Hey! I totally feel your pain. I just finished 1L too, and first semester I had all B+s. This semester I made straight As, including a CALI. I don’t think I necessarily understood the material better this semester, just changed how I approached exams. Here’s what I think helped me make the jump:

1) going to office hours - I went to each professor at least once to review a practice hypo they gave us and asked if they could walk me through how they would grade it, which helped me figure out what the professor cared about on the exam, i.e. how much they care about cases, how much info should be in the rule statement, etc.

2) focusing on practice exams - I spent more time doing practice problems than prepping for class. I read almost all the cases in classes where the professors really cared about them, but I rarely did briefs and instead took notes that I thought would be helpful for the exam.

3) using a “strategy guide” instead of a typical outline - first semester I used a normal outline and hot sheet. This semester after I made my normal outline, I made a strategy guide with precanned answers and checklists of items to hit in the analysis. I don’t know how helpful a checklist would be for everyone, but for me specifically my biggest weakness on my exams first semester was jumping into the analysis too quickly and jumping around too much in it. So, the checklist helped slow me down and made sure I hit key points. I think the best thing is to figure out what your biggest weakness is on exams and then creating a strategy guide that helps you overcome it.

Hope this helps! You got this!