Hey, does anyone know of a reliable way to simulate the LSAT-flex environment? I already switched to using LSAC's interface to take my practice tests (which is HORRIBLE compared to 7sage's interface) but using the 4 section LSAT proctor video doesn't seem right.

This is my first time posting here, so if I violated some rules/norms, so sorry!

I got my second LSAT score back in November, and for a second time, it was much under my PT range. The first time, it was only 4 points under, which was reasonable enough that I thought it was nerves. The second time, I knew I made a critical mistake on a LG, but I thought I pulled out with roughly a 168-170, which was around my PT average. Instead, I got a 162 for the second time.

I have no idea what went wrong, other than the LG and missing some time because of it, but that wouldn't account for that large of a discrepancy. I did study content right before for my peace of mind, so maybe that played a role in confusing me or something.

I'm taking it again in January as a last-hope effort, but I am unsure how to proceed because I don't know what I need to correct.

For reference, LR is usually my best with LG being a struggle with time, and RC can be its own devil sometimes. I don't have averages on hand, but if that's needed, I figure those out.

Browsing through an article and found this:

"So long as opinion is strongly rooted in the feelings, it gains rather than loses instability by having a preponderating weight of argument against it. For if it were accepted as a result of argument, the refutation of the argument might shake the solidity of the conviction; but when it rests solely on feeling, worse it fares in argumentative contest, the more persuaded adherents are that their feeling must have some deeper ground, which the arguments do not reach; and while the feeling remains, it is always throwing up fresh intrenchments of argument to repair any breach made in the old."

Without Googling, tell me what you think this means. Reminded me of something that could be on the LSAT.

I see 7Sage has the option to simulate the LSAT-Flex which simply removes one of the LR sections from a practice test. From a prep perspective, is there any benefit to doing this? I see it from the alternative position and being more advantageous to work on an extra 25 LR questions. What might I not be thinking about?

I haven't been able to score a 150 (untimed) the closes I've gotten is a 146. Recently I find myself stuck at a 143 (timed) but when I do blind review, I manage to get 150 (I've gotten this twice my last two PT's). I don't know if I'll be able to start scoring in 150's by January (untimed). I would really like to get into school for the fall. My LSAT goal is mid 150's. I'll take a 150 too honestly. Anyway, my top two schools' deadlines are March 1. I COULD take the Feb LSAT, but I'm wondering if that is risky. Should I wait for next cycle? I feel like my time is running out. My next test will be the third attempt. I would try at most 4. Advice?

I'm nearing the end of the core curriculum and I will begin doing preptests every couple of days, but since I'm limited with time before the January LSAT I wont be able to get through most of the practice tests. That being said, should I just focus on doing the newer tests, or the old ones, or a mix of both? I expect to be able to do about 15 in the time I will have remaining before my exam so I want to make sure that I am making the right choices.

Hi, I am retaking the LSAT in January in hopes of increasing my score. I am looking for an affordable tutor who can help. If you know of anyone please let me know. Thank you!

is there a lesson on taking the contrapositive for combined conditional statements where "and" is in the sufficient condition/"or" is in the necessary condition. Trying to work on my conditional chains. Thanks!

I purchased the prepaid plus account however it is not linking to my account and I am not able to access the questions and all on my account. Can someone please help and walk me through it? 

I have the Prep+ from LSAC and the 7sage plan. However, when I try to link them by pressing the button it just transfers me to LSAC, prompts me to log in LSAC and just takes me to the Prep+ LSAC page to do practice tests... okay..?

I want to follow along with JY's videos in the syllabus but it won't let me properly link. What is going on?

I also tried going in my email and clicking 'Link to Coach' there

I'm prepping for the January Flex and was hoping to get some tech advice. I had issues that caused me to cancel my November score (my connection was lost through ProctorU but my Wifi seemed fine...?). I've heard investing in an ethernet cord might be worth it. Thoughts? Other ideas?

As a preface, I know quality matters much than length, and someone could respond not to worry about the average, just focus on making a clear strong case, but I'd like to get an idea of about how many words an average LSAT writing response is/should be. Thanks!

So I was trying to understand what is different about the LSAT-flex and noticed on the LSAC website it said it is made up of 3 sections: Analytical Reasoning, Logical Reasoning, and Reading Comprehension. So there is no logic games section on the flex version or am I missing something?

^ would the current trend of crazy number of 175+ continue once we are back to the original LSAT format?

Hello!

I am currently going through the 7Sage Core curriculum and am looking to test in January. I am a fee waiver recipient and was wondering if there was free/low cost high quality 1:1 tutoring available.

Thank you!

Hi 7sagers!

Given that several people expressed interest in my RC methodology, here is the basic outline of my approach for the Reading Comprehension section based on my own progression. This covers some very broad concepts that were significant for me. If there is interest, let me know and I will work to do a couple more installments like this and drill down on some very specific areas that are much more targeted, such as how to approach specific arguments, subjects, and question types in RC.

For now, I think that I noticed three distinct tiers or levels that I went through in my RC prep. My hope is that since these three levels represent three distinct stages in my own preparation, people at many different stages of their LSAT journeys will be able to benefit from at least something in here.

When I started out on the LSAT I frequently missed 18 or more questions on an RC section. I had to work hard to develop good reading habits. But, the good news is that these skills are like riding a bike. Once you have got them, it is just a matter of maintenance at that point. I know I am just going to be repeating things that other people have said here, so I will be brief, but it is so important. Reading with an eye to structure is incredibly important on the LSAT. This includes picking up on the low resolution and high resolution of the content as well as the structure. I think that it is very beneficial to do several RC passages/sections untimed (these can be retakes) and work on ingraining these skills. Although I am sure many of you have seen my posts on the RC passage explanation videos, here is the template that I used.

Paragraph 1 –

• Low resolution content:

• High Resolution:

• Structure:

• Sneak Peak:

Paragraph 2 –

• Low resolution content:

• High Resolution:

• Structure:

Paragraph 3 –

• Low resolution content:

• High Resolution:

• Structure:

Paragraph 4 –

• Low resolution content:

• High Resolution:

• Structure:

Main Point:

Tone:

Viewpoints:

Organization:

Cookie Cutter:

For those who aren't familiar with some of the terms, "sneak peak" refers to taking a quick moment after reading the first paragraph to see if you can anticipate what will come next and maybe even glance ahead in the passage to see if you are on the right track. The more you can anticipate what comes next, the more "at home" you will feel. Although we never want to become complacent or neglect to read actively, being "at home" with the passage will reduce the anxiety that I know I can feel when reading a new and overwhelming passage. There actually is a lot of uniformity in RC and many structures and patterns are used over and over again. For example, if the first paragraph describes to me a scientific study that was done a while ago, then my anticipation is that the next paragraph is probably going to tell me that the first group of scientists didn't really know what they were talking about. Another example would be a passage where the first paragraph describes some very complex or unexpected phenomenon that was noticed in nature. My anticipation here would be that the next paragraph will give me a hypothesis to explain what comes next. Those are pretty straight forward examples, but the principle applies broadly. Obviously, some passages are weird and your anticipation will be wrong. That is fine, that is not a bad thing. Anticipating what comes next is a tool to keep you active and engaged in the reading. The correct-ness of your anticipation is not nearly as important as the thought that you put into making the anticipation.

"Cookie cutter" is a related concept and refers to the common forms that are reused over and over in RC. So an example might be "phenomenon/hypothesis" or "OPA (other people's argument) is wrong."

"Viewpoints" is where I note which viewpoints we got in the passage. For example, we might have gotten the viewpoints of the author, some economists, and some political theorists. "Structure" under each paragraph is where I note what role that paragraph plays in the structure of the passage. Is it the main point? A premise? A sub-conclusion? Just context?

"Organization" refers to how the passage is put together structurally, so an example might be "two competing alternative explanations for an unexplained occurrence are given, an experiment is done that indicates one is more likely than the other to be correct, and the implications of this research are discussed."

In my own prep, I filled out the above template for every single RC passage from PT 7-89. While I think for most people that is overkill (and i'm probably just a slow learner) the repetition helped. I did it over and over for untimed retakes and I did it for every passage that I blind reviewed. Overtime, I developed enough muscle memory that I got to the point where I didn't have to think consciously about these things so much during a timed run. Having all (or at least most) of this information floating around in your head means you will have the information you need to answer probably all but the hardest and most detail oriented questions on the RC section. If you are a beginner in reading comp or are missing 4 or more questions in blind review, then I would say that this is probably the place to start.

As important as it is to master good reading habits, unless these habits are paired with a proper timing strategy then you will have a difficult time translating your new skills into a significantly higher score when the clock is running. For some people this information will be repetitive, but it is worth repeating for those who haven't heard it. The single biggest jump in RC that I had came from treating the RC section similarly to the LG section. Initially, if I ran into a hard RC passage my instinct would be to give myself as much time as possible to deal with the questions, which inevitably comes at the expense of having time to deal with the passage.

But that isn't how I would approach a very challenging logic game. If I ran into a difficult game with a lot of rules that interacted in complex ways, the first thing I would do would be to see if I could split the game board, force out inferences, and see how much I could figure out before ever getting to the questions. Of course, splitting game boards takes time. But this is always worth it in the end because the questions go by so much faster, I am much more confident, and I am more accurate.

I used to try to think that I needed to finish reading an RC passage in about 3 minutes in order to have time for the questions. I had to actually let this go and give myself permission to take the time that I needed to understand everything in the passage. For many passages I easily took 3 and a half minutes, 4 minutes, or even more. For some of the difficult passages, I took more than 5 minutes to read it. We all know that 5 minutes is practically an eternity in LSAT time. However, this actually made me faster in the long run. My understanding of the passage was so improved by taking this time that I was able to dramatically cut down on the time spent on questions. In fact, I was able to cut my average time spent on a question by half. After spending so much time on the passage, I frequently could cruise through most questions in 20-30 seconds. This meant that even though I was spending way more time on the passage, my total average time for the passage plus questions dropped noticeably.

This was a game changer for me for another reason as well. For the first time ever, I started to semi-consistently have time for a second round on RC to go back to a question or two that I had skipped. Furthermore, because I had taken so much time with the passage up front, I had really retained the information and did not need to waste precious time on my second round trying to reread part or all of the passage. I was able to much more efficiently target my time and my effort. This is in contrast to before I had ingrained good timing habits. Back then, even if by some miracle I had a minute or two left over for a second round, I couldn't do anything productive with that time because I basically had to go back and reread the passage to give a question a second chance since I hadn't meaningfully retained the things that I needed to the first time I read the passage.

In my experience, a combination of good reading habits and decent time was enough to get my average PT score into the low 170s. I think this was because these skills together will be enough to allow you to answer all the questions that deal with the low res (I find that in a typical RC section about 19ish questions will be low res focused). After that, there will be another 3-5 questions that deal with the high-res that are aren't too challenging and can be picked up with a decent understanding that good reading habits will give you. Combined with a good timing strategy then, this much is usually enough to get you to a consistent -3/-4 in RC.

Now, at least in my case, the last points on the table are typically the result of the extremely difficult questions that are detail-oriented. These are generally the MSS/inference curvebrearker questions. For me, I generally knew that I would take so much time getting them correct that they would cost me points elsewhere, so I just had to accept that I didn't know the answer and move on to save time.

I knew that to push my score past the early 170s I needed to increase my retention of the very fine-grain information in the passage, which brings me to highlighting.

Although many people have said that this can be counter-productive, highlighting made a noticeable difference for me. I began to consistently use the highlighting function liberally, including all three colors. I found this had two purposes. First, it just helped me to read actively, remain engaged, and cement details in my head. Second, I also began to use highlighting as a tool to keep track of and remember the little, tiny, out of the way details that the LSAT loves to use as support for very difficult MSS questions in RC. For example, I would highlight any word that was in quotes but was not a direct quote, since that means the author is using the word outside of its ordinary meaning. Whenever I would see something like that, as I highlighted it I would be thinking about the distinction between the way that the word might be ordinarily used in contradistinction to how the word is being used by the author at this time.

I would also highlight any conditional statement. I actually ended up being surprised how many conditionals are in RC. The LSAT hides these RC conditionals by almost never using group 1 or group 2 indicators, but they are there in almost every section and the majority of passages. For some reason, I was also surprised by how much conditionals matter in RC. I was well aware of their importance in LG and LR because those sections make much heavier use of them. But conditionals are no less powerful in RC. Sometimes they can be major premises and sometimes are they are conclusions. Sometimes they are just "throw away statements" and don't really contribute meaningfully to the argument. But regardless of what they do, they are very powerful. That makes them prime targets for very difficult MSS questions. The LSAT can take a statement that barely even relates to the argument in the passage, but use it to conclusively prove out one answer choice.

I also highlighted the little details that are irrelevant to the actual argument. This includes the little things where the author isn't even editorializing (since I would pick up on the editorializations as indications of the author's tone as part of having good reading habits). I'm talking about where the author is just adding extra words. This happens most often in the context of a passage that sets the stage for an argument. Sometimes a whole sentence falls into this category, sometimes it is just a word or two. But a lot of times the hard inference or MSS questions pull their correct answers from these details. All of this is in addition to highlighting things like viewpoint shifts, structural elements, and other things to keep me engaged and reading actively.

If you are thinking at this point that RC is generally the section where people are most pressed for time and this highlighting strategy sounds like it takes an additional chunk of time, then you are absolutely correct. However, I found that it was a worthwhile price considering how much my retention improved. I am a big proponent of taking a lot of time to understand the passage and then being able to power through the questions very quickly. One disclaimer that I should state up front is that this method takes a lot of self-confidence and trust that if you invest the time you will have a proper understanding. It can be jarring when you glance at the clock and see how much time you spent reading the passage, but I think that this is the path to a high score for many people. It certainly was important for me. If we take the time to really understand the passage in all of its intricacies and nuances (just like we take the time to split gameboards in LG) then we are going to be rewarded by not really having too much work to do in the questions, since we already did our hard work in the passage.

Full disclosure, with the exception of my proclivity for highlighting, pretty much all of this is material that I originally learned from @Sami who was my fantastic tutor during my LSAT prep. I hope that this helps some people with RC, it really is an extremely challenging section. If you have questions feel free to drop them in the comments. Im happy to try to answer anything!

I earned a 168 on my November Flex (my first real LSAT) I started out in the mid-140s as a diagnostic. It's been 3 weeks since I looked at any LSAT material. I registered yesterday to write again in January. I have taken every single PT (some of them twice). I was wondering how to choose which full PTs to take from now until January in order to maximize value.

Do I stick to PTs from the 40s and 50s so the material is not as fresh in my head or do I take some from the 70s and 80s anyway? If anyone has any other experience or advice pertaining to studying for a retake I would greatly appreciate it.

Not entirely sure how to approach this. I was taking a full length PT every other day towards the end of my studies. Is continuing on that course going to be effective? Or do I primarily focus on drilling and take 1-2 PTs a week? I truly appreciate you all for taking the time to read this.

hey everyone,

I remember JY used to do group-based BR for every new PT that comes out.

I'm just wondering if there is any news that he might do the same for the may 2020 test? Or did I miss it?

Thanks y'all

Hi Non-native English speakers out there, many people don't realize my English is not my first language in everyday life but when it comes to LSAT, I definitely feel the "non-native" language comprehension problem. Especially under pressure, I can't read and understand the RC passage correctly and accurately... so it will be a slow journey for me to get a good score on LSAT.

Non-native English speakers, how long did it take you to achieve the score you want ?

How do I unlock PTs 1-30 with Ultimate Plan?

Hey everyone, I just wanted to echo what others have said about 7Sage. It has been an immense help during my struggle with this test! There were times I thought I could not get over this hurdle. I was crushed, I had anxiety, I thought my dreams of attending law school would never be realized. It too every ounce of resolve to defeat this test once and for all.

You know it's tough, for others on the outside to comprehend what we all put ourselves through. The stress is real and you all understand that! I cannot thank you guys in the community enough for helping me through this. I am usually a lurker, and do not post often like so many of you, but it has nevertheless been amazing to be surrounded by so many dedicated individuals.

To JY, I owe you many thanks. Your countless video explanations along with your dry and witty sense of humor made the journey a little more enjoyable. I am sitting at the airport waiting to return home, drinking a blood orange IPA, and it feels good to sit bac kind reflect on my journey.

Thank you to all and god bless 7Sage! I hope you all have a great night, crush the LSAT, and get into the school of your dreams. It's not about the score, it's about your journey. Wow that's a cliché. But the thing about clichés is... they are usually true!

does anyone know how many questions you can skip and still get 170+ on the flex?

Hi all! I wanted to post one last time to the forum to offer my gratitude to 7Sage and well wishes for those who are still studying. This program was instrumental in getting me the score I aimed for (146 --> 167). I just got accepted to UGA and am waiting to hear back on eight others. I just want to encourage everyone to keep up the hard work and offer help to anyone who feels they could use some guidance (e.g. on tough LR questions you can't parse, LG tricks, or just a friend to vent to). I'm honestly a little sad to no longer be studying, so don't hesitate to throw questions/thoughts my way. I know how tough this process can be, and just want to do my part and make it a little easier. My access to 7Sage expires in 5 days, so the best way to reach me will be through: dmarwh0@gmail.com.

Good luck to everyone! You got this =)

I noticed that the way the core curriculum is structured has you taking one diagnostic PT very early on, and then has you complete the entire course before taking another PT (and then at that point, it's just PT after PT until you run out).

Is this the actual recommended way to study? Would it not be beneficial to sprinkle in a few PTs throughout the core curriculum to see how you're progressing?

Curious how you all have tailored your 7Sage and LSAT studies to fit your needs, and would love to hear what worked best for you (or if the 7Sage prescribed path is in fact the most fruitful method). Thanks!

This discussion is for those who are feeling overwhelmed in the process of studying and preparing for the LSAT.

I started with a 129 diagnostic mid-October, I have about six weeks left until the January LSAT and I've improved to a 152 today.

I remind myself it's okay to take a mental break and recoup, keep practicing, stay strong, and don't forget to breathe!

I am aiming for a 170.