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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Interesting reddit post on the (alleged) use of the Socratic Method in law school:

You've all heard it, it's one of the legal community's favorite buzz phrases. But I get sick of hearing faculty and others constantly refer to the Socratic Method when in reality what most professors do is just ask questions that verify if you did the reading, usually with little follow up. This is stupid, I had undergrad professors who did the exact same thing.

The real Socratic Method uses questions posed in an argumentative dialogue to make the student logically defend and think through their position on a specific topic. Essentially playing the devil's advocate. This is often hard to accomplish in a law school context since most classes deal with the law as is and not the law as it should be. The Socratic Method typically works best in philosophical discussions. As a result, it's not actually always that useful in legal classes where the goal is to learn the case law, not debate about its merits.

I guess the reason this grinds my gears is that it sounds both pretentious and scary, and it's misleading. People assume that the Socratic Method and getting cold called are the same thing. Just remember the next time your professor asks you "what did Justice Black say in his concurrence" that is not the Socratic Method. Your professor is just checking to see whether you read.

https://www.reddit.com/r/LawSchool/comments/16vf5px/law_schools_suck_at_the_socratic_method/[/quote]

Well lawyers aren't philosophers, not surprising to see they've butchered the Socratic Method.[/quote]

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