Self-study
Hello!
As the title says, I'm struggling to close the gap between my scores and my blind review scores. I average a 167 on my PTs (best 171), and average a 177 on my blind reviews (best 180). That is a pretty significant jump, and getting consistently over 170 would make my dream schools much more feasible. I am struggling with how to get there.
I think a big thing for me is eye fatigue by the ends of sections and especially by the end of the test. I also just really struggle with the same question types consistently, despite having spent a lot of time reviewing those questions, creating a wrong answer journal, and watching explanations.
Any advice?
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9 comments
Prometric allows for eyedrops with personal belongings on test day; preservative-free artificial tears are also great to help with ocular fatigue on screens.
Hey, I'm pretty much in the exact same spot. Here are a couple of things my tutor suggested to me a few weeks ago.
The tricky thing with BR scores is that you, in theory, have eliminated 3ish answers in your first pass. That means you should be down to a 50/50 or 1/3 in the worst case. Knowing which answer you've previously selected, you are much more likely to be correct the second time around (whether you are looking at the answer you picked initially or not). This shouldn't take the wind out of your sails; it goes to show that you are consistently getting down to the closest two answers and choosing wrong a few times.
With that in mind, you should feel like you are on the verge of reaching your target score. As we all know, the only way to improve is to keep drilling to become more familiar with the patterns and tricks. You don't mention a trend of which type of question you miss, so it's hard to diagnose from an outside perspective.
I use blue light glasses for studying and on test day sometimes, but haven't found much of an impact. I then tried eye drops and hydrating more, both water and Gatorade, which I found to work better. It is worth considering that your brain and eyes can only handle so much screen time (not a scientist, so look that one up). If you are prepping on top of a work or class schedule, it can become more of a factor. I treat eye fatigue sort of like a concussion, shut everything off for an hour, take an excedrin and reevaluate after some time in the dark. Alternatively, if you are grinding in the dark, some sunlight is great for your eyes.
I realize that I haven't really said anything groundbreaking. Sorry, I can't be of more help. I'll make a note to check back later if you want to share what types of questions you are struggling with or anything
@TylerBird This is super helpful, thank you! I think that's a good way to frame it certainly. I've added the types of questions I struggle with below, thanks for your advice!
Which question types do you struggle with? Example question perhaps?
@Karl! For LR big ones are higher difficulty level conditional reasoning questions.
I find in particular, questions along the lines of "Which one of the following arguments is most similar in its reasoning to the argument above?" questions, and "Must be true" questions. For the "which of the following" questions, I think that my literal thinking tendencies lead me to overthink and just simply have no clue. I've done some diagramming, and often do for those questions. However, diagramming does not really mesh with my style of thinking all that well.
For RC, it is primarily primary purpose/main point. This is typically because I get down to two choices and tend to second guess myself. I can typically verbalize what I feel the main purpose is, and then talk myself into thinking more than one option is viable.
Blue light glasess helped me a lot, and also on breaks seemed silly but blinking very slowy, like 3 seconds per blink and moving my eyes in full slow circles helped me gain some of that focus and eye strength ig you could call it lolz
@Kihla333 Yes, I think I will wear blue light blockers, based on what folks have said. Thank you!
Do you wear glasses?
@AdamLaw I don't! I did get my eyes tested a few months back (I do yearly due to some health conditions), so I don't think it's that. It may be blue light related, so maybe I should wear blue light blockers for test day