I always start my classes off by telling a personal anecdote about how I've applied something that we've been learning about regarding the law in my own civil litigation practice. The stories I tell are anecdotal in nature, but there is always a hidden moral that ties together what they have been learning. I think that this sets the tone for the class that what we are learning is important and will be applied readily when they enter the "real world" and start working in the law office. An alternative to my personal anecdote is using a story in the news to highlight what we've been learning...I've found that either of these methods opens up great questions and discussions from the students and I see the interest in their faces b/c they know that someday the stories I am telling could happen to them.