Undergraduates represent a burgeoning element in the realization of the Chinese dream. Their understanding of the law is intimately connected to the advancement of a law-governed China, underscoring the importance of fostering legal awareness among university students in contemporary times. Utilizing empirical research, this paper delves into the efficacy of the inquiry-based instructional approach in enhancing the legal consciousness of students. In a higher education institution in Hainan, first-year nursing students were randomly assigned to either an experimental or a control cohort. The experimental group received instruction through the inquiry method, contrasting with the traditional teaching method used for the control group. The educational experiment spanned a period of five weeks. Data were gathered via surveys, discussions, and classroom observations, with the SPSS program employed for the quantitative analysis of data, encompassing descriptive statistics, t-tests, and analysis of variance. The findings indicate a marked enhancement in the legal literacy of the experimental group post-experiment, with a statistically significant distinction observed between the experimental and control groups. The paper advances a suite of pedagogical strategies grounded in empirical analysis, with the goal of refining the implementation of the inquiry method in legal education and offering targeted recommendations for institutions of higher learning, educators, and students.