Curriculum development

Taken from Teaching legal research

The chapters on the definition of legal research and relevant learning theory provided information to underpin the design and delivery of a course. In this chapter the definition will be expanded into learning outcomes and the timing, phasing and embedding of the course discussed. Underlying every successful legal research skills course is co-operation between the teaching school, library and computer services staff. Although the last matter to be discussed here, it is fundamental to successful curriculum development.

Developing learning outcomes

The definition of legal research given in the first chapter may be likened to a broad statement of intent, or a goal. As stated in generic terms the goal provides only a general direction to instruction. It is rather akin to saying “I am going shopping”. The next stage is to map out what I wish to buy, where I should buy it, how I am going to get to the shops, what will be the benefit of the particular purchase to me.

The three generic skills elements must be developed into learning outcomes or objectives which are more specifically related to the subject of law and which will assist in shaping the content of a legal research skills course. Set out below are learning outcomes which I have devised for the three generic elements.

Identifying and analysing a problem

• identify the objective of the research
• identify the facts and issues
• identify relevant areas of law
• classify the information required in legal terms
• develop relevant keywords

Research and retrieval of information

Finding appropriate information to solve the problem:

• demonstrate an understanding of the structure of legal literature and the media through which it is made available
• locate and use a law library and the catalogues and indexes it contains
• use IT skills to locate and retrieve relevant information
• select relevant original material, commentary, opinion and guidance
• use indexes within legal materials to find relevant information
• use and interpret legal citations and abbreviations
• check the currency of information
• keep up to date with legal developments generally

Communicating the results of research

Presenting the results of the analysis and research in an appropriate and effective manner:

• organise the written response into a logical structure
• employ appropriate layout techniques for written communication
• employ style, tone and format appropriate for the intended purpose
• employ correct spelling, punctuation and grammar
• concisely and accurately summarise or paraphrase relevant materials
• apply the law to the facts of the problem so as to produce satisfactory answers to the problem posed
• provide clear advice or conclusions, as appropriate
• acknowledge the use of all sources and materials cited
• construct a list of sources or bibliography
• use IT skills to present the results of research

The present Bar Vocational Course outcome specification for legal research is based on the above list, which appeared in the first edition of this book. Many of these learning outcomes will be familiar from the earlier discussion, although they may be expressed in a slightly different form. The additional outcomes cover three matters, they:

1. provide the framework within which other learning outcomes are placed, for example “demonstrate an understanding of the structure of legal literature”
2. provide additional steps between outcomes which will help to clarify course content, for example “locate and use a law library” as a step before selecting relevant material
3. introduce specific IT learning outcomes, for example “use IT skills to locate and retrieve relevant information”
   The designer of a legal research course needs to consider the list of learning outcomes in the context of two further pieces of information:

• how and where the skill will be applied in other parts of the particular law programme
• the level and nature of research skills possessed by students entering the course

How and where the skill is to be applied

The discussion at the end of chapter 1 on the application of the concept of information literacy to legal research skills training is pertinent here. The concept offers a model through which essential skills training can be embedded into law teaching. As Davies and Jackson (2005) note: “Librarians offer expertise in accessing information effectively and efficiently (Standard 2 of the ACRL Standards discussed at the end of chapter 1). Law school IT staff, where available, provide the specialist law applications, maintain the hardware and train and support students on a daily basis. The IT skills they offer underpin all aspects of information literacy. However, only with the active collaboration of the law tutor can such legal research and IT training be seen by law students as relevant and applicable to their studies. It is the tutor who establishes the context in which the learning takes place and the expectations of the students. It is the law tutor too who plans the progression of the curriculum, monitors progress and who has the skills and remit to develop the higher order skills in the student of analysis and application of information to the legal context. By pooling the expertise of the law librarian, IT specialist and law tutor at the planning and delivery stages skills training can be delivered and information literacy standards met without sacrificing substantive content. Davies and Jackson go on to describe a successful example of how the concept of information literacy has been embedded within an undergraduate law curriculum.

What does it mean when we talk about integrating information literacy into the curriculum? It includes embedding teaching time into the course or module and ensuring that the course or module learning outcomes and assessments include information literacy. However, integration of information literacy is much more than this.

Here are some pointers to guide a review of your training to embed information literacy principles:

• content – ensure that the content of your sessions flow from what the students have just been doing in the module and into what the students will be doing next; ensure that your teaching is going to be relevant and timely, that the learning will address real needs and that the context is authentic
• modelling the process – information literacy is not just about finding information, but knowing what to do with it; design the curriculum in such a way that the students need to find and read the information they have identified in your session and use it for a specific purpose
• involvement of academic tutors – academic staff are best placed to develop some aspects of information literacy in students; explore ways in which academic tutors can help students to evaluate and critically analyse the information found from your session/s and to use it for a specific purpose; the law school may integrate your undergraduate teaching into the activities it already does to prepare students for academic writing and developing critical analysis and research skills to meet Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) benchmarking standards
• opportunities for reinforcement – students need to have the opportunity to repeat the process of finding, evaluating and using information for a formative or summative assessment (see chapter 7 for an explanation of these terms) as soon as possible after the process has been modelled; if the assessment is for another module, the links between the teaching in the one module and the expectations of the tutors in the other module need to be expressed very clearly
• assessment – use assessment tools which are integrated, such as research trails accompanying an assessed essay, rather than bolt-on assessments, such as the creation of a bibliography on a set topic (see chapter 7 for further information on these assessment instruments)
• personal development plans – the QAA requires that from 2005-06 all students in higher education be given the opportunity for personal development planning (PDP); PDP includes some means to enable students to reflect upon their learning, performance and achievement and plan for their personal, educational and career development; is it appropriate to include reflections on information literacy in the PDP structure suggested by the school?

Even where the concept of information literacy is not applied it is important for the designer of a legal research skills course to know how and to what extent the skill is to be used in other parts of the law programme, so the level of research skill taught matches the demands that are to be made in knowledge areas or in the application of other legal skills, for example mooting, advocacy or opinion writing. Consonance between the level of skill taught and the level of skill to be displayed within the rest of the programme is essential if course coherence is to be achieved. Factors which will inform the discussion will include, amongst others, the overall learning outcomes of the law programme, the extent of integration of skills with knowledge subjects, the extent to which teaching staff are wedded to problem solving as opposed to directed reading techniques and the ingenuity of teaching staff to create genuine legal research opportunities in the knowledge subjects. Since these are institution specific factors the result is likely to be unique to that institution, and no further guidance can be given here.

Students’ prior research skills experience

It goes without saying that it is important to consider the particular student population for whom the instruction is intended. “Instruction takes students from where they are to where they need to be, from their present state to a desired state of competence”. (Mager, 1990:52). So, to create effective instruction it is necessary to review what students can do at the starting point of the course as well as defining the outcomes or end points.

The limitation of many of the official documents cited in chapter 1 is that they consider only the outcomes of a course of study. Further, they recognise only standard access routes to education and training. In devising learning outcomes recognition must be given to students entering any stage by a non-standard route – students having previous part time study or distance learning experience (which may have been undertaken without any or only very limited use of library/IT facilities. For example, I know that several students following the Bar Vocational Course every year at Cardiff, and probably also at most of the other BVC Providers, had obtained their LLB by distance learning and had never set foot in a law library until the BVC induction). Other examples are those students whose previous tuition has been exclusively in an overseas country (where the sources of research will be different to those in the UK) or students entering a course of study by direct entry to a year other than the first year (as many ERASMUS exchange students do). Finally, some of the official documents are concerned with law taught only as a major element in a programme of study. In many educational institutions law is also taught as a minor part of a degree programme, for example in accountancy, business studies, construction, journalism or social work. In addition, all students bring to their study of law knowledge and skills picked up outside higher education. Of particular relevance to legal research is the ‘Google factor’. This is the commonly held belief that all research can be achieved successfully solely through use of the Web search engine. Tutors need to be aware of and counter such a false belief.

Instruction in the skill of legal research can be introduced at the most basic level of education in the law, and elements added as students progress through education and into practice. For all programmes (non-law degree, law degree, postgraduate vocational and postgraduate non-vocational), a legal research course could fruitfully cover all the learning outcomes listed above. The differences will be in the depth and focus of the instruction. For example, instruction in the structure of legal literature or in the use of specific indexes (whether paper or electronic) would be at a more basic level in a non-law degree programme than in a law degree programme. And again, the focus of instruction in a postgraduate vocational course will be client and practice centred, whilst in a non-vocational programme it will be academic and discursive. The list of learning outcomes would not be used in its entirety for in-firm training (except for the induction of new entrants) or CPD training, where the focus would be on updating participants in new skills and sources, especially those related to IT and electronic databases.

Nevertheless, it is important to consider including at the commencement of any stage apart from the most basic, some form of ‘recap’ or ‘refresher’ element to ensure that those students who have missed out on or forgotten the skills learnt at earlier levels are not disadvantaged. This must be handled carefully, otherwise those students who are more than competent will find the recap or refresher a negative experience, which will colour their attitude to the rest of the course.

Checklist of legal research skills

Table 2 sets out the points made above in a more structured manner. It lists each of the legal research skills learning outcomes with details of which particular outcomes, in the author’s view, should form components of the curriculum for different types of course. It also indicates the focus of the instruction and whether student competence in the skill of performing the objective can be inferred.

Legal research skills rarely feature as part of CPD programmes because practising lawyers ought to have achieved competence in the individual aspects of legal research already. According to the latest study of the Junior Bar (Shapland and Sorsby, 2003) since more students are coming to the Bar Vocational Course with improved IT skills there is now only a minority in their first five years at the Bar who feel the need for some updating of their IT and database use skills. This contrasts with the findings of a similar study conducted five years earlier (Shapland and Sorsby, 1998).

Checklist of materials

When the particular curriculum is considered in more detail decisions must be made concerning the actual legal research sources (both paper and electronic) which should be featured so as to satisfy the learning outcome relating to ‘finding information’. These decisions will be influenced by the way the law course as a whole is taught – the extent to which students are set problems requiring independent research – and the availability of particular paper and electronic sources in the institution concerned. Table 3 sets out, for each of the types of course included in Table 2, the type of information source which, in the author’s view, ought to be included in a legal research course. Since so many institution specific variables shape the content of a legal research skills course the table should be treated as a checklist to assist the designer in considering all the possibilities rather than as a prescriptive statement. This table and Table 2 are likely to provoke debate amongst readers – if so, I am happy to have set people thinking. I do not think their form and content have been portrayed previously.

Underpinning legal research with adequate IT skills

The learning outcomes set out at the beginning of this chapter recognise the importance of IT skills in searching for and retrieving information, and in presenting the results of research. Students cannot meet these outcomes unless they have a basic level of IT literacy. These prerequisite skills include:

• keyboard familiarisation
• how to access networks
• use Windows or similar operating system
• undertake basic file management
• wordprocess
• use e-mail
• how to access the Internet

In addition students need to be aware of administrative matters such as:

• institutional regulations on computer use
• availability of PCs for their use
• availability of computer advisory and support services

It is helpful to students to include in the IT course a tour of the institution’s network, ‘stopping at the doorstep of’ but not entering applications and databases relevant to the students’ law course. This helps to provide links forward to later lessons covering more detailed instruction in the use of these applications and databases, and establishes coherence between the IT course and the legal research skills course proper.

The seven prerequisite skills can be expressed in more detail as follows.

Keyboard familiarisation:

• keyboard layout
• special keys (for example the escape key)

Basics about the computer and network:

• hardware
• software
• parts of the computer (for example box, screen etc)
• printers
• drives

Accessing networks:

• file servers (if appropriate)
• logging on
• relevant menus

Basic word processing:

• opening files
• printing files
• saving files
• different file formats
• basic text formatting

Using Windows or similar:

• accessing Windows
• the mouse
• double clicking

Basic file management:

• accessing the Windows file manager or use of DOS commands
• directories
• copying files
• moving files
• deleting files

E-mail:

• accessing e-mail
• extracting files from your mailbox

Internet:

• open and close a Web browser
• understand the main navigation buttons and hyperlinks
• understand what a uniform resource locator (URL) means
• use bookmarks or favourites
• understand what a PDF document is and how to open it
• access and understand how to use e-learning software (such as Blackboard or WebCT), but only if it is used by the law school in teaching and learning

As a result of the National Curriculum more students are entering higher education with competence in some or all of these skills. But there are certain types of student who do not possess appropriate levels of competence – some overseas students (from countries where IT skills are not included in the pre-university curriculum), some mature students who have not been in either work or educational environments in recent years. It is important, therefore, to ensure all students are competent in basic IT skills before they are given instruction in the use of particular databases or required to use databases or other applications as part of their studies. The experience of trying to teach the use of a database when some of the class have never before used a mouse is salutary. The time spent teaching ‘mouse skills’ makes the stated learning objective of the lesson (using a database to retrieve relevant legal information) almost impossible to achieve.

IT skills audit

Since there will be a range of prior experience amongst students it will be advisable, if not essential, to carry out an IT skills audit amongst students before the course of instruction commences and to stream students according to their professed ability. If an audit is not carried out and students are not streamed some students will feel intimidated by the expertise of others or, conversely, some will be bored with the basic level of teaching and either switch off mentally or ‘play’ with computer applications to the distraction of others in the class. Some institutions carry out a pre-course audit so that by the time of registration students can be informed of the IT stream they will be following. An example of a pre-course audit form is given in illustration 1 available to download at the bottom of the page.

The wording of the questions is purposely designed to require students to select which level of tuition they are to receive. Some students may overestimate their ability, and by timetabling classes for different levels of ability over a period of, say, 10 days, it should be possible for students to change streams without too much difficulty for all parties. In our experience at Cardiff University those students who tick the beginners box need four, one hour sessions (including two, one hour lessons on wordprocessing) covering all the seven prerequisite skills and the administrative matters listed above. Intermediate students need three, one hour lessons covering the same ground as the basic course, except that the wordprocessing element can be reduced to a single hour. The expert student requires only one session (perhaps 50 minutes) to provide him/her with a personal ID and password for the network, cover administrative matters, using the institutional e-mail system, receiving a handout on wordprocessing and a tour of the range of applications relevant to their course of study.

Teaching IT skills

Although this is not the section of this book dealing with how instruction should be delivered it is worth emphasising that instruction in IT will not succeed if it is only provided by means of tutor demonstrations, especially if the demonstrations are given as part of a large group session (lecture). Students must be sat one to a PC (not sharing) and have ample opportunity in the lesson and outside it to practise what has been taught. An effective and widely employed means of delivery is for students to use a workbook (or self paced learning technique, the term used by some who wish to inflate this method of learning into something mysterious (!)), containing detailed ‘stroke by stroke’ instructions, exercises and answers. The workbook technique will be discussed more fully in chapter 4.

Pacing the programme appropriately is important also. The IT training course should be planned to provide several days between lessons, so that students have opportunities to practise and consolidate the skills they have learnt. This is especially important for ‘basic’ students. Experience shows that ‘crash’ IT courses, where the whole training programme is delivered in one or two days, are not effective and can result in students developing negative attitudes to the place of IT in their learning.

Many institutions will have loaded on their networks keyboard skills packages such as Accutype, or games such as Solitaire or Minesweeper, which will improve mouse skills, and which students should be required to practise between lessons. Additionally, out of lesson e-mail exercises can be set, where students are required to send a message with an attachment to the tutor, who will return the communication with comments on student performance. I have come across this exercise used in the first few weeks of the Bar Vocational Course where the student is asked to create a wordprocessed CV and e-mail it to a tutor prior to the first meeting to discuss career aspirations. The attached CV is therefore serving several learning outcomes – use of IT, written presentation skills, and as a basis for a discussion on careers. Finally, students can be set exercises to be undertaken between lessons, to create wordprocessed files on floppy disk and bring them to the next lesson to carry out more advanced formatting techniques.

It should be emphasised that the basic IT course outlined here is the prerequisite for instruction in the use of legal research databases and other non-wordprocessing applications. Experience indicates that the basic IT course ought merely to highlight the existence of law databases, leaving instruction in using them to be timetabled to a point in the law programme when students will be expected to make use of them in their research work. Always aim to match the timing of instruction with the need to know, so as to benefit from maximum student motivation. Avoid the temptation to place instruction on every aspect of legal research, especially the electronic, in the first week or two of the law programme.

Phasing and timing of course delivery

Matching skills instruction to the ‘need to know’

It is clear from the discussion on information literacy earlier in this chapter and the various lists and tables in sections 3 and 4 that any comprehensive legal research skills course, apart from one given as part of a continuing professional development programme, has the potential to cover many different skills and take a considerable time to deliver. Many of the skills are basic to the work of a lawyer, and it has been observed already that there is a temptation amongst some course designers to include as much as possible as early as possible in a student’s course of study. The result is usually student mental overload. As with all learning, the best plan is to provide instruction in a skill when there is maximum student motivation to employ that skill in the rest of their studies.

Phasing instruction in information sources

Table 4 takes the legal research skills listed in Table 2 and allocates them to phases in the delivery of a legal research skills course. Phase 1 skills are those a student requires in order to successfully undertake basic legal research, the types of skill which might be included in the first two or three weeks of the teaching year. Phase 2 skills may be termed intermediate, and follow after the student has successfully completed the IT skills course described in the previous section and when assignments or assessments in other parts of the law programme require students to search more widely. Finally, phase 3 skills should be taught later still in the course.

Some Phase 3 skills (for example, using non-law sources) may best be imparted as late as the final year of a three year undergraduate programme; conversely, in a one year postgraduate vocational course phase 3 skills may best be placed towards the end of the first term or semester. The precise phasing and timing of instruction in a particular legal research skill should be a matter for discussion and agreement between skills tutors and colleagues delivering other elements in the law programme, so that student motivation and the ‘need to know’ are at their optimum – an ideal achieved too infrequently.

Table 5 uses information from Table 3 on the materials to be featured in the ‘Finding information’ section of legal research courses and suggests how instruction in the wide range of sources may be phased through the law programme. For non-law degree courses it has been assumed that the law element will be taught towards the end of the programme (possibly in the third year), by which time students will have already acquired and become proficient in IT skills. As a result the use of electronic databases to access the law and commentary on it can be placed in the first phase of the legal research skills course. For law undergraduate and postgraduate programmes, however, instruction in electronic sources should come after students have successfully completed the IT skills course. For this reason these sources are earmarked for phase 2 instruction.

The table also tries to distinguish between the needs of students following a postgraduate programme by research only and those following a taught postgraduate programme with a research (dissertation) element limited to the final stages. So, in the column headed postgraduate non-vocational (law first degree), the first phase number relates to research only degrees (where a knowledge of secondary sources and databases at the outset is essential to kick-start the research process), whilst the second phase number relates to taught courses, where instruction in secondary sources and databases can usually be left to a later stage in the programme. In the CPD column only phases 2 and 3 are represented, since some competency in IT skills (phase 1) will be a prerequisite.

LexisNexis and Westlaw

Instruction in the large general databases, such as LexisNexis and Westlaw, may take place in phase 1. Since writing the first edition of this book the increased familiarity of students with the use of Web technology and improvements in the screen design of law databases have prompted me to rethink the timing of instruction of these databases. Even in phase 1 of their courses students are able to use these general databases successfully to find specific cases or statutes. However, the cautions I expressed in the first edition do still apply when the general databases are used for subject searches to support coursework. Students struggling to understand legal principles can be ‘fazed’ by the vast number of hits produced by a simple query. First year and, to some extent, second year students have not developed sufficient powers of discrimination to sort the ‘wheat from the chaff’. There is also considerable anecdotal evidence from law librarians that undergraduate students do not undertake subject searches in the statute and case law parts of LexisNexis and Westlaw, but use them merely as a finding tool for specific materials.

It is still my view that a LexisNexis or Westlaw problem-based training session will be necessary for vocational postgraduate students and will take at least 60 minutes (including hands-on practise time). Once out in practice many lawyers will not be allowed access to these databases without having attended training offered by the database providers. The reason – commercial charges for the use of these databases are many times higher than academic rates, so mistakes can be expensive for the firm or chambers. My view is that students should be given basic training in LexisNexis and Westlaw in phase 1, but that subject searching might be left until a later phase.

Courseware

The inclusion of courseware may need a word of explanation. Iolis not only contains a section on using a law library but also a vast amount of material of use not only to undergraduates but also to vocational postgraduates wishing to refresh their grasp of first year undergraduate topics such as contract and tort. Instruction in accessing and using courseware can fall neatly within legal research skills.

I believe the form of presentation and the content of Tables 4 and 5 have not been attempted previously. If readers disagree with the phasing suggested I consider one of the reasons for writing this book has been achieved – to set people thinking and discussing the place of legal research skills in the curriculum to ensure all its elements are given due prominence.

Integration of legal research skills with knowledge-based subjects

Embedded model or ‘bolt-on’ model?

The Dearing Report (1997) considered how skills instruction might be embedded into programmes (paragraph 9.22 and following). Although the report was concerned with key skills, defined as communication skills, numeracy, the use of information technology and learning how to learn (paragraph 9.17), the comments in the report may equally well apply to the skill of legal research. There are two ways in which key skills might be included in a programme of study – by embedding the skill in existing programmes as the vehicle for development or by creating parallel modules of ‘skills development’. The report notes the results of a project by Hodginson (1996) for the Open University, where both methods were used in its programmes and the outcomes evaluated. “The OU found that the embedded model required the programme to be completely revised to integrate the selected skills. Academic staff provided feedback to students on their skill development in the same way as on the subject being studied. In contrast, the parallel model involved the development of a separate ‘bolt-on’ skills pack. In this model, staff were not involved in feedback or assessment of students. The OU’s findings were that in the long term there was considerable advantage in embedding skills into programmes. However, this will require an initial investment to redesign programmes to include skills and to train staff in feedback and assessment techniques.” (paragraphs 9.23 and 9.24).

Research by Lynch, Moodie and Slater (1993) appears to indicate that, for undergraduate programmes at least, library skills and IT (the terms used in their survey) are highly likely to be included amongst the practical skills elements of foundation legal instruction. This is akin to the OU ‘bolt-on’ model of integration.

Some form of integration of legal research skills can be achieved even with a ‘bolt-on’ module, where topics for research are based on those being studied or about to be studied in knowledge areas. This requires considerable co-operation between those teaching legal research skills and tutors in knowledge subjects. It also depends on the legal research skills element running concurrently with knowledge subjects which offer the maximum opportunities for research using paper and electronic sources. In the first year of an undergraduate law programme such knowledge areas would be contract and tort, where there is plenty of case law and commentary for students to research. The linkage is more difficult to achieve if the knowledge subjects running concurrently with the legal research skills course are constitutional or administrative law, or an introduction to European Union law. The opportunities and possibilities for linkage need to be considered when the structure of the whole law degree programme is being reviewed. If these opportunities are not provided then integration of the legal research skills with other aspects of the law degree programme will be weaker.

Promoting the course to the teaching school

Chapter 1 highlighted how the concept of legal research skills has developed since the late 1980s. Up until then, with a few exceptions, there was little formal instruction in legal research skills at undergraduate level, and none at postgraduate. Students could hardly be described as ‘independent researchers’ but tended to rely on library staff for a great deal of assistance even with simple information needs. Since then official and professional bodies have required that law students learn to be effective, independent researchers. However, there are institutions where these requirements are not fully met, and so this section, based on personal experience, is written for anyone – lecturer, librarian or computing staff – who feels the need to promote an enhancement to a legal research skills course.

There is no single, appropriate method of promoting the concept of legal research skills training, ie persuading the teaching school that it is a good thing and getting support for it. The promoter needs to gauge the method most appropriate to the style and personality of the teaching school involved. Timing is also a very important factor. In general, the success or failure of promotion depends largely on the ability of staff to take advantage of the opportunities available. Support staff who are well informed and involved with the work of the teaching school will be at a clear advantage over those who are not.

Some institutions are starting to develop strategic aims and objectives for teaching, learning and employability. The ability of students to carry out independent research or to be information literate may feature in these documents, which can provide the promoter with a valuable strategic context in which to place detailed discussions with the teaching school on legal research skills training.

The following is a list of examples of promotional methods which have been used successfully both at Cardiff and elsewhere. Frequently, several promotion methods need to be used together, rather than a single one in isolation:

• informal discussions with teaching staff
• formal and informal contact with key members of school research, teaching and library committees
• alert relevant staff (such as library representatives, course or module directors, heads of school) to relevant strategic documents issued by the institution, especially any documents on information literacy
• send relevant staff (such as library representatives, course or module directors, heads of school) copies of examples of instruction used by support staff for other schools
• offer to train lecturing staff in the use of a particular database and then ‘sell’ the concept of student instruction in this and other aspects of information skills
• try to integrate your staff training sessions within the school’s staff training programme
• prepare a formal paper for the head of school (an example of the headings used successfully are given below)
• keep track of the views and proposals on library instruction and the use of electronic media of any professional or vocational bodies in the subject field and the Quality Assurance Agency, and draw them to the attention of the teaching school
• bring appropriate sections of government reports to the attention of the teaching school
• tie in discussions on legal research skills training with other school initiatives, such as combating plagiarism and requirements for students to create personal development plans (PDP)
• give a formal presentation of proposals to meetings between support staff and the teaching school

The list of headings used in the formal paper mentioned above consisted of:

• an introduction which related the proposals to those contained in a consultation document issued by a professional or vocational body or the strategic aims and objectives of the institution for teaching, learning and employability
• a brief definition of what was meant by legal research skills
• linkage to other parts of the curriculum, to highlight integration and complementarity
• learning outcomes for the course, expressed in student centred terms: “At the end of this course/module a student will be able to…”
• the scheme of study and course timetable, considering constraints (for example resources, in terms of rooms, equipment and staff) and presenting alternative solutions
• how students might be assessed
• proposed date for implementation
• summary of recommendations

Promoting the course to students

That it is necessary to promote the course to students might come as a surprise to some staff. Surely students automatically recognise the importance of developing competence in this basic lawyering skill? Regrettably not.

Law school teaching staff in general tend to give priority to the textbook amongst the learning materials they use as part of their teaching. Undergraduate law students prefer to depend on digested material, whether it be in the form of handouts or textbooks, rather than research independently – see Little, Leighton and Mortimer (1997), especially page 218. Students believe that using Google will provide all the information they need to support their research of the law. Students fail to develop the skill of independent research, although many consider they possess the skill by the end of their studies. This is particularly noticeable when they enter a postgraduate vocational training course. They think they know how to undertake legal research in a client based environment, but the answers to practice exercises set early in their postgraduate studies show clear signs of weaknesses.

Further, some students enter postgraduate vocational training with the view that legal research is beneath them and that when they enter a law firm they will be able to delegate the task to even more junior staff. This view is misconceived. According to a limited scale research study by Eisenschitz and Walsh (1995), 97% of the fully qualified solicitors surveyed delegated case research. The work was delegated to either trainees or librarians – the distribution about evenly split. Further, since the fully qualified solicitors in the survey undertook their own ‘quick research’, delegation was used for in-depth searching only. This alone is justification for trainees being competent, independent researchers. In contrast to the solicitors, 72% of the barristers surveyed did all their own research.
During vocational training many students are ‘dazzled by the glamour’ of other skills – advocacy, interviewing, conferencing. Legal research can appear to be the ‘Cinderella’ of the lawyering skills.

It is important to emphasise to students at the outset of their course of study, whether it be undergraduate or postgraduate, the importance of them developing the skill of independent legal research. At Cardiff University, at the beginning of the undergraduate programme, library staff use a 10 minute lecture slot on induction day to demolish the popular media image of the lawyer who sits in a room lined with books s/he is rarely seen using. We emphasise the importance of the foundation skill of becoming an effective and efficient researcher in paper and electronic sources so that written and oral work done is confident and accurate. Also, on the Legal Practice Course, teaching staff with ‘practice experience’ have spoken to students in small group sessions about the importance of legal research, relating use of the skill to their own early work as a trainee. On the Bar Vocational Course a past student is invited back after a year or two in practice to ‘tell it how it is’.

Student misconceptions about legal research can be emphasised by the attitudes of teaching staff throughout the law school. How frequently, for example, are tutors seen in the library consulting books or using PCs? Is legal research seen to be done by teaching staff? Is an appropriate example being set students? Of course, many teaching staff have access to their own materials and a PC in their room, and therefore have very little need to use the library. Further, some teaching staff prefer not to use the library in term time because of interruptions to their work by students seeking advice or assistance with essay questions or coursework. But, legal research could be better promoted as an essential lawyering skill if it was employed more visibly by teaching staff.

Co-operation between teaching school, library and computing

As we have seen, a comprehensive scheme of instruction in legal research covers a range of individual skill areas. Devising and delivering the legal research programme ought to be a co-operative partnership between the teaching school, library and computing staff, since each has experience and skills to contribute which will make the student learning experience richer. That is my personal view, based on the co-operative nature of the legal research programmes with which I have been involved during the 25 or more years I have worked in academic institutions.

Surveys conducted between 1991 and 2001 (Clinch, 1992, 1993, 1998, Jackson, 2000, 2002), indicate that provision of legal research skills instruction has grown steadily, if erratically, from a joint responsibility between law library staff and the law school amongst 34.5% of respondents to the earliest survey, to joint provision amongst 60% of respondents in 2001.

This movement is encouraging, but there are still some institutions in which the skill of legal research is taught almost entirely by law school staff with minimal contributions from support staff. My guess is that the reason for this is the notion of who ‘owns’ the course – the law school. I have no empirical evidence of any link between the quality of student performance in legal research and whether the course was taught by the law school alone or co-operatively, but I do make the point strongly that library and computing/IT staff have a unique contribution to make, because in their jobs they have had to keep track of the increasing range of sources of legal information and the increasing range of formats in which it is held, and to come to terms with the lack of standards in the way in which information in electronic sources is presented to the user.

As mentioned earlier in this chapter a law school which embraces the concept of information literacy in the provision of legal research skills is more likely to run the course as a joint responsibility of academic and support staff.

Teaching staff have the subject knowledge and experience to devise and deliver the ‘identification and analysis’ elements of legal research. Computing and IT staff have the knowledge and experience to teach the basic IT skills programme, though I know that in some institutions, including my own, library staff regularly undertake this part of the programme for the law school. This innovation benefits students, since library staff usually have a better knowledge than computing or IT staff of how IT applications will be applied within the law curriculum, and this informs their teaching. The ‘finding information’ element can be very effectively taught by library staff, for they have knowledge of the range of sources available, experience of using the sources both personally and, uniquely, as observers of others using the sources. By observing and assisting others in the use of paper or electronic sources librarians gain invaluable insights into how instruction can be most effectively devised and which details, especially ‘points to watch’, ‘things to avoid’ or ‘short cuts’, ought to be included. Lecturing staff know how they, individually, would use a source, but librarians are able to contribute the broader picture of what a range of users find easy or difficult. Finally, both librarians and lecturing staff have experience to contribute to the ‘presenting results’ aspect of legal research.

There is also a further reason for advocating co-operation. As student numbers increase there are advantages in having a pool of teaching and support staff available to give instruction. At Cardiff it is the only way we are able to deliver a comprehensive programme of instruction in the autumn term to 350 first year undergraduates, over 200 vocational postgraduates and about 100 non-vocational postgraduates.

Summary

Expanding the definition of legal research into learning outcomes has enabled the identification of key building blocks in the development of the curriculum. In the next chapter those building blocks will turn into discrete lessons, having structure and content to match the learning outcomes discussed in chapter 3, and meeting some of the findings of learning theory discussed in chapter 2.

References

• Clinch P (1992) ‘The skills revolution: the challenge for librarians’ The Law Librarian 23(4): 200-206
• Clinch P (1993) ‘Legal research skills training in uuniversities and polytechnics in England and Wales: report of a study’ The Law Librarian 24(3): 137-140
• Clinch P (1998) ‘The SPTL – BIALL Survey 1996/7’ The Law Librarian 29(3): 165-177
• Davies J and Jackson C (2005) ‘Information literacy in the law curriculum: experiences from Cardiff’ The Law Teacher 39(2): 150-160
• Dearing, Sir R (1997) Higher education in the learning society: main report of the
  National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education London: HMSO
• Eisenschitz T and Walsh R (1995) ‘Lawyers’ attitudes to information’ The Law Librarian 26(3): 446-450
• Hodginson L (1996) Changing the higher education curriculum towards a systematic approach to skills development (Open University Vocational Qualifications Centre) Milton Keynes: Open University
• Jackson C (2000) ‘BIALL Academic Law Library Survey 1998’ The Law Librarian 31(4): 227-239
• Jackson C (2002) ‘SPTL/BIALL Academic Law Library Survey 2000/2001’ Legal Information Management 2(2): 38-49
• Little C, Leighton P and Mortimer T (1997) ‘A “black hole in legal education”: research into learning materials for law students’ The Law Teacher 31(2): 208-231
• Lynch B, Moodie P and Slater D (1993) ‘The teaching of foundation legal instruction’ The Law Teacher 27(3): 216-243
• Mager R (1990) Making instruction work, or, skillbloomers London: Kogan Page
• Shapland J and Sorsby A (1998) The Junior Bar in 1997 (Report to the General Council of the Bar) Sheffield: Institute for the Study of the Legal Profession
• Shapland J and Sorsby A (2003) The Junior Bar in 2002 Sheffield: Institute for the Study of the Legal Profession
  

Last Modified: 30 June 2010