With the recent announcement of the July LSAT now being Flex, is there a more accurate way to score PT's?

I recently was able to take part in a discussion with a very well respected and recognizable civ-pro professor. The question I asked the professor was: “is there anything you recommend that an incoming student learn or be aware of before they come into your classroom?” The professor answered with a very relaxed response that essentially stated: you could skim a commercial outline over the summer but you don’t have to, mostly relax and maybe read a novel [Paraphrase].

I found the answer shocking but it is also indicative of a response one gets quite often when asking this question. Some of the forms this answer takes are: “don’t bother learning anything.” “Don’t bother learning any substantive law, you don’t know what your professor is going to focus on.” Before I continue I should with full disclosure state that:

-I have yet to attend law school (This August I will be: God willing!)

-I did not study law in school formally and have never worked a legal job, my interest in law mainly comes from life experiences and my own independent watching of the news in my home country of the USA.

So ultimately because I come to this issue from a particularly inexperienced perspective, I might be completely wrong about my analysis so wanted to start this discussion as an open and transparent way of evaluating the arguments for and against doing 0L prep and to what extent.

My position:

Is a student in a better position if they go into an American law school not knowing anything at all about the law? Is that student going to be better prepared for a Con law class for instance if they have never heard of the 5th Amendment or the 14th amendment beyond a law and order rerun? Is that student going to be better prepared for a property class if they have never heard of the legal concept of trespass? Is a student better off as a “blank slate” to both learn the law, understand how that law might be applied to cases and then contextualize that information to such a degree that they can both effectively issue spot and know what is important for their professor come exam season?

I think the resounding answer to each of these questions is no, if we define “better off” as engaging with the material in a more meaningful way and doing better on exams, a student that knows something: what the basic elements of a contract are for instance, will be better prepared for the rigors of 1L than a student that knows nothing. As I have stated previously, I don’t know of any other domain of knowledge acquisition where an individual would be better off coming into something as a complete blank slate, think of how these pieces of advice (that are routinely uttered online in response to the 1L prep question) would sound:

1.The summer before med school, it doesn't help to know what the major functions of the liver are

2.The weeks before auto mechanic school, it is a waste of time to know what the major components of a car's fuel injection system are.

These pieces of advice hinge on a key assumption: that everything you could possibly need to know for the grades that largely (but not exclusive) determine your future employment will be dispensed in the classroom time. Could this be true? Airing on the side of caution, I would say no, but of course, my experience here is limited. Even if this is true, even if the exams are exclusively determined by what is stated in class, doesn't it help to come into the class with some background knowledge of the topic to be able to distill that information effectively? So for me personally, I just don’t believe the professor, respectfully. Civ-Pro is one of the most convoluted subjects I have ever looked into, with all due respect, I would rather struggle now when I have 2 hours per day to spare with the basics, then to struggle later, when 1L grades are on the line and my anxiety is running high and the cases we are reading are based on the foundations I’’m struggling at the very same time to learn. For me personally the question is not should one spend any time studying, but rather: how much time should be spent?

With that position outlined I should take the time to ask other 7Sagers:

-Did you 1L prep?

-If you did, did you feel better able to engage with the material?

-If you didn’t, do you wish you did?

-If you didn’t, did you feel “behind”?

-What do you wish you did differently?

*Fallacy alter: we might not be able to tell what the causal mechanism for being “prepared” here is. 1L prep or not.

So for me personally the question becomes: how much should I study? I have never heard the blank slate idea defended properly. I’m open to hear this case.

So for me, my plan is to read some outlines, continue taking the 7Sage courses, explore LarryLawLaw’s practice exam, read “getting to maybe” as well as some other 1L resources for bout 2 hours per day, schedule permitting. My plan is to be ready with the basics of each subject so I can build upon that knowledge and take practice exams. I don’t plan on writing a masters thesis on the origins of the 5th Amendment in British Common Law, lol, but giving myself some tools to be ready for the material. Gunner much? maybe… But as of this writing I simply cannot buy the blank slate approach.

*Full disclosure, no one paid me for this as an endorsement for anything, I receive no monetary kickback from anything I mentioned, this post is rooted in genuine curiosity and an attempt to stimulate engaging conversation with the users on this forum.

Questions for my fellow 0Ls:

-Are you prepping for 1L and if so, why and how?

-If not, why?

-Want to form an online study group, maybe reach out to some professors as guest speakers and review material together?

I should note here that I will commit myself to following up come 1L the best I can on these boards, particularly trying to answer the question: how much did 1L prep help me?

Hi all -- I compressed my studying for the June LSAT Flex (i.e. I started too late, which is no one's fault but my own) and don't have time to take every practice test the curriculum suggests.

Does anyone have any practice specific practice tests they suggest I take before the LSAT Flex, or am I better off doing the practice tests in order?

thanks!

Hi everyone,

So I initially set aside 4 months (May-August) to study full-time for the LSAT and plan on writing the end of August. I've been studying about 4-6 hours per day for the past month here on 7Sage and I'm about 34% of the way through the CC. Overall it's going well enough, however I am afraid that I've perhaps not allocated myself enough time to prepare. I should be able to finish the CC by mid July, leaving me approximately a month and a half to consistently take PTs and review. My diagnostic was a 144 but I really feel I could have done a bit better (family was making plenty of noise during the later portion).

I am dead set on being admitted for 2021 (to a Canadian School), so the other option is to take the October test. However, I feel that restricting myself to one attempt would apply extra pressure.

I have already registered for the August date and I am considering registering for the October date as well. This really is a sticky situation since I may only get my test results back from the August test just before the October test, and thus not be within the range to cancel. Conversely, I don't want to bank on doing well in August and be too late to register for the October test in the event that my results are not up to par.

I would sincerely appreciate any advice!

I have been averaging -7 per section on LR for over a month so I decided to read the Loophole. I have practiced her methods but I am still missing the same number of questions. I understand all of the question types and what I should be looking for but I always fall for the trap answer choice. I also have a hard time finishing an entire LR section in time (1-2 left at the end). I am taking the June test and would like to know the best way to proceed in order to get at least a couple more LR questions right!

You're taking a timed test. The clock is ticking. You glance at the clock. "crap, I don't have enough time". You begin to rush reading the stimulus. You don't know exactly what's going on, but you have an idea. "It probably has to do with causation/correlation", you say to yourself. You go through the answer choices. None of them seem right. Now your anxiety levels are up and you don't know what to do. "I spent so much time on this question, lets just look in the stimulus again I'm sure I'll find it". You waste your time rereading the stimulus, but you know you're wasting time, so you skim through it frantically. You see a word or two that look the same in the stimulus as it does in answer choice B. You choose answer choice B. You finish the test and you realize the answer choice was C.

"Crap! Why did I get this question wrong?!!"

I don't know about you, but I've had way too many of these scenarios come up time and time again in my studies.

I eventually realized that most of it stemmed from the mistake I made at the very beginning: Reading the stimulus too fast.

The LSAT is hard. The writers write in a way that no writers should ever write to make things difficult to understand, using grammatical sentences that no sane person would ever use. That's exactly why rushing through the stimulus is a surefire way for you to get questions wrong. When you rush through reading, you're playing right into the writer's hands. They are banking on you missing something, and when you don't read carefully, you are much more likely to miss it.

Special forces operators have a slogan when it comes to urban combat - "Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast." If you move too fast and too quickly, you can get surrounded by the enemy and outflanked.

This slogan applies just as much to the LSAT. Moving too fast through the stimulus leads to falling into the psychological traps that the LSAT writers set up for you. Reading slower allows your brain time connect the complex ideas and reasoning that are critical to getting the question correct.

I know what you might be thinking. "You're telling me all I have to do to improve on the LSAT is read slower...?"

Well, no. It comes with some other things. When you read slower, what should you be doing with that time? You should be thinking and internalizing what is actually happening in the text that you're reading. Some things you can be thinking about are "What things do I need to make this conclusion valid?" or "What can I actually conclude from these premises that are given to me? How does that compare the the conclusion I'm actually given?". Reading slower allows you time to process this critical information.

"But I don't have the luxury to read slow! This test is timed and I just don't have enough time to get through everything!"

Let me tell you something buddy. You don't have the luxury to read fast. When you read too fast, you miss things which lead to the wrong answer choice or you get confused and go back to reread. You either get the question wrong, or you reread and spend even more time than you would've if you just took it slow the first time. In practice, fast reading actually makes you slower.

From my experience self studying and studying in groups, I've seen many people (including myself) get caught up in reading too fast on the LSAT. Take a chill pill. Slow down. Have a conversation with yourself and what you're reading. Stop skimming through hard concepts.

Truly understanding what you're reading is a key factor in improving on this test. Hope this helps someone. Happy Studying.

Ever since LSAT Flex was announced for the July test, I have been saving the second logical reasoning section for last. My logic here is to try and simulate the experience of a varied, three-section test before completing an "extra" section at the end. That being said, I've struggled to maintain my discipline in the fourth section mostly because I know it won't be there on game day. While I could stand to motivate myself more here, what would be the point, exactly? It's not clear to me how extra time on logical reasoning is necessary in the blind review process if I want to start emphasizing other parts of the test which will now be weighed more heavily than before.

Under its 7Sage Flex Score Calculator, our friends at 7Sage make this recommendation: "... you've already been given the best converter in existence from the LSAC itself: the regular 4 section PrepTest. Take 4 section PTs. That will be the best predictor of how you will do on a 3 section Flex test. On test day, frame the loss of 1 LR section to yourself as a treat: 1 fewer stress inducing nerve-racking task to do."

Hi all I have a question for those who have had to push their test date back. I started the curriculum at the end of February after trying to study on my own for two months and not getting anywhere. I recently finished the curriculum and am in the process of foolproofing before I begin the pt phase. I was hoping to be ready for August and last resort October. However, I watched a 7 sage video last night about the post curriculum strategy by a sage named Josh who describes the three phases after the curriculum. After watching this I realized even though I finished the curriculum I still have a very very long way to go with this test and it does not seem like I will be ready by August and possibly even October. This is kind of disappointing because that is the date I had my eye set on for a while. I am wondering how anyone has dealt with the disappointment of having to delay your test date and sort of the mindset that helped you get over that disappointment. Thanks in advance for your responses!

Hi all, every time i do the individual passages before the problem sets on RC, i almost always go -1 or -2 with 9-10min/passage and questions. However when i do the problem sets for the RC, my score tanks to -4 to -6. Is there anything i can do to help me from rushing through the passages and stressing out about the time constraints? thanks for any feedback.

I'm about to start the advanced PSA and SA portion of the CC, and with the PSets I've been realizing a recurring theme:

I have 6:40 to finish the 5 questions so I try to balance out the time to about 45 seconds to 1:15 per question and a little extra time on those that are longer/more convoluted. 80% of the time, I end up speeding through parts of the PSets because I'm running out of time, but once I hit blind review, I can take my time and review everything and end up getting everything correct or perhaps miss one.

My question is if that's just because I haven't done enough practice problems yet. I'm able to do the questions and understand the concepts, but application takes longer than I want. How can I speed this up? Can I even speed it up? Or is it just about how much time I put into analyzing it so my brain can start developing shortcuts?

Planning on taking the August 29th LSAT btw.

Are these separate classes or one course?

Hi all,

I am new to 7sage. Previously, I used a Kaplan prep course that was from Jan-March. During this time, I had a few hiccups in life and couldn't dedicate all the time I intended to my LSAT prep but did learn what seems to be the fundamentals. In the last month, I have hunkered down and devoted a lot more time to studying and reached a plateau in my progress, especially when it comes to Logic Games. That is how I ended up at 7sage.

Right now, I am scoring a 162, and I want to raise my score at least 10 points. I work full time but still plan on devoting about 20 hours to studying each week. I was initially planning on taking the August LSAT. However, the 7sage ideology of not studying with a specific deadline and instead studying for the greatest possible score I can achieve really resonated with me. That being said, I am looking for advice on how to use all the resources of 7sage. My questions are:

Thanks in advance!

I am taking the June 14th LSAT Flex. However, in the prep tests I'm doing, they have 4 sections - 2 LR, 1 LG, and 1 RC. Since the LSAT Flex only has one section of each, how should i prepare for this? Is there a way to make a unique prep test with only 3 sections? Or should I just take them as normal?

Thanks!!

I'm seriously struggling with taking tests/reading on a computer screen. There's at least 10 point decrease in all 4 sections when I take the test online compared to when I take it on paper. I'm registered for July and August LSAT and honestly am not sure if I can improve my scores by then when I'm struggling this much. Losing all the confidence here!

For some reason the pages will randomly stop scrolling up. It makes it so you can’t see the content below whatever loads originally. I have to log out and log back into the app when it happens to continue moving forward. It’s happened on random pages with a video, and on question pages.

Any help appreciated, Thanks

Hello,

I recently started the 7sage course and I'm about a quarter of the way through the core curriculum. I was wondering if you all would recommend finishing the core curriculum and THEN taking practice tests, or taking practice tests (i.e. timed sections that correspond to the core curriculum topic) throughout the core curriculum lessons?

I guess I just feel a little bit of a rush because I haven't take a practice test in a while since starting the course and I'm hoping to take the test before the end of the year..If anyone has any input on what approach worked for them, I'd really appreciate it!! Thank you!

Am I unable to blind review a section of a PT until I have completed all four sections? If not, could somebody explain how to do it? Thanks.

Ok i have been doing a different PT everyday, and it seems the pts in the 80s are significantly harder for me in terms of reading comp. LR and Games i find them the same. Is this normal? In the 60s i am averaging 2-3 wrong a section, in the 80s 5-7 wrong :/ is there anything specifically different about these passages that I am missing? #help

Hello,

I am planning on taking the August 2020 exam. It has not been announced yet if it will be flex. Any advice on whether to use shortened versions of PTs (3 section tests) when taking practice exams to prepare for the August 2020 exam in case it is flex? Or is that something we should prepare for if/when the announcement is made? From what you might already know, would it make a huge difference in prep?

Hi guys,

I'm 64% through the CC. I finished RC, I'm almost done wth LR and I'm moving into games very soon.

Considering that we're a month and a half from the July LSAT and I haven't taken any of the practice tests...(besides June 2007 - 153) would it be reasonable to take it in July if I want 165-172 and can study full-time?

ALSO, what is a good PT schedule to follow?

Thanks!

Hi, in a former post I mentioned I did receive accommodations for the LSAT. A lot of people had questions and I hope to address some of those here by explaining my process for requesting.

To give some background, I'm an Army veteran with years of back and neck issues as well as an anxiety disorder stemming from on the job stuff as well as ADHD. When taking the test I would have panic attacks where I'd stop breathing, often I'd have neck spasms and have to stop what I was doing, and I'd just have a hard time staying focused. After the Nov 2019 test I decided to apply for accommodations.

The LSAC was super helpful and courteous. I had to make sure I had official diagnoses for each condition, I filled out the 3 forms for requesting accommodations from LSAC, and I had a doctor verify that each condition actually existed and I wasn't lying. There seemed to be some lack of clarity when I spoke with LSAC reps on who qualified as a "doctor," sometimes a social worker qualified and other times a medical doctor was required. In the end I had a PhD psychologist sign off on mine.

The LSAC was extremely courteous and kind through the whole process and very responsive. They worked with me to ensure I was able to "demonstrate my full aptitude" for the test, something that's written pretty clearly in the accommodations application. When I took the Flex I felt everything had been done so that my limiting conditions had been minimized to a very acceptable degree.

Caveat: The accommodations were NOT a silver bullet!!! This is so important to emphasize. First, your 2.5 hour test becomes a 5 hour test. This is a huge difference!!

Lastly, additional time isn't going to compensate for lack of knowledge or lack or timing strategies. @"Cant Get Right" mentioned in a webinar of his that some of his students' scores went down after being granted additional time.

Hope this helped!

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Hello 7Sage!,

Anyone have, created, or know of question type strategy flashcards for all of the sections and willing to share? Or maybe just LR? Getting to the end of the CC and I wanted to know if this exists somewhere for 7sage (not sure if I just haven't gotten there but I haven't seen this yet).

Thank you in advance!

This finally game me a deeper understanding of these concepts, and the visualization really cements the idea in my mind. Just thought I would share. Let me know if this is incorrect or I'm missing something!

https://www.reddit.com/r/LSAT/comments/gthxwg/andornot_both_visualization/

Hey, can anyone please tell me the optimum amount of practice tests that one should target to complete before taking the LSAT (read: LSAT Flex)?