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“This One Time at Band Camp”: Reexamining the Use of “War Stories” in Trial Advocacy Pedagogy
No full text“War stories,” i.e., the retelling of an event from the teacher’s experience as a practicing lawyer to illustrate a teaching point, have long been a part of law school pedagogy. In this regard, faculty teaching doctrinal courses recognize that the use of war stories can work as an effective teaching methodology. Interestingly, however, the use of war stories to teach trial advocacy has proven far more controversial. To that end, the most dominant approach to teaching trial advocacy in American law schools, known as the National Institute of Trial Advocacy (NITA) method, embraces an approach to war stories that ranges from ambivalence to outright hostility. The NITA method largely follows a particular three-step process. The f irst step of that process entails a lecture regarding a specific trial advocacy skill, followed by a demonstration of the skill in action. The second and third steps involve students performing the skill in question, followed by instructor critique of the student performance. Importantly, while the NITA method is silent with respect to war stories as a teaching tool during the lecture portion of a trial advocacy course, the method outright prohibits the use of war stories when critiquing student performances. Considering NITA’s approach to war stories, scholars have devoted little attention to how storytelling can (or should) be used when teaching trial skills. In filling this scholarly void, this article posits that war stories can indeed be used as an effective teaching tool in trial advocacy courses. Accordingly, this work is the first to thoroughly explore how to best incorporate storytelling into trial advocacy teaching. In so doing, this article offers guidance for successfully using stories during both the lecture and critique portions of a trial practice class. Consequently, this discussion not only demonstrates the value of storytelling in trial advocacy pedagogy, it is also the first to challenge the anti-war story perspective engrained in the dominant approach to critiquing student performances in trial practice courses
