Oral Examination
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Curriculum
Rapid recall: the forty points examiners ask most 1 lesson
Lesson OR2: The Spoken Answer 1 lesson
Lesson OR3: Court Craft for Advocacy Exercises 1 lesson
Lesson OR4: Preparing for the Oral, and the Day Itself 1 lesson
Mock orals with model answers and marking guides 1 lesson
About this course
This module prepares you for the oral examinations of the Advocates Training Programme. The Kenya School of Law conducts the orals in batches during the programme, while the Council of Legal Education sets and marks the written bar examinations. In an oral you face a panel, usually of two or three examiners, for ten to twenty minutes. The panel puts a set of facts or a direct question, then follows up, challenges your answer and watches how you handle pressure.
The orals test the same nine units as the written papers, but in a different way. A panel cannot give marks for what you would have written; it marks what you say, how quickly and accurately you say it, whether you cite the right authority, whether you see the ethical issue, and whether you conduct yourself as an advocate. Many candidates who know the law lose marks because they ramble, guess at section numbers, argue with the panel or miss the duty to the court.
The module is built in three parts: a forty-point rapid-recall sheet of the rules panels ask about most; four short lessons on how the orals work, the spoken answer, court craft and preparation; and twelve mock orals, nine panel orals covering the ATP units and three live advocacy exercises, each with a model exchange, a weaker answer for contrast and a marking guide.
What you’ll learn
- • State the core rules of each ATP unit in one sentence, with the correct section or case
- • Structure a spoken answer as Answer, Authority, Application and Action, in under a minute
- • Handle a question you cannot answer, and respond to a challenge without either collapsing or arguing
- • Spot the ethical trap in a set of facts and put the duty to the court first
- • Take appearance and make, oppose and reply to a short oral application in the right order
- • Cross-examine on a prior statement, raise and answer objections, and make a plea in mitigation
- • Prepare over four weeks and conduct yourself correctly on the day, in person or online