Major Variations Between Practice Tests

[annesm]

Hi,

I've been having an issue with my practice tests where I either do well on reading comp, and do poorly on logic games, or I do well on logic games and poorly on reading comp. My logical reasoning scores have been slowly but consistently improving. Is there a reason why this is happening? If I could do well on both the sections within the same test, I could achieve my target score, but for some reason they seem mutually exclusive. If you could provide any advice I would greatly appreciate it!

Andy

[Dave Killoran]

Hi Anne,

Thanks for the question! That inconsistency you are seeing relates to how the LSAT tests a wide variety of areas each time, which makes some tests better for you and some worse. I talk about that here: http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/bid/310 ... sat-casino. For students who aren't 100% on the fundamentals or who aren't machine-like in their approach, these variations in exams often reveal themselves in varying performances. LR is great on one test, but then not so great on the next while LG seems to do the same thing, but on different tests. You fix it by doing the following:

• 1. Tracking everything that gives you problems. Miss a question? Mark it down and why. Don't feel 100% comfortable? Same thing—mark it down. Then, every so often, go through those lists and look for patterns in what you are missing. There will be patterns!
  
  2. Make sure you really know the concepts and techniques. For example, can identify premises and conclusions without thinking, do you know the basic argument flaws, or do you know all the ways to break down causality in LR, and so on. Instant execution with no delays is your goal.
  
  3. You look at questions repeatedly until they are second nature. Review, review, review. Stumble on a question? Look at it again a few days later. Get to know questions so well you could teach it to your friends without missing a beat, and without stumbling over any of the ideas.

Perhaps most important, inconsistency often relates to your analysis of the stimulus. How good do you feel coming out of each stimulus? Do you feel like you understand what is being said? Is your clarity on the argument as good as you'd like, or do you find yourself uncertain of exactly what has been said in many cases? If it's the latter, then the first place to start is with that—in those sections of untimed questions, stop after the stimulus and make an assessment of how strongly you feel about your stimulus understanding, and then compare that to how you perform when answering each question. If you see a connection between problems with the stimulus and missing questions, then you'll know that has to be part of your study focus.

In other words, each step of the way through a problem is an opportunity to get better and to really make sure you have everything in place. The good news is that since you can do well on individuals section, you've shown you have the ability. Now you need to eliminate those weaker spots, which will help create a more comprehensive and consistent performance.

Those are broad sketches, but hopefully that helps. Thanks!

Note: I expanded on the above reply over at: lsat/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=15044. That adds a bit more to the reply.

[annesm]

Hi Dave! Thanks so much for your help.

I've been doing what you suggested and I brought up my PTs from 157 on first try to a 167 the other day. I was reading through some of the blog posts about splitters/reverse splitters (I may be a reverse splitter, with a 3.94 GPA), and I noticed a lot of people talked about having high PTs, and getting their LSATs back and losing a lot of points on the real thing. Is there any identifiable cause of this/is this common? I know a good attitude/sleep/no distractions can help, but are there any other tangible things that can be done to make sure your score is consistent on test day? I would love to go top 14, and I don't want all this preparation to go to waste on test day.

Thanks again for your help-- I find all these resources to be very helpful

[Eric Ockert]

Hi Anne!

Glad to see the solid improvement!

As Dave pointed out, there is variability to LSAT's, so certainly there is the possibility of going down on test day. But many test takers find the opposite. I can tell you personally that my actual LSAT was the best test I ever had. So I actually outdid my practice tests.For me, I found the test day experience and the gravity of the situation caused me to tighten up some sloppiness from my practice tests. There were now real consequences to my decisions, and for me, that helped.

Many people find the test day experience throws them off of their game, however. There can be lots of causes for this.

More than anything, I would just recommend trying to simulate that test day experience as much as possible with your Practice Tests. You want to get psyched up when doing a practice test. Imagine that it's the real thing, that the score really matters. Let your stomach get into knots over it. Get nervous, let the adrenaline flow a little bit. Those things are inevitably going to happen on test day, and you want those feelings to be as familiar as possible.

But I would also second Dave's advice from above. Just keep working to improve your understanding of each issue that arises as you take your practice tests. Over and over. The more you keep addressing these, the less surprises you see on test day. Things just look more and more familiar because you've seen them before. You can't ever achieve perfect consistency, but you can certainly improve it.

Finally, once you do get to Test Day, don't even settle for consistent. You want that score to be higher than your best test, not equal to it. This is the moment you've been preparing so long for. Let yourself rise to the challenge and you may be surprised what you are capable of.

Hope that helps!