166 in Feb, 173+ in Sep possible?

[josephcheung]

I have studied for LSAT since December last year, and finished PT 30-60, ranging from 164-173, with an average score of 169. Got a 166 in the real one, frankly a bit disappointed.

My current situation is LG -2, LR -3~-4 for each session, and RC -3~-8. I dunno what's wrong with my capricious RC performance lol.

I really want to raise my score, ideally above 173 in the September test (because I am studying at a university in Hong Kong famous for low GPA. my current GPA is 3.5, which is already 5-10% in my year). Is this even possible? I can spare 28 hours per week from March to May, and 50 hours per week from June to August. I don't wanna burn out so I've plan an 10 day trip in the summer.

Any suggestion will be much appreciated!

[Dave Killoran]

Hey Joseph,

Thanks for the info! Before rendering a decision on those two resources (both of which I generally think are good tools), can you tell me a bit more about how you've studied up until this point? I don't mean in general, but specifically what materials you studied and how much each week, as well as the types of issues you encountered that caused you problems. In other words, the sort of info I talk about here: http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/need-ls ... s-help-you. The reason I ask for this is that the details make all the difference in the kind of recommendations we will make.

If you can do that, I'll do my best to give you clear and unbiased advice. Thanks!

[josephcheung]

Hey Dave,

Thank you for your reply. I borrowed the 3 Powerscore Bibles from the library and read them once, and started the PTs.

For RC, the greatest problem is that when I encounter pieces about literature, art, or history, I can easily get lost, and finished reading a paragraph without comprehending its contents, and thus wasted lots of time. But sometimes when I have a good feeling, I can do a got job. My RC performance ranges from -3 to -8, with an average of -5.

For LR, I tried to remember the strategies for each type of Qs. But sometimes it doesn't work. Also, I find Parallel Qs the most difficult and time consuming for me.

Thank you!

[Dave Killoran]

Hey Joseph,

Thanks for the reply! Ok, I have several thoughts here, in no particular order.

First, you read the books a single time—did you get much of a chance (or any) to review the ideas or to go back in the books and read portions multiple times? With over 1000 pages of fairly dense content at times, my concern is that you got a lot out of the books, but not everything. and, that secondarily, what you did get wasn't emplaced at the level you'd typically want to see. That would in part explain why under the pressure of the real exam you ran into some problems. It's something we see in the LSAT courses—students who retake them often tell us they learned a bunch of things they missed the first time, and hadn't even realized we were discussing. The Bibles work the same way, and I've had students scoring in the 170s tell me many times that the second and third readings of the books made a big difference to picking up critical but small details. Going back into the books might help significantly with steadying out your performance, and in particular they would address this point you made: "I tried to remember the strategies for each type of Qs." To me, that's a warning sign; you shouldn't have to remember anything, and it should be automatic for you. But, given that you read the books once, you're probably doing pretty well all things considered!

The prior point makes me think that you might also be helped by grabbing the LSAT Bible Workbooks. Those expand on the ideas in the Bibles, and help drill them into becoming second-nature (which, regardless of the system you use, is absolutely critical for success). They would also help really see how well you knew the range of concepts. I've been thinking of creating a series of tests for each book, but until I do that, the Workbooks are the ultimate "prove it" tool for showing that you have the ideas down.

Before talking about some of the other options, I'll make a general comment about preparing. One of the things that is a benefit to students today is the wealth of options out there. But, one of the concerns that everyone who does LSAT prep has is that those options make it easy to simply jump to another approach before really learning the full scope of the first system. I've seen students do this with other approaches and then jump to ours, so it's not really a complaint more than just a note about how people study It's something I think you should consider as well, because from everything you've said, I'm concerned you might not know our system well enough yet (for example, you should be able to absolutely crush Parallel Qs if you use the techniques properly). Continuing on with it might make you better, faster, and the quote that comes to mind is from Bruce Lee: “I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.”

Anyway, please feel free to ask me about any of the above. I'm happy to help!

[josephcheung]

Thank you so much for your detailed and prompt reply Dave! It is really nice you quoted Bruce Lee haha.I will definitely read the Powerscore books again. Thank you!