Knowing if your ready for the September Lsat

[Grecia.S]

Hello, I am unsure if I should be registering for the September LSat? I purchased the RC, LG, and LR bible books and have also purchased the bible workbooks that are also available for all of them. I have been able to read all of them ( I purchased them in November of Lsat year and its taking me quite some time to finish because of my work schedule). When I would work on the problems offered in both the workbook and the bible I would get about half of the answers wrong. I would review each problem to see what I would get wrong but I don't feel as if I've actually improved much since then. I am now taking practice test and I am not doing great and its a bit harder because I am only seeing my answer choice and the correct one. I'm not sure what to do, there's a little under 2 months left and I am not sure with how other students react to this type of feeling? Sometimes I feel as if I should just wait for December? At times I feel as if i should just start all over and just take it in June? I know that we are able to take 3 test in 2 years but not sure if I should just throw myself out there and see what I score? I may be experiencing what other students are feeling but I am not sure because I don't personally know anyone else going through this. I noticed there is a 6 week study plan available on Powerscore involving the material I have purchased and I did dedicate about close to 16 hours on the weekend and about 2 per weekday but I feel as if I am a much slower person when it comes to getting through the material because it would impossible for me to finish that in 6 weeks. Any advice would be greatly appreciated

[Ron Gore]

Grecia,

I'm sorry to hear that you are having these difficulties in preparing for the LSAT. Everyone is different, so it is not a good idea to compare your progress to that of other students. The two questions I pull from your post are: 1) can you prepare yourself for the September LSAT; and, if you can 2) how to go about it?

I'm concerned that you may not be able to prepare yourself for the September test. You know yourself better than anyone, and it seems to me that YOU are convinced that you cannot be prepared in time. This mental starting point is a big deal, and is hard to overcome. You self-identify as someone who takes longer to digest new information, so the 6 week prep plans may not be for you. Likewise, it may not be helpful for you to take a Weekend Class, which is inherently fast-paced.

Rather than force yourself to be prepared for the September test, which will involve the nagging uncertainty about whether you were really properly prepared, I recommend making a clean break from your previous study history and set your sights on the December LSAT. You could sign up for the earliest available full-length course, either in person or online, and have confidence that you are getting yourself fully prepared. The increase in score that you likely would gain would outweigh any potential advantage you could get from taking the test in September.

To start you off, I would stop taking practice tests until you have reviewed our Test Mentality seminar. You can watch a free recording of a past seminar, and get some insight into the perspective needed to really jump into your study.

The main thing in my mind is to make a clean break with what you seem to perceive to be your past study failures. Let them go. Rather than consider that time as wasted because it didn't secure for you the score you want, think of it as a valuable foundation that you can build on in a full-length course. You can even pick an online course that meets just once a week, and so will extend for 12 weeks. That will be plenty of time to get you to your highest level of preparation, and let you be confident that you did everything you could to be prepared on test day.

To be clear, this is just my perspective on your situation, and reasonable minds can disagree. I imagine some of my colleagues may weigh in on your situation with a different perspective. Take all of the advice you receive and come up with a decision that you will feel comfortable with not only now or in September, but in the future as well.

Best wishes,

Ron

[Nikki Siclunov]

Hi Grecia,

Let me add my 2c to Ron's excellent advice. While somewhat premature to say at this point, I agree - it is highly unlikely that you'll be ready to take the test in September. Here's why:

You mention that you purchased the Bible trilogy back in November, and I assume it's taken you this long to complete all the books and workbooks. Six months is certainly on the very high end of what we expect you to spend learning the foundational concepts; indeed, if you look at any test-prep timeline, you'll notice that question-type training and practice test-taking ultimately take just as long (or longer) than learning the basics. This is not to say that mastering the techniques is unimportant; on the contrary - it is critical. Which is precisely why you need repeated exposure to the same (or similar) types of arguments, logic games, passages, etc. The Bibles and the workbooks are not designed to provide this type of training. So, unless you clear your schedule for the next 6 weeks and dedicate at least 20-25 hrs/week entirely to question type training, test taking, and review, I am afraid you won't reach your maximum potential by the end of September. You may be OK with that, of course - it all depends on your goals. If you aren't, however, here's what you should probably do:

Take a clean break from your study regimen you've stuck with so far, and plan to take the test in December. I highly recommend enrolling in a Live Online or a Full-Length course. I realize there may be budgetary constraints involved in this decision, but when a given approach does not yield the expected result, you need to change it. There are 3 main benefits of taking a course over self-study: 1) Structure; 2) Homework; 3) An instructor. Let me elaborate:

1. Structure. If you've taken 6+ months to complete the Bible trilogy, your study plan does not have structure. I realize you have a full-time job, and probably a myriad of other obligations that come first. Unfortunately, this is not the way to study for this test: you need to know what you're doing every week, and do it. A concerted effort for 2 months where LSAT test prep is your part-time job is way more effective than studying the Bibles on-and-off for six months.

2. Homework. As I mentioned earlier, the Bibles are meant to familiarize you with the techniques you need to attack every question on the test, but are limited in the number of questions they give you to test these techniques out. There are two ways to practice your approach: either take a course where your homework will consist of mostly question-type training, or invest in the Question Type Training Volumes I and II. A unique advantage of taking a course is that each homework question will be explained online. There are literally thousands of them. These explanations are incredibly helpful in that they tell you not only which questions you got wrong, but also why you got them wrong.

3. Instructors. Our job is to make sure your scores improve. We do that not only by explaining the approach you need to take to the test and its questions, but also by focusing on your weaknesses, correcting any flaws in your methodology, and generally giving you guidance to help maximize your score. Keep in mind that if you decide against taking a course, you can still post questions on this forum and we'll be happy to answer them However, nothing can replace an actual instructor that you meet with twice a week.

One thing that struck me while reading your post is your way of taking practice tests:

I am now taking practice test and I am not doing great and its a bit harder because I am only seeing my answer choice and the correct one.

Of course, when you review the test you know which answers were correct, and none of the questions have explanations. This sort of test review is not particularly helpful: you can always "convince" yourself that the correct answer choice is right without critically examining why your answer choice was wrong. A prep course avoids this pitfall by providing you detailed explanations and in-class test reviews. If you don't take a course, try the test-taking technique explained in some of our blog posts:

http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/bid/331 ... ctice-Test

http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/bid/153 ... tice-tests

I hope this is somewhat helpful... let us know if you have any questions about any of the above.

Thanks!