Same Scores Past 3 Months-20 days left

[wshah11]

Hey Dave,

Thanks so much for all those resources and fast response. I'm happy about the the Highest LSAT score for law schools. Just took my first PT since the actual LSAT and I scored 1 point higher than my actual score which kind of bummed me out due to the fact that I was beyond rusty and I still managed to beat my test day score. But it reaffirmed the fact that retaking it is a smart option for me because I know now for sure I can still score better as I just did and have done in the past. I would like your advice on some more matters that have recently came up.

1. Scheduling advice- As mentiomed earlier I am going to be more busy in the next 2 months rather than this month. As a result of this, I created this study plan. I have decided to do a PT day, Review the PT day, and a Law School Applications work day, every 3 days till the end of this month. By the end of this month I will have done 7 PT's (Planned a vacation about month ago so I lost the last week of July).

- August I will study as best as I can, but due to my schedule it seems I can only get in 4 PT's and review days. (I may be able to fit more on weekend's, if I can.)

- September I will be able to do 7 more PT's before the exam day. Based off that it looks like I will be shooting for best case scenario 18 PT's before the exam. I have already done 16 up to this point as well. I was wondering during the month of August would I lose my retention of infomation and my fast paced habits?

2. It seems that I have hit a plateau with my RC section. I keep getting 17/27 or 18 and it's not going higher. Is there any suggestions that I can do? I heard reading the "Economist" and heavy word counted Journals could help, but any strategies on the actual passages that you have up your sleeve?

3. Practicing with old material - So I followed the directions of the blog you posted on how to reuse old materials and the benefits of it. I am still having an issue because I can see the answer on my page. As result, I am biased to automatically accept that answer when I know I would look more deeply into the other answer choices. Any advice for that as well?

Thanks
Sam

[Jonathan Evans]

Hey Sam,

Jonathan here, LSAT instructor. I hope you don't mind if I jump in to address your questions. First off, I want to complement you on your dedication and perseverance practicing for the LSAT. A component of effective preparation is having the right disposition and attitude towards the test. Just as I do with every other student, I suggest that you set the September test date as D-Day. That's when you're taking the test for the last time. You're going to do what you need to do to get ready for the test; you're going to knock it out of the park; then you're going to move on with your life and law school applications.

Now, with that goal in mind, you need to make a commitment to do some LSAT practice every day. If it's only 15 minutes, make it happen, but make that 15 minutes 100% focused on LSAT. Also, don't fry your brain trying to cram in four hours of LSAT prep on any given day. It's all about quality over quantity. Be directed. Set small goals and keep pushing forward. Change things up. Don't get stuck in a rut.

Here's a metaphor that I find is sometimes helpful. If you were trying to do strength training at the gym, and all you did was to go every day for three hours, do a total body workout with lots of reps, take a day off, and then repeat the same routine, you'd make some progress but you'd quickly hit a plateau and stop improving. So it is with the LSAT. You could sit down and take 50 LSATS in a row and score about the same every time.

You need to break things up, break them down, change things up, and work smarter. Instead of an entire practice test, do a timed section. Then review that section. Make a note of the problems you missed and any problem you had difficulty with. Categorize the problems. What kind of questions were you missing? On a Logical Reasoning section, were you having difficulty with Strengthens and Weakens for example? On an Analytical Reasoning section, were you having trouble with Global questions that test deductions? On a Reading Comp section, are you having more trouble with questions that resemble arguments? Drill down on the kinds of problems you're missing. Drill down on the kind of wrong choices you find attractive. Getting down to two? Drill down on noticing the small differences between the credited response and the incorrect response. If there are concepts you are shaky on, review those concepts.

Mix it up with your practice. Give yourself a set of ten arguments to do and set a timer for 10 minutes. See what you can knock out. Now set a timer for 9 minutes and do ten more. Now set a timer for 8 minutes and do the same. The same advice is true for reading comp. You need to identify where you're having issues. Are you spending too much time on the passage and rushing through the questions? Remember VIEWSTAMP. Focus on getting the main point and structure. Keep your annotations effective and directed. Don't get stuck in the weeds. Get through the passage and attack those questions.

Sorry to come at you with all this advice at once, but I strongly suggest that you break up your LSAT practice into a smaller, more manageable, directed daily routine that will help you achieve goals on your way to improving your score. Then, perhaps once a week or once every two weeks take a full practice exam and integrate your review of that exam into the next two days of LSAT prep.

As for old material, by all means, print out a fresh copy of old tests if you can, but don't stress about seeing the answer. The important part of practice is not getting the answer right and giving yourself a high five; it is going through the process, noticing what is important on any given question, and then going through the answers with Process of Elimination in mind to know deeply and definitively why every wrong answer is wrong and why the credited response is right. I learn new things from LSAT problems I've done dozens of times.

I hope this helps. Please follow up with further questions.

[wshah11]

Hey Jonathan,

That analogy about working out (full body vs specific) really struck home and made sense. I listened to the advice and just took another PT and my RC section boosted by two points I got 20/27 for my first time. I am hoping now I can maintain this.

As I was recently reviewing my last PT I found myself saying, " Oh wow that was an easy one, how did I miss that question?" About 80-90% of the time about the questions I am missing on the LR section. When I go back and review my entire exam, the ones I got wrong, when I do them for a second time, I almost always get them right the second time. Is that a good sign? Kinda upset at my self for not seeing them the first time. Have you any of you seen this with past students? If so, any advice?

Thank you
Sam

[Clay Cooper]

Hi wshah11,

Thanks for your follow-up post and your questions.

Is this common? Yes, definitely, I have seen that before - many times, in many students. Typically it occurs in my students who work the hardest; they look over a practice test, and it seems clear to them on each question that they missed that the actually correct answer is the one they should have picked.

Is it a good sign? Yes, but probably not as significant a good sign as you might think. It is a good sign in the sense that, if the correct answer makes sense to you on a second reading, you are probably not way off in your understanding of how the questions work, or what you are supposed to be looking for. In other words, you can't be totally out of your depth if a second try gets you to the right answer, and it is reasonable to expect that, as you continue to improve, you will more often find the right answer on the first trip.

However, don't start celebrating just yet, because this habit is misleading due to a subtle bias we have. On many (probably most) questions, there are one or two answers which are clearly better than the rest. If, then, you later go back through on questions you missed, knowing you missed them, you are likelier than it may seem to a casual observer to be able to choose the correct answer, because you have already eliminated your favorite. Furthermore, you will be hyper-vigilant in reading the stimulus, and will be more critical than usual of your initial understanding of it; each of these factors makes it unrealistically likely that you will notice mistakes and see why the actually correct answer is correct.

In other words, knowing that you missed the question the first time makes it pretty likely that you'll get it right this time - probably more so than we tend to account for, and therefore the confidence that arises in us from having gotten it right on the second try is probably not totally justified.

I hope that helps! Keep working hard.

[wshah11]

Hey Everyone,

So I followed everyone's advice so far and seen some positive results. I am consistently scoring 155-157 now without any variations on the past 3 PT's I have taken. Good to see that I am slowly locking things down. I want to address a weakness that I have, that I believe I can work on to bring me up in the scores. I have been consistently missing 10-8 questions on the RC section. I still barely make in time reading and doing all 4 sections. If I do not make it, I usually guess on the last 2 questions.

So I know I am missing points there, throughout my time studying for the LSAT I have slowly, but surely increased in speed, but of course I would like to get even faster. So I was thinking of buying the PowerScore RC Bible. I have already been through all the RC passages in my homework books from the in person class. I was thinking of buying the bible and just drilling RC sections daily for a week to see if anything improves. Any suggestions about that? I looked at the supplemental sections on testing center and could not find any extra RC sections, unless I am missing them? I basically just want new RC sections to drill.

Any other advice on how to improve my RC score would be appreciated as well.

Sam

[Adam Tyson]

Three bits of advice here:

1) Yes, the RC Bible may be a great resource to expand your understanding of RC and get exposed to more passages and more explanations.

2) Be careful about overdoing it - like Jonathan said, vary your routine some. I think a week of intense RC practice, at the expense of the other sections, is too much. Do RC one day, untimed, just to work on concepts, strategies, pattern recognition, etc. Do a timed section another day, and score and analyze it. Then take a day to work on LR, perhaps, maybe on Must Be True questions since those are the most common type in RC and you can be reinforcing your RC work while also taking a break from it. RC again, untimed, the next day, then maybe a games day. Or, split each day up into parts - RC in the morning, then LR in the afternoon; next day start with LG and finish with RC; then LR and LG; and keep rotating around like that to stay fresh and sharp.

3) You might not like this one, but slow down. Let's think about what you said - you are missing 8-10 questions, but only guessing on the last 2. That means there are 6-8 questions, pretty much one entire passage, that you are attempting and getting wrong. A better approach for you might be to slow your pace down to where you are targeting just 3 passages for completion, roughly 11.5 minutes per passage, and just guessing on the final passage. If you were a little more meticulous and careful, might you get a perfect score on those three passages? Might you then pick up one or two correct answers from your guesses on the final passage? That by itself would be an improvement, wouldn't it? Try that. Stop trying to finish, and start trying to be perfect on the ones you do answer. Gather evidence from the passage to support every answer choice. Prephrase as much as possible. Sort into losers and contenders. Be focused, not rushed. As you get better at the questions, and better at hunting for the evidence, better at recognizing the patterns and taking notes, you will gradually find yourself going a little bit faster as a natural result of your improvements in those areas. Before long, finishing all four passages won't be such a rare thing, and your accuracy will have improved along the way.

Keep up the good work!

[Ricardo]

Writing in December. Studied pretty much since May, diagnostic was 140 PTing around low 150s now, want to hit a 165 come December. I have all 3 Bibles and every PT out. I have done about 20 PT so far, 10 timed around low-150s and 10 untimed around high-160s.

What can i do to jump at least into the 160 zone timed by then. I'll admit i wasnt doing the most comprehensive reviews and certainly didnt review answers i got right. I did a PT today and was the first time i comepleted 4/4 RCs. LR highest ever was like a 19/25 and games 20/22. Ill admit games is my strongest or at least most comfortable section (but i feel its gone down a bit in recent days).

During the summer i was around 20 hours a week studying, i could probably commit the same time now untill December even with school.

Its incredibly frustrating PTing around a low 150 and in some instances quite fastinating how every test i write i score exactly the same regards of using a scantron, writing it after a late night, after early morning runs, and in different enviroments.

Nonetheless i want a 160s, please help me what should i do? reread bibles? how many PT a week?

Thanks!

[Stephanie Oswalt]

Dear Ricardo,

Thank you for your message. Dave actually responded to your questions on our LSAT Blog here: http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/the-bes ... .0000.0000

Thanks!