Hey all,

I have time to work with 1-2 more students a few times per week this summer. 1L expanded my ideologies about the test and its importance. More about my background can be found on the tutoring page here:

https://classic.7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/comment/68763

Update: My inbox filled up more than expected and I no longer have openings. However, I am always willing to offer insights about the test or admissions process via DM. Happy Studying!

Should we be practicing with a 4th section to help us prepare for August test?

Are multiple colored highlighters allowed on the LSAT?

If anyone knows any books that are dense -- but not too dense -- that you can read while studying for the LSAT, please list your suggestions. I enjoy topics like basic economics, experimental technologies (i.e. quantum computers), social injustice, or history books, just to list a few. Also, big philosophy guy.

Pretty much what the title asks.

Hi guys, I'm taking the test in August and live in NYC. I won't be able to take the test at home because I don't have a quiet place to do it. Wondering where NYC residents, if you have rented a place for lsat in this past year, have successfully (no wifi failure, not noisy, etc) completed this test at? Did you go somewhere outside of the city or just really far out in Queens, Bronx, or Brooklyn? Thanks!

What was that "flip of a switch" moment or piece of advice that dramatically changed your perspective of the LSAT or of how you go about your LSAT study?

Hi, I have just purchased the Ultimate+ with the bundle package and received a confirmation email but when I log out and sign back into my 7Sage, it still says I need to purchase a subscription. What should I do?

Does anyone here keep an error log and if so do you use a notebook or on the computer? Im trying to figure out a way to create an error log on paper that's easy to use/helpful so if anyone has any suggestions I would appreciate it!

do you guys ever end up hating the lsat and just feeling so so stupid? sometimes ill do something and feel confident then check my test scores and im like omg what is wrong with me. I end up beating myself up over answer choices and feel like no matter how hard I work I'm constantly missing something. When I do well I feel energized and happy and when I do bad I end up calling myself names and end up going into self hatred mode. is this normal?

My preptest formatting is off. It won't allow me to save questions that I am unsure about for blind review and I feel like taking preptests is a waste if I can't use the highlighting feature nor circle questions I was uncertain about. Can anyone #help me figure out this technical issue?

Today, we have our first discussion about attitude. This is a rather sensitive topic, because nobody likes to be told that their attitude sucks, but the fact is that sometimes peoples’ attitudes suck and sometimes they don’t even realize it. I also tend to be very blunt when I talk about this stuff (could you tell from the prior sentence?). Nevertheless, I think that it’s an important topic worth discussing.

This first topic is a UNIVERSAL problem that happens up and down the scoring scale, so everyone stands to gain something here. My goal here is to get everyone to think about the mental barriers that may be impeding their progress, so try to remember that if something strikes a nerve. That being said, if I have to be the bad guy and ruffle some feathers to help people, then that is a price I’ll gladly pay.

Ready? Let’s go.

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The #1 most important decision you make regarding your LSAT prep is not about what materials you use, or how much time you spend each day studying, or what your overall timeline will be. Nothing like that. Rather, the most important decision you can make is the decision to set aside your ego and embrace the likelihood that you are actually very bad at logical reasoning and reading comprehension.

That last line feels sort of like I’m insulting everyone who reads this, so perhaps I’d better explain where I’m coming from.

Let’s start by considering exactly why it’s so demoralizing when you don’t do well on your diagnostic. It can’t just be because you don’t have the skills – after all, you probably wouldn’t feel bad if someone pointed out that you didn’t know how to juggle chainsaws. It can’t just be the academic component either – you probably also wouldn’t feel too bad if you couldn’t solve a differential equation or write an academic analysis of Shakespeare’s work.

And yet, just about every single person thinks that they should be scoring better than they are.

Why?

My theory is that it’s because the LSAT is ‘just’ logic and English, and everyone thinks they’re experts at those things.

This is not a universal thing. You can tell the average person that they suck at calculus or chemistry and they’ll probably laugh and maybe even agree with you. But try telling someone they suck at reading comprehension or logical reasoning, and the reaction is wildly different and much more defensive. Math and science can be, and often are, rationalized away as over-technical mumbo-jumbo that is irrelevant to most peoples’ everyday lives, so it’s easy for people to separate their inability to do math/science from their ‘actual’ intelligence level. But reading comprehension and logic? Challenging those things feels to the other person like you’re directly challenging their intelligence, because pretty much everything we do on a day-to-day basis relies on one or both of those skills.

Fact is, everyone thinks their viewpoint makes sense and is arrived at rationally, because nobody considers themselves to be irrational or their reasoning poorly-considered. When’s the last time you heard someone say “My logical reasoning skills are terrible and it’s a big problem for anyone who has to work with me”? Now when’s the last time you heard someone excoriating someone ELSE for making no sense? In most cases, calling someone out for being illogical or being a poor reader is just one step away from straight up calling them stupid, so it’s really not hard to see why most people take so much personal offense to being challenged in this arena.

And yet, the proof is in the pudding. The LSAT is nothing but a mix of logic and reading comprehension. Not doing well on the LSAT demonstrates that one or both of those skill sets isn’t up to par, at least in the specific (and highly relevant!) context of understanding and responding to written argumentation. It’s understandable why people would be defensive about their skills, but that doesn’t make it justified.

Let’s be clear here. The LSAT is not the sum and substance of your worth as a candidate, or as a human being generally. The LSAT cannot tell me that you spend your weekends volunteering at the local homeless shelter, or that you have excellent leadership skills, or that you’re an incredible musician in your free time. But here’s the thing – it’s not designed to do any of those things. Despite its limitations, the test really does do a good job of testing a specific set of logical reasoning skills; just ask anyone who’s made a big score improvement how obvious the mistakes they were making before are to them in retrospect. The fact that there are other considerations relevant to whether a candidate will make for a good law student or lawyer doesn’t change that. Overemphasized as the LSAT may be in the admissions process, it is still a hugely relevant piece of information.

That being the case, it is imperative that our reflexive defense mechanisms don’t limit our learning potential. The most important thing to get out of your head is the notion that you ‘deserve’ a better score, because even if it were true (which it probably isn’t), it doesn’t help anything. Your score is largely the result of your skills, and if you’re dissatisfied with your score then there are clearly some things you need to work on. The test isn’t changing, and if your skills don’t improve then your score isn’t going to change either. This would be true even if the LSAT was based on truly arbitrary principles, but it’s especially true when the LSAT is based on actual logical precepts. You can either get defensive about not knowing how to do it, or you can do something about it. Only one of those things is going to make a difference in your chances of going to law school.

Your ego will take a huge hit in the short term as you make mistake after mistake, but that’s honestly how it should be. Every mistake you make is 100% on you, because sugarcoating your competence level only hurts yourself. You need to be your own biggest critic, and that means not being too prideful to admit when you’re bad at something. We’ll deal with the motivation issues this brings up another time.

Bottom line: the faster you let go of your pride, the faster you can get to the business of actually improving yourself, and the higher your score will rise as a result.

Hi all, I am unsure if I am going through a natural digression from my typical performance or if it is a symptom of burnout. I have recently began to do considerably worse on PTs and sections, although if feel that I still understand the material fairly well. I will say that I have been getting less sleep than usual recently, but I am not convinced that is the only reason for my atypical performance. What are the symptoms of burnout and how do you treat it while not being entirely absent from studying? Does this sound like a natural progression in scoring that everyone goes through?

I live in Toronto, Canada and just recently got a full-time permanent job. I have been preparing for my LSAT for over 3 years now since I was in grad school full-time and working full-time. I am hoping to write my LSAT in August and apply for Law School. But I am getting worried and anxious just thinking about if I get into Law School in 2022 is this the right time to let go of a good full time job when the economy is doing bad due to the pandemic? The fear of struggling to find another job or the uncertainties of pursuing law school is making me lose my focus and motivation.

I also worry that pursuing a new career at this age maybe too late now as I could be competing against a lot younger people and will not have same energy/ patience to start all over again.

Anyone else in the same boat as me or have any advise? Thanks!

I’m registered for the August 2021 LSAT, where we’ll have 4 section with a 10-minute break between section 2 and 3. To prepare I’ve been doing full length PT with the same 10 minute break in middle. However, I find that my scores in section 2 and 3 tend to be my lowest and I do feel myself become more passive as I read. Also on the break I tend to close my eyes or mentally test but I think that could be contributing as well since the 10 minute break isn’t exactly waking me up.

I am considering doing 3 sections back to back to increase stamina, focus, and endurance. Do you think that would help amp up my focus in those sections?

I’ve tried different computers and different wifi and it is soooo slow.

Hi all,

I understand that a lot of 7Sagers fool proof games so they they can eventually do each game in a section at or below the time suggestion noted on the 7Sage LG explanation videos. I completed the LG section from PT 11 and thankfully got all the questions correct under 35 minutes. However, for games 1 and 2 I was under time, and games 3 and 4 I was over time (ex. for game 1, the time suggestion was 7.5 minutes but i completed the game in 6 minutes. for game 3, the time recommendation was 11 minutes, but I took 13 minutes). I wanted to know if this indicates that I have timing issues or if its perfectly okay and normal to be quicker on one or two games in a section and take a little longer on games 3 and 4 if that means I am finishing the section in 35 minutes? Appreciate your help!

Scored a 166 in April, it's down to 161 in June. I'm not even sure of what went wrong; I felt good coming out of the test despite a proctor interruption. Threw me off on the final bit of LG (had only a couple questions left on the final game) but I was okay for RC which was the final section - I just don't know what went wrong.

Has anyone experienced anything similar? I didn't expect to do this badly at all

[I am posting on behalf of a 7Sage user. Please feel free to leave your comments below. Thank you for your help!]

I am confused on one of the lesson. Lesson 11 question 2 says that it's not an argument because the author is only reporting what the researchers concluded. Lesson 16 question 4 has the same scenario that the author is sharing what researchers concluded but yet this one does have a premise and conclusion. Just wondering how this is different. Thank you

Hi, so I was unhappy with my June 2021 LSAT score and have lost some confidence. Should I still take the August exam or truly try and prep for the October examination instead? Or simply take both? For some background info, the June LSAT Flex was the first exam I have taken.

Hi all - I'm taking the LSAT in August and it's my first time doing so. As such, I have a few logistics questions for those who know/have taken the FLEX recently.

Can you take the exam on a desktop? LSAC website says yes, but the Writing Sample Video (and presumably the actual exam) suggest that we're supposed to show our work environment, including floor, etc. Has anyone encountered this issue using a desktop?

Can you use scratch paper on RC/LR? Obviously we use them for LG, but has anyone been called out by a proctor for writing out, say, lawgic for a complicated LR question?

Any other tips for first-timers re: technology, proctoring, logistics? Hoping to keep stressors like these to a minimum on actual test day.

Thank you!!

My untimed score was a whopping 13 points higher than a clean timed PT. It was 7 points higher than my usual blind review score. Other than LG, I didn't use THAT much more time than 35 minutes. Maybe somewhere around 45 minutes. Anyone curious as to how we can efficiently push through this moat?

How long did it take you to find that balance where you know you need to slow down on certain questions?

I'll go through my BR and miss like 3 stupid ones, and than perhaps 2-3 more difficult ones. I feel like just avoiding the small mistakes would get me to a consistent 165 at least.

I think I like have an understanding of all the questions and stuff. I suppose my challenge is the execution.

P.S. if anyone has any general or specific questions on how to get to early 160ish avg score thats in the 150s feel free to send a message. It's helpful for me to walk through someone a LR or RC question that may not understand.

Hi friends! I am registered for the April test, and am aiming to have my overview of the curriculum complete in the next week-ish, so that I can move on to practice tests for the last 12-14 days. I'm not working at the moment, so I've had the brain space and time to focus on this since mid-February, and while more time would always be better, I'm ready to get this done so I can move on to the next chapter in figuring out my life! My plan is to take at least one practice test per day -- morning test, afternoon BR, and if I'm up for it, evening problem sets to work through questions that I'm iffier or feeling less confident about.

Are there any recommendations for how to prioritize the prep tests? I've been planning to work in reverse chronological order and do as many as I can without losing my mind. Other suggestions?

Hello! Due to a lot of unfortunate circumstances (loss of job, funeral, etc) I have fallen a good few weeks behind on the study schedule. Whenever they explain the study schedule they say if you fall behind you can adjust it but I am not sure how to do that? I am trying to adjust it so its more evenly spread out on what I need to catch up on rather than just overdoing myself and burning out trying to catch up. How do I do this? Thank you!