Hey there. I'm starting with PTs in 4 days. I have 50 days till the test and I can only take about 20-25 tests if I take a test every second day. I'm confident it's doable. Thoughts? CANNOT postpone. Tell me the numbers of some of the toughest PTs you've taken. Thanks !
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34 comments
@parmeet319499 said:
Hey there. I'm starting with PTs in 4 days. I have 50 days till the test and I can only take about 20-25 tests if I take a test every second day. I'm confident it's doable. Thoughts? CANNOT postpone. Tell me the numbers of some of the toughest PTs you've taken. Thanks !
I do not recommend that at all. Take 1 test, blind review it, figure out your weaknesses, then do drills. Once that's done, only then, take the new PT. This should take at least 1 week for each PT.
Taking a PT only shows you what you don't know and taking PT's after PT's is only going to reinforce that knowledge. In order to improve you will have to figure out what you need to change in order to get a better score the next time you take a PT. To do that, you'll have to first analyze your last PT (blind review and figure out weaknesses). Then, you will have to do drills to get rid of those weaknesses. The new PT will show whether you were able to overcome your weaknesses from last time and what's the new thing you need to work on.
Instead of thinking LSAT as a test where doing [X] amount of PT's before your test date will get your goal score. See it as a test where working on your weaknesses is going to help improve your score. But this is a slow process. I understand that you do not want to move your test day. But it could mean that your current test day and when you are actually ready with the goal you have in mind may be different days. So my advice is to not burn PT's, do proper review so you can improve and not plateau, and register for the test when your PT score starts looking like your goal score.
Is it bad I want to take PT72 now just to see what the hype is about....
That’s way too many tests. It can definitely be done, it just shouldn’t be done. You’ve got to take some time after each one not only to BR it but to reflect on what went wrong and how you can improve it. At that rate, you’re just going to hit an early plateau and stay there because you won’t have time to actually address or really even identify your problems.
I thought 72 has exceptionally tough LR sections. I find with PTs it's the individual sections that are what I always remember being hard, not necessarily the full test.
@gregoryalexanderdevine723 said:
Lol yep almost a 10 point drop from PT 71 to 72 for me...
That's why I love ya'll so much -- I never feel like I'm alone or as much of an idiot as I probably am lol
The good news is, I bounced back on the next one... So there's hope!
I thought 74 and the most recent one from June were both hard
@sherisherilu254 said:
@alextobin14717 said:
I thought 72 has exceptionally tough LR sections. I find with PTs it's the individual sections that are what I always remember being hard, not necessarily the full test.
72 was an all time low for me. made me feel really bad after taking it
Same dude. I was at the peak of my performance leading up to it too which made it hurt that much more lol. I was finally seeing solid low170s scores and I think PT 72 ended up being a 164 for me.
Deleted. I quoted myself here. :joy:
Ok yeah adding to this: 72 wrecked me and my self-esteem. I took a long shower after I took it and contemplated my life. I intend to watch Brooklyn Nine-nine soon to lift my spirits lmao
First off, yeah, don't take a PT every other day. At most you should take two PTs a week, and that's assuming you have plenty of time to BR thoroughly, review, and drill your weaknesses. Like JY says, PTs are snapshots. Your time spent between PTs are how you truly improve your score.
In the beginning you'll likely have more stuff to drill anyway, so you might consider just one PT every couple of weeks until you get your foundations solid.
As for tests, I actually thought 72 was fine (scored my average, did fantastic on BR), but 76 was one of my worst, 73 not far behind.
More than overall PT difficulty, you might take a PT that has a hard version of your worst section (LR, LG, RC). I honestly think my subjective belief about PT difficulty changes with how difficult the LR section is (my comparatively weak section), and it's doubly bad when there are two tough LR sections in one PT.
@alextobin14717 @gregoryalexanderdevine723 maybe it won't be as jarring since I've taken PTs in 70s before. Although I am doing better on 70s than I have for the others, but that's also to be attributed to getting used to timing and implementing test-taking strategies.
@gregoryalexanderdevine723 said:
@parmeet319499 weird games section, and also the start of the change in LR and RC questions to being more open "most strongly supported" type rather than "must be true" types are what made PT 72 hard imo.
Facts. I actually skipped from like 64 to 72 but that was one thing I noticed too.
@alextobin14717 said:
I thought 72 has exceptionally tough LR sections. I find with PTs it's the individual sections that are what I always remember being hard, not necessarily the full test.
72 was an all time low for me. made me feel really bad after taking it
72+ were the hardest for me.
Do the latest ones you can get your hands on, they ramp up in difficulty and have a slightly different feel.
Appreciate the advice. This test is killing me :)
All of them, but knowing we're here helping each other is a great thing to remember when things don't go as well. We're going to keep improving, sometimes slowly but an improvement is still an improvement. Don't give up.
@53333 Yeah I had a huge score jump coming into the 80s. I think that was mainly due to me finally adjusting to the new LR and RC language in the 70s. I will reiterate that though I scored a lot lower in 72-78 versus 67-71, I was definitely getting better at understanding the LSAT and learning a lot more from the tests in 72-78. It just wasn't reflected in the scores lol.
@gregoryalexanderdevine723 said:
I should clarify that my scores died from PT 72-78 lol Some of the toughest sequences of LR and RC I've seen.
that sounds terrifying. Did they rebound in the 80s? I still haven't hit the 70s. So I'm trying to brace myself.
73 was tough for me! 72 has a brutal RC if I recall. For me personally I find modern tests with tough curves to be the hardest. Obviously 72 is harder then 81 raw score wise. When it comes to getting a good actually lsat score, 81 and 84 were bad for me. Did not play to my strengths. On the other hand, hard tests with generous curves (71) do play into my strengths. I think it’s a personal call.
I must be a weirdo cuz I actually found PT 72 to be okay for me lol. My lowest score after finishing CC was from PT 60 (I went 6 points lower than my average), but I also feel PT 84 (aka June 2018) had one of the hardest LR.
@parmeet319499 said:
Is it bad I want to take PT72 now just to see what the hype is about....
Haha that is exactly what I was thinking while reading all of the comments. Now I am curious how I would do.
I should clarify that my scores died from PT 72-78 lol Some of the toughest sequences of LR and RC I've seen.
I just drilled PT 71's RC and I found it to be very difficult. It has the famous mirror passage. If you wanted to challenge yourself and check it out, go for it while you're at it lol
72 was my personal PR but I thought that 73 was pretty hard haha!