice and be sure to avoid making excuses for deviating from the timing of the exam. It's easy to do so, but at that point you're better off simply doing untimed practice and building up your confidence. 
  
  Once you choose to simulate the exam conditions, you will only truly benefit by steeling yourself and persevering under these exact conditions. If you can push yourself to accomplish this at home, it will be a cinch with the adrenaline on exam day!
  
  

By practicing under these real conditions, you’ll iron out any hesitations and feel confident on exam day. This discipline transforms practice into a strategic tool that prepares you for success.

We hope that our Brickam Strategy guides you in conquering the Ontario Bar exam. Best of luck, and keep an eye on our blog for future articles covering our in-depth Bar exam tips!