I'm excited to finally begin taking practice tests and wanted to know how others have simulated test day conditions most effectively. While taking the test in a perfectly quiet room at home seems unproductive, I'm tempted to start out there and then move to nosier locations.

RC is my weakest section. Which of the below options do you think is best for helping me to improve my RC? I want to improve as much as possible, but not at the expense of sacrificing top performance in the other sections.

If you have a suggested distribution other than the three mentioned in the poll, feel free to comment with input.

In the starter package - JY makes a lot of references to like words like But and Because introducing premises. Does anyone know which module/video talks about these key words? Is there a cheat sheet?

Hi I took a practice test today and scored 10 points lower than my last practice test and even lower than my diagnostic test...am I doing something wrong in my preparation?

My goal score is a 151, not too ambitious, I know. I am PTing still around 148, and BRing in the mid 150s, mostly 155. Diagnostic of 142.

I am sitting for February's test (I will take June if need be). So I take a PT, I BR it, other days I drill LR and FP. Somehow my RC is the highest, and 2nd is LG, and lowest is LR sects. But I'm drilling LR and only at like -4 or -5. And I'm drilling whole LR sections at 35 mins. What do I need to focus on? Continue LR drilling and working through those questions? I wish my PTs would be closer to my drilling of LR..

Some ideas may be but not limited to scholarships, location, course variety and/or student life. Mines are:

Hey all!

I took Sept 17, and got a decent score. Not the score I want or need. But the dilemma begins: how do you shake the "where do I go from here?" vibe?? I did decently, LR being my weak point, and I'm a very self-driven studier. My issue is that so many study plans are focused on starting from square one. I've done the CC twice, am now working with a tutor, but I sit at my desk and kind of just shuffle from one paper to the next. How do you get back into the groove? Having checked out some tips, I did watch a couple webinars, reviewed some CC, am working through the Trainer as a refresher, but I'm terrified of doing worse and learning the "wrong" way. Ay yai yai, help please!

Good evening beautiful people,

There is hope. I'm merely here to reiterate that.

Let me start off by saying: I am so tired. I've been in meetings and sitting all day, and didn't make it home until 6 pm. After making myself dinner, I opted to drill an old (and when I say old, I mean PT 11) LR section, even though I felt mentally drained.

Since I have not yet completed all of the LR modules in the CC, I didn't time myself - I'm ensuring that I'm able to give a logical reason for each answer choice I pick, on every question. Due to this, it took me an entire hour to finish just a SINGLE section. I blind reviewed the single question I had circled, and proceeded to grade the section.

Y'all-- I only missed 3 questions. ONLY 3!

Sure, it was an untimed section that took me 60 minutes to complete, but for me-- it's an improvement! Three months ago, before I started the CC on 7sage, I would miss anywhere from 9-11 questions on an untimed LR section, and it would take me even longer! I'm so enthused! Seriously!

Working full-time and working towards my law school dream has been mentally challenging, but today I feel so accomplished.

To everyone, and specially to those 7sagers working full-time: don't give up. Be resilient. Be brave!

It's so tough to study after a long work day, and the most arduous aspect of all of this may not even be your work schedule--but the people at work, or the tight deadlines. There are so many factors that affect our well-being, and even our ability to come home and be able to keep practicing and studying.

I love this community, I hope to be able to keep sharing my successes, and to share your successes as well.

I'm treating myself to the gym now. I need it! Sorry if my post doesn't make sense. I'm tired-- have I said that?

:D

To get a 170, do you think one should consistently finish all the questions in 30-32 mins? Which of course will allow some time to go back and double check answers that one is not 100% about. Should 170+ mastery allow for that? I’m trying to get my pacing down, and although I right at 35 mins for all the sections, I’m wondering if I should speed up a little.

like stuff it with tissues during the test?

First off I am so excited to be joining such a wonderful community! The positivity, I have already seen is so uplifting.

For the past few weeks, I have been in the valley of the LSAT. We all have peaks and from those we can definitely find glimmers of hope on the horizon, but I believe no more than when in the Valley! My LSAT journey so far has been abysmal and utterly disgusting. After graduating with a a degree in education and teaching the young minds of elementary aged children, I left the wonderful profession in May to dive head first into the massive ROADBLOCK called the LSAT. After taking a Kaplan Course and PTING consistently in the 158-161 range I thought man I am going to rock the LSAT and Hey Sweetheart, were moving to X place to go to X law school, pack up your bags and let's begin this new journey! Little did I know December would come and I would put out my worst score ever...lower that my Diagnostic a HORRIFIC AND TERRIFYING..........141. I was absolutely shocked and astonished, I remember spending hours contemplating the idiotic decision to leave a career that I was finding success and accolades come my way. But here I am...not at a pizza buffet like I have been for the past few months! I fell off the peak into the valley only to learn how I desire to see this piece and part of my life to be marked with a stamp of personal triumph and perseverance.

With the sob story behind, really...so sorry! I had to let it out finally! To those of you feeling discouraged please know that you are not alone, we see many a triumphs here and all around us. We all have the capability to find success in our endeavors, regardless of what this BEAST of a test spits out at us. To those of you beginning the journey or continuing the LSAT journey we truly have this! To those leaving this journey for your acceptance letters and plans of where and what next, I salute your dedication and hard work to slay the BEAST you are our inspiration!

Let's finish the race strong!

https://media.giphy.com/media/26tPrj21W9DYMB2dW/giphy.gif

Hello,

Does anyone know how seriously admissions considers gaps in your résumé when applying to law school?

I'm a recent graduate of my state school CU Boulder (May 2016). I was very involved in school, business fraternity, founded a social fraternity, student government, business case competitions, internships, and side jobs; I graduated with a 3.6 with a double in Finance, Accounting, and minor in Philosophy. Then I worked as an analyst for a management consulting firm in the energy industry for buying/selling power plants.

I had the job for a year, but quit because I wanted more time to study for the LSAT.

If I worked the job for a year and quit in August 2017 and apply to law school in September 2018; how much will admissions consider this one year gap in terms of my résumé? Is this a serious problem if I don't fill the gap between now and September?

Thank you for any advice!

The ThinkingLSAT podcast takes a strong stance on several issues that seem directly counter to 7sage forum advice.

In particular, they say that people should not care about time at all and should instead focus on understanding what they read and "figuring it out". Obviously there is some merit to that point, but it seems to be the opposite of this "skipping strategy" that many 7sagers recommend. Some high-scorers on this forum apparently try to work through an entire LR section in 25 minutes while skipping liberally along the way so that they can spend 10 minutes on the problems that were hard. Thinking LSAT would say that that approach encourages rushing and not thinking carefully enough and places too much energy and focus on timing and thinking about whether one should skip or not. Instead, going in order without skipping and trying your very best on each problem until you are truly stumped will produce a better score, even if you have to guess on whatever you don't get to.

Another issue they have strong opinions on is stimulus first. They assert that understanding the stimulus is the most important part of LR and that reading stem first can interfere with how one reads the stimulus and encourages a highly question type-specific approach that is inflexible. Just understand what you read and think about it critically; you can answer any question and you don't need to know the question ahead of time, is what they'd say.

What are your thoughts on ThinkingLSAT's positions?

Hi this may sound like a silly question but I want to make sure- I still haven't gotten my score back due to waiver appeal, but I see on other forums online that the real LR was sections 1 and 3. On my December test i had three LR reasoning sections, I believe they were sections 1,3 and 5 if i remember correctly. Not sure if I'm making this too complex, does that mean that for sure the first and third sections that I took were the real ones? I just didn't feel good about section 1, does that mean for sure it was the real section and not experimental or could i have been given the real sections in different order to take?

As the discussion title says, the Dec. 17 LSAT is now available for purchase on Amazon. Hopefully @"Dillon A. Wright" will soon put up the electronic version for 7Sagers.

Is there any rule of the English language that allows us to tell when the claim "As are B" means every single A is a B, and when "As are B" is a generalization that means only that some or most As are B?

This issue comes up in PT57, Section 2, #12.

The conclusion says that "criminal organizations will try...."

But the premise told us that MOST criminal organizations' main purpose is profits.

If you add the correct answer to the argument, it's sufficient to prove that MOST criminal organizations will try to become involved. But the conclusion here is "criminal organizations", which grammatically seems to mean all criminal organizations. So the conclusion technically is still not fully proven even with the "sufficient" assumption added. The only way the correct answer is sufficient is by reading the conclusion as giving us a statement about "some" or "most" criminal organizations. How does this add up? Any thoughts?

Here are additional example sentences to explore the issue:

"Dinosaurs are extinct." Does that mean some dinosaurs or all dinosaurs are extinct? I submit that it clearly means all, and not only some.

"football players with at least one year of experience in the NFL are used to taking hits." Does that mean some or all players with one year of experience? I submit it means all NFL players with at least one year of experience.

"Criminal organizations will try to become involved in tech revolutions." Does this mean some or all crim organizations will try to become involved? If the first two example sentences apply to "all", then what distinguishes this last example from the others?

The issue seems to be that sometimes plural nouns are referring to all members of the group, and sometimes they're not. But what are the rules governing such interpretation? "Videogames are fun." Is that asserting that every single videogame is fun? I submit that it's ambiguous. Naturally, I would not think that claim commits one to thinking that every single video game is fun...maybe there are a lot that are not fun, but generally, videogames are fun. However, in a hyper-literal logical thinking type of analysis, I could easily see that sentence implying that, yes, all videogames are fun.

How about this example? "Apples are fruit." vs. "Apples are healthy." The first statement means all individual apples are fruit -- it'd be very odd to think it leaves open the possibility that some apples are not fruit. Yet the second statement seems to mean that apples generally are healthy and is not asserting that every single apple in the universe is healthy...some might be unhealthy/poisonous etc. But WHY do we interpret these sentences differently and how can one tell the correct interpretation?

OKAY, I have been almost mastered my LG skills and have been getting the 100% with untimed pts (under 1 hour ). And most of the time, the wrong answers were from my small mistakes. HOWEVER, I am completely lost with LR & RC. Yes, maybe it is because my reading skills are sucks to comprehend or to make an inference from the passage? I can admit that I was never a reader, never really enjoyed reading, but what can I do ? I have no choice since I want to go to the law school and become a lawyer. I have been studying for almost 2 months, 5 days a week, almost 10 hours a day at the library, but LR and RC are killing me.... It's really painful to see myself just staring at the passages and not even understanding or cant even comprehend with the questions or answer choices.... I really believed that I have been studying so hard but I don't see any improvement on those two sections..

Any advice to save my poor life : (

Can someone please tell me a story where they took the diagnostic and scored like, low 130s, but after months of studying improved drastically? I read a forum of people taking the diagnostic and scoring over 155 and I just feel like crap right now haha. I realize some people are naturally gifted when it comes to the LSAT, and I am happy for them, but I am not one of those people. I'm really struggling here. Just BR an LR section and only got 11 questions right.

.

Feb LSAT takers, we're almost there!

I've been getting down on myself these last few days, because my LG is not where I want it to be just yet. And so naturally, I've been having another existential crisis. So I decided to sit down and write out how far I've come with my LSAT prep to motivate me to finish strong these next few weeks. It was really helpful, so I thought I'd start a thread so we could all celebrate our growth and keep moving forward.

I understand the LSAT. I know what to look for with each question type.

I finally started consistently scoring -3 in LR. Started off with -11, and this took months and months of work.

I have the stamina to finish tests.

I know how I learn best ( this is my biggest take away).

I can talk myself down from my anxiety in the middle of PT's.

My BR went from 159-178 in 9 months.

What have your takeaways been?

I finishing the LSAT Trainer and I am now deciding what to do next. I'm deciding between 7Sage and the Powerscore Bibles, but I'm leaning heavily towards 7Sage. Is it worth it to buy the Powerscore Bibles or should I just forgot about them and go 7Sage all the way? I'd love to hear about everyone's experiences with either.

from those of you who have already taken the lsat after completing practice tests. how close is your practice score to what you scored on test day?

i have heard that it is easier to make a higher score..anyone else know anything about this?

Went theough the LSAT course, took a preptest yesterday, and only scoring a 135. I felt confident in every section aside from logic games, but turns out I got everything wrong. Should i just go through the course from start to finish again? I was supposed to take the feb. lsat but I think i’ll be pushing it back to june.

Today a friend mentioned that headache you get after staring at a computer screen for a long time. Y'know, the one behind the eyes that makes you feel nauseous? This got me thinking about last semester, where I was taking five classes (all required extensive computer use), had a part time job (again, using computers), and working on 7sage (an online course). I would notice after long day of working on the computer, I was groggy and couldn't quite piece things together like normal.

My classes are about a fifteen minute walk from my apartment and I made it a priority to not look at or use technology while walking to class. No answering texts/emails. No listening to podcasts. Nothing. Just me, my thoughts, and my walk. And I think it truly helped.

Einstein would go for daily walks, no matter what. Getting moving not only helps, but so does having an "empty" mind. If you can, I recommend getting a walk in at least once a day. I noticed things on my campus that I've been walking past for three years now. Did walking alone allow me to score 20 points higher on my Dec. test? Nah. But I do think clearing my mind helped my studying. Now that I drive everywhere, I miss the freedom of letting my mind wonder on walks. If you notice yourself stagnating, try to get outside and move a little. Who knows, it may help.