- Mon Aug 17, 2015 6:51 pm
#19406
Hi Dustin,
Thanks for your question - it is a good one, and one I hear a lot.
My answer is always the same: the primary way to improve your speed within any one section is to improve your technical skill in answering each question type. In other words: you can improve your speed by getting better at the concepts that underlie the questions (for instance conditional reasoning, logical opposition, causal conclusiions, etc) and especially by honing and practicing your approach to each individual question type, for every section.
I always encourage my students to keep faith when they are in the beginning or the middle of their prep efforts, because in learning more about how these questions work and how they should be attacked, our approach almost always becomes more complicated than it was before we began intensive prep.
For instance, in an assumption questions, a superficial reading of the question will enable you to take a stab at it, but it will probably remain difficult and you are unlikely to improve much on your baseline ability with assumption questions. By learning the Negation Technique, however, you can greatly increase your understanding of and accuracy on assumptions questions. Crucially, though, the Negation Technique is confusing and difficult to apply in the beginning, and it will almost certainly slow you down in attacking these questions.
Keep faith, though! As your understanding of the Negation Technique improves, your comfort level while using it will as well, and your speed will almost certainly increase.
This example is just one illustration of the broader concept that I encourage students to remember and apply: that your speed will increase as your understanding of the various concepts and question types improves and you become more efficient and effective in applying them.
Does your concern over timing apply more to any one specific section, or does it apply about equally to all three?
