Quality review of test but exactly what does that entail?

[salmach]

Hi,

This question is primarily for Dave or Jon Denning because I tend to follow their posts frequently, but of course, all feedback is welcome! Everyone on this forum is so helpful.

Could you possibly walk me through a typical PT review, one that emphasizes quality and allows me to gain the most traction for future PTs. When I took the class in 2015, I recall my tutor taking up tests, but I find it rather difficult to do the same, as we would only take up specific LR questions everyone found difficult and simply go over the games.

I'm writing for the September 16, 2017 test and hoping to squeeze in a few tests during the next two weeks. Could you also possibly recommend a specific number of tests I should try to reach while maintaining good practices of reviewing to ensure a good score on test day?

Thanks again! You guys rock!

[nicholaspavic]

Hi salmach,

Dave has actually written a really good summary in answer to this exact question.

http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/the-bes ... tice-tests

I think that both Jon and I would echo exactly what Dave emphasized there and I would point you also to the blog entry's comments where Dave goes on to link other articles that may be of deep interest to you about other questions that will come up for you as you explore these different types of reviews.

Just to throw in my two-cents here, a successful PT review may be a little more than what the average student thinks it is. You have to try all three methods to find the one that works and in fact, a combination of all three may be the most beneficial leading up to the September exam. As I said to you in your other question, PT's at least twice a week and maybe one more if you can stand it, but above all, take some sanity breaks. At least one full day a week in order to recover. You got this! And best of luck!

[Dave Killoran]

Hi Sal,

Thanks for the message! Nick actually posted the exact article I would have referred you to, so thumbs-up to him for doing that. I would probably try at least one of your test using blind review (and all of them, if you can manage it time-wise), since that gives you a great opportunity to review your own work prior to knowing the correct answer. Those moments of self-illumination tend to stick the strongest I've found, hence my preference for that type of approach.

After going through the test question by question and doing the blind review, make sure to input your results into the scoring system (in your Online Student Center and also at http://students.powerscore.com/self-study/index.cfm). Among the vast trove of data those analytics provide, you can see the types of questions you missed as well as the difficulty of each question. For example, if you keep missing Flaw questions at a high rate on each test, then you've learned something incredibly valuable. We recently did a Self Study Webinar, and in the middle of it Jon provided some examples of analyzing your performance using test results. The seminar recording is at [link coming shortly—I'll come back and add it because it turns out this seminar has not yet been posted online, but I'm having it done currently!], and I'd recommend reviewing what he did—it blew a lot of students away, and yet it was fairly simple and certainly something anyone could do on their own.

Using the difficulty data helps place your misses in perspective. If you miss a question that only 23% of students answer correctly, then you've missed a hard question, the kind anyone could miss. Yes, you want to examine it and see why it was difficult and try to determine what you could do differently next time in order to solve that, but it shouldn't be the kind of question that haunts you or that you beat yourself up about. On the other hand, if you miss a question that 86% of test takers answer correctly, then you've made the type of mistake you should be angry about! Go back and really break down what happened and make sure you know exactly what you need to do next time in order to never miss a question like that again.

Those are some thoughts to help shape how you review your tests, and given that you have about 11 days until the exam, I'd say you should look to take about three exams between now and then. That allows you ample time to review each exam, which is actually the most important part! And make sure to take each exam with an Experimental section; that adds 75 more questions total to review, making it really 3.75 tests you'd be taking (I make a comment about that here: lsat/viewtopic.php?t=15166).

Thanks!

[salmach]

Thank you so much Nick and Dave! As tedious and daunting as it is to sit there and go through question by question, I'm actually starting to learn quite a bit that I so clearly and easily skimmed over my core curriculum in the bibles and drills (i.e. subtle changes in wording, etc). Also trying my best to approach all of the review in a positive light.

Hopefully it goes well! Appreciate all the help