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Learning cases for GDL

I am currently doing the GDL. I have a training contract and (strictly speaking) only have to pass, but obviously wouldn't be too happy with just this. For those of you who have done the GDL (I'm at BPP), I have two questions:Firstly, how do you learn cases? There seem to be so many for each lecture and several just won't get into my brain. I have a high first class degree from a good university, so I am not thick, but it is extremely different in the learning skills required

Secondly, if you can't remember a case name in an exam, but perhaps can remember the specifics of the case or the principles, will you get at least some credit? Or is it a case of if you don't remember enough case names, then you will fail that question?Hope that someone can shed some light on this.
Original post by daniel-leons
I am currently doing the GDL. I have a training contract and (strictly speaking) only have to pass, but obviously wouldn't be too happy with just this. For those of you who have done the GDL (I'm at BPP), I have two questions:Firstly, how do you learn cases? There seem to be so many for each lecture and several just won't get into my brain. I have a high first class degree from a good university, so I am not thick, but it is extremely different in the learning skills required

Secondly, if you can't remember a case name in an exam, but perhaps can remember the specifics of the case or the principles, will you get at least some credit? Or is it a case of if you don't remember enough case names, then you will fail that question?Hope that someone can shed some light on this.


Hi there,

I wonder if the mistake you're making is trying to learn the cases too early in the game. I didn't even attempt to actually learn the cases until it came to revision time. In my opinion, there's just too many to learn to keep them all in your head for that long. The best way to play the GDL (as, really, with most things that have an exam at the end) is to do the work for the tutorials and ensure you understand it then and also attend the lectures, and then (hopefully) when it comes to revision, you'll remember bits and pieces so that you can learn them by rote if necessary.

The other advantage with this approach is that by the time you come to revision, you sort of understand which are the important cases you absolutely must know, and which ones are a sort of added bonus, if you will. Then you can prioritise your learning as appropriate.

I hope that helps a little with your first question.

In answer to your second question - my understanding is that you usually do get some credit, yes. But I am positive that when you actually come to the exam, you'll remember the names of the most important cases anyway. I know it seems daunting now, but it's just like learning vocabulary for a language exam; and it will get easier.
Hey, I'm studying the GDL part time, but I scored a distinction in my first year. To learn cases I used the app "Anki". It's basically a flashcard application where you can create your own cards. As part of my revision I would boil down the cases into principle --- > case name, and make a flash card out of it. I then spent maybe 10-20 mins a day for a couple of months blasting through those and had absolutely no problems remembering anything when it came to the exam.Hope this helps!
Tip - use flashcards just to acquaint yourself with the facts / simple conclusions from cases, but do not rely on them beyond that.

concentrate hard on the 7-8 key cases for each topic. this will give you the ability and understanding to answer any question on the topic with the required depth and understanding. when i did this i got firsts or just off a first in every module. when answering questions in the exam i only quoted 5-6 cases and still got 70+ when i did this.

incidentally, when i got a first, i knew the least cases compared to when i relied on the textbook summary and knew a huge amount (and got low 60s).

if you know a case but just cannot remember a name, you will still get alot of credit. it is however, highly unlikely you would forget an important case if you have spent a great deal of time researching the outcome and reasoning of the case.

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