haena

Joined: Jun 2025
Subscription: Core

DMs are open if you need to vent or work through a question! Trying to spread positivity and to build a supportive community!

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LSAT

162

CAS GPA

3.86

1L START YEAR

2027

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Discussions

LSAT · Moving on from Tricky/Time-eating Questions

haena

2 days ago

@HappyTestTaker I love this kiss goodbye thing!! Will be implementing that immediately 🫡

LSAT · Moving on from Tricky/Time-eating Questions

haena

2 days ago

@WillowBound2 Really good point, I think I might just have to bite the bullet and start skipping 😔

LSAT · Moving on from Tricky/Time-eating Questions

haena

3 days ago

@DaliaGolovco Ahh thank you! Will try that

LSAT

•

3 days ago

haena

😦 Anxious?

Moving on from Tricky/Time-eating Questions

Hello! Just wondering if I could get advice from any instructors or high-scorers on how to become better at skipping a question and moving on? Is there a sort of confidence drill that I can do to help build that habit? Over the past few tests, I've noticed a pattern of freezing early in an LR section and spending 4+ minutes on one level 2-3 question and spending 20+ minutes on Passages 1 and 2 on RC. As you can imagine, I'm burning through a lot of time in the beginning/middle of sections, and it's costing me quite a bit of time and points towards the end.

Sometimes I get stuck on a question because of two tricky contenders, but most of the time it's because I know I can figure it out but I panic and start jumbling up my diagrams and refuse to move on from the question. I know that I should just flag it and come back to it, but I don't trust myself to have enough time!

This hasn't always been an issue for me, but I think I recently slipped into a very bad habit of needing to be 100% confident of every correct answer before moving on. How do I learn to trust 70-80% confidence on an answer?

Thanks in advance!

LSAT · Hovering in the 160-165 Range

haena

3 days ago

I recently made the jump from low 160s to high 160s! What helped me the most was doing drills of my highest priority question types. But now I'm stuck in high 160s 😵‍💫

PrepTests ·

PT117.S2.Q20

haena

4 days ago

@corbanthomas I was confused about this too, but I think (B) doesn't attack the premise -- it attacks the study itself. Like if (B) said something about how the sample chosen by the scientist was not representative of all children or that somehow the impulsive children had all incidentally consumed sugary foods, then we would be able to point out that his conclusion may not necessarily follow. It could be true, that impulsive children are twice as likely to have the gene variant; but (B) just pokes a hole in the method used by the scientist.

LSAT · Goodbye to RC line citation highlights (we match LawHub's interface now)

haena

5 days ago

@ScrumptiousBiscuts Oh yes! I was just wondering about keyboard shortcuts because it's a teeny bit faster for me 😅

LSAT · Goodbye to RC line citation highlights (we match LawHub's interface now)

haena

5 days ago

Does anyone know if keyboard shortcuts like Cmd+F/Ctrl+F are permitted on the computers they use at the testing centers?

LSAT · Lawgic Group Question

haena

6 days ago

I would check the Conditionals Without Indicators lesson! They technically belong to Group 1 and 2, they just might not look like what you're used to. For example: "is enough" is just saying that A is enough for B, or the existence of A is all that you need for the existence of B!

LSAT · 90 days to study full time. What would you do?

haena

Friday, Jul 10

@AndrewMcGinnis I definitely understand your concern about overcompensating! Especially for RC, I have quite a bit of score fluctuation depending on the passage. I like your strategy of switching LR/RC every other day, but I also think you'll find that one or the other will require more time and effort. I neglected RC for a really long time (honestly still do), and I think that it has harmed me in the long run.

As for the short term goals, I also assumed the same thing. My diagnostic was a 157, and I was really impatient to get a 170+ immediately. I stayed around my diagnostic for months, and I have been very slowly hitting every possible plateau since then. It was really crushing every time I would hope for a 170, and I would just be getting 150s despite studying a ton.

What I have learned over time, is that 75 scored questions on an exam is really not a lot of questions. So being stuck in 150s was not a sign that I was getting 'worse,' but it was just that my diagnostic score and the PTs I took in the beginning happened to be around the same number of questions incorrect. And if you have some score variance, it's important to remember how normal this is. It's even calculated by LSAC on your report, it's called a 'score band,' and I believe that its ± 3 points from your score. This is why a lot of students take the LSAT a couple times; 75 scored questions leaves a ton of room for plain human error, and eventually you will be able to work your way around them.

The last thing I'll say about the score goals that I wish I knew earlier was that depending on where you are averaging, each question will be worth something different. Around the mid-range of scores, you may need to get 2-3 more raw points right to move up 1 scaled point. Around the 170+, missing 1-2 questions can drop your scaled score by 2-3 points. In other words, the higher your score, the more points you risk losing per question. In my opinion going from 150s to 160s was significantly easier (though not easy by any means) than going from 160s to 170s. A lot of it has to do with the raw number of questions I can get wrong as my scaled score increases.

Sorry for another long response, but these are good questions you're asking!

LSAT · 90 days to study full time. What would you do?

haena

Friday, Jul 10

I've been studying full time for a while now, and my advice is to first stabilize your scores. Once you are consistently out of 150s, focus on getting out of low-160s, high-160s, low-170s, etc. I think I made the mistake of trying to immediately jump out of 150s too quickly without actually learning the content. And don't burn through your PTs! Especially PT145-159.

I do spend around 6-7 hours of studying a day, and I take one day off a week and do one PT a week. It has changed over the past few months, but I am currently following this schedule. I do blind review the day after my PT, with no recommendations on (7sage has a feature that suggests recommendations for blind review questions, i.e. questions you got wrong, flagged, spent too much time on).

I fortunately don't have to worry about living expenses, but I have definitely been digging into savings for LSAT prep materials (especially since it's been taking me a little longer than I expected). Thrift used LSAT prepbooks online, watch free Youtube videos, and find what works best for you. Some people on 7sage also offer free or discounted tutoring, so I would look into that. 7sage also has 'office hours' and a robust community of people who will respond to your questions.

One more thing about The Loophole, it's a great resource but has pushed students to take shortcuts and rely on patterns that don't actually work a lot of the time, especially on the more recent exams. I fully believe that LSAC has become aware of the types of 'powerful/provable' words that students default on and have been trying to remedy that over the years. After I read The Loophole, my scores also suffered a bit because I tried to apply her hacks rather than actually thinking logically. I don't think any one resource will be the best for learning for every student, so I tried to gain as much insight as I could from different platforms and prepbooks.

Three months is a deceptively short amount of time, so don't burn out and try to cram everything in all at once. Good luck!

LSAT · Highlighting on 7Sage now matches LawHub

haena

Friday, Jul 10

@beepbopboop If you're using Chrome, the highlighting feature pops up automatically if you just start highlighting the text!

PrepTests ·

PT142.S4.Q21

haena

Wednesday, Jul 1

I wanted to add my two cents for why (C) is wrong!

The question stem is asking us for which one will conflict with the letter.

if trusted source in past + source has good reputation → continue to trust source

Like many have said, we don't know whether or not they have trusted this source in the past. But (C) also doesn't conflict with the letter. The letter is arguing that because Hanlon is a trusted member of the community, the newspaper should trust his claim. That would make their skeptical tone unjustified.

So, even if (C) said: if the source has a good reputation, the outlet should continue to trust that source (with no mention about whether they trusted a source in the past), this answer choice would still be incorrect because it would align with the letter's argument. Hope this helps!

LSAT · LR Help! Averaging (-9) (-10)

haena

Wednesday, Jul 1

I had a tutor help me with this! You can try doing a timed section doing the first 15 within 35 minutes and leave the last 10 blank, then without looking at your score do the last ten in blind review. After you're getting all 15 correct, do 16 within 35, then 17 within 35, etc. until you reach all 25 within 35.

You can also see if you have any mistakes coming misreading question stems with True/False, Except, NOT, Without, Agree/Disagree, for a quick point boost!

Also, timing will come naturally, I promise! Everyone struggles with timing, even high-scorers. But once the language and diagramming starts to flow immediately, you'll eventually be able to make time for the last 10.

LSAT · 🎮 Two New Games! Feedback welcome 💬

haena

Edited Tuesday, Jun 30

@Kevin_Lin Yes! And also long conditional chains with embedded conditions, quantifiers, double negatives, uncommon indicator words! I think it would be particularly helpful for parallel questions and other instances that require speedy diagramming! I agree that the other games are great for valid/invalid conclusions, but I’m thinking of just the diagramming part!

LSAT · 🎮 Two New Games! Feedback welcome 💬

haena

Tuesday, Jun 30

Is there maybe a chance that we could have a speed diagramming game? I've been loving the games!

LSAT · Reading Answers E->A instead of A->E

haena

Friday, Jun 26

Interesting data! I do worry though, that the LSAT writers are likely aware of any such patterns and have been changing the exams to prevent this kind of pattern recognition, which is why PT150s feel so different from PT100s. I think there is a valid strategy to reading from E to A, but I do caution against people relying on this method in a time crunch that could be better spent diagramming or rereading the stimulus. Perhaps this strategy will work for those 100 questions, but it's hard to say whether it will help on the day of teh real exam.

I also think that tutors who say that "every wrong answer is a trap" are most likely saying that traps are very subjective to each person's preconceived assumptions and reading habits. Sometimes I don't even pick the trap answer because I was able to recognize the trap in the answer choice, but not in another. Other times, I'll get a question correct and fail to see how the trap answer was even an attractive choice for people. But figuring out why certain traps attract certain people and why certain traps attract me is an essential part of studying and misreading a word or two is rarely the sole reason for an incorrect answer.

Interesting food for thought!

PrepTests ·

PT23.S2.Q10

haena

Thursday, Jun 25

let 5060 = bridges built between 1950 to 1960

Stimulus:

5060 → rehab
5060 ←s→ faulty design
rehab ←s→ /suspension
faulty design → /suspension

Chain-able Inferences:

faulty design ←s→ 5060 → rehab
5060 ←s→ faulty design → /suspension

Final Extractable Inferences:

faulty design ←s→ rehab
5060 ←s→ /suspension

(C) points to our first simplified expression, faulty design ←s→ rehab. None of the answer choices lead to 5060 ←s→ /suspension; otherwise, it would also must be true.

Important takeaways:

You CANNOT take a contrapositive of a some or most statement.
You CAN flip the conditions of a some statement. This is why it uses the bidirectional arrow. So faulty design ←s→ rehab is logically equivalent to rehab ←s→ faulty design.
You CANNOT flip the conditions of a most statement. This is why it uses a unidirectional arrow.
Some Before All and Most Before All are VALID conditionals.
- A ←s→ B → C = A ←s→ C
- A ⎻m→ B → C = A ⎻m→ C
All Before Some and All Before Most are NOT valid conditionals.

LSAT · Advice for Last Attempt

haena

Wednesday, Jun 24

I'm afraid I don't have any insight on using all 5 attempts (I would definitely check reddit, I've seen some people talk about their experiences on there!), but I definitely feel your pain. I haven't been PTing in 170s since September, but I've been studying since then and it feels endless. I feel like I can tutor others in it as well, simply based off of the fact that I've seen all of the PTs hundreds of times, so it's crushing to score lower than you know that you are capable of. Your discussion thread comments are superb, and you clearly have a strong grasp on the material.

Is there any chance that you might have some severe testing anxiety (beyond normal anxiety)? In that case, you may benefit from beta blockers (please talk to your doctor first) or anti-anxiety medication. If you have burnout, then your performance may be reflecting brain fog or memory loss and could benefit from a longer break. If a longer break isn't an option at the moment, the thing that helps me push through burnout is switching hobbies every few months and changing up study schedules.

If you're nervous about the new format changes, you could also consider simulating testing conditions, like asking a friend to keep time for you in a public library while you take a PT. Certain testing accommodations will also allow you to take the exam remotely, so I would look into that as well!

Just remember that you are not alone, goose! My DMs are open if you ever need to vent or walk through a question 😊

General · Physical vs Digital Notetaking

haena

Tuesday, Jun 23

I prefer physical, especially for reading dense material! But I recently switched my note-taking to digital, and while I still prefer the analog, it is not so unbearably different. It is incredibly convenient, although I do believe that I am a faster note-taker with a traditional pen and paper. Not sure of what I'll do in law school yet, but I do love the accessibility of being able to carry all of my notes and readings around everywhere with me. The pros are currently winning for me!

LSAT · How to close the gap between score and blind review?

haena

Tuesday, Jun 23

Do you have any of the blind review suggested settings turned on? I found that when I had them turned on, I was essentially never forcing myself to question whether I actually knew the content or just relying on a crutch.

If you do have all of them turned off and you are going through each question you got right and wrong, then it will likely be an underlying content or strategic gap. These are kinds of questions that are coming up for me:

I see that for S2 and S3, you got the last question wrong. Was this because you ran out of time? Are the questions you got wrong scattered across different question types, or are they aligned with your top priorities? And for your RC section (it's harder to know where the passage breakups are so I'm estimating 😅), your errors are clustered around Passage 2 but you did great on Passage 4! Did you rush through Passage 2, or was it a harder passage type? Did you misinterpret the author's tone, or get confused by an answer that sounds right but is actually not supported at all?

These are the types of questions that I like to ask myself (and ask the 7Sage bot too!) to isolate which problems are content vs. strategic. I found that a lot of the questions I initially labeled as 'strategic' were actually an underlying issue with my content. Either because I wasn't confident in the logical error, or I initially couldn't identify the flaw, or I rushed a contrapositive and diagrammed wrong. Technically I could find the answer with unlimited time, but the fact that I couldn't quickly identify the issue pointed to an issue of a shaky foundation.

What you can try to do, if you don't want to do a whole PT at the moment, is do a few drills of 10 level 4-5 questions of your top priorities (technically you can do this with RC too by taking your top passage type but do it sparingly so that you don't run out of PTs) and take it with the recommended standard time. Then, with all of the BR recommendations turned off, go through each of the 10 questions and see if you can confidently pick the answer you chose again and confidently eliminate the other answer choices. Log any of the questions you get wrong timed/correct BR, wrong timed/wrong BR, wrong timed/no BR, right timed/wrong BR, right timed but over-time, and flagged questions. This data will help you gauge where you may be having more serious issues, and where you may have some easily fixable issues.

For example, if all of your wrong answers are correct on BR, then it might be a timing issue (maybe rushing and misreading a word, overly trusting your prephrase, etc). But things like wrong timed/no BR or right timed/wrong BR can point to a content gap.

I've seen your explanations in the discussion tab of the PT questions, and I think that you definitely have a strong grasp on the foundations! Now it's just about eliminating the small errors that have slipped through the cracks. I'm in a very similar spot as you, so I definitely feel your struggle! Wishing you the best, blueberry!

Feature Request · vocab game?

haena

Tuesday, Jun 16

@Kevin_Lin Specious, prudent/imprudent, prevarication, aberration, putative, windfall, posterity are some that I've come across!

PrepTests ·

PT158.S2.Q21

haena

Monday, Jun 15

Devastating question, but I think it's a really important one to go back to!

I diagrammed the speaker's claims like so:

life → reproductive mechanism → size bigger than nanobe

(C) is a really excellent trap answer because it does superficially weaken a part of the claim. If (C) were true, then it would give us reason to think that size is NOT a necessary condition for life. This would mean that nanobes could be living!

But the issue with (C), is that we're given a premise that life requires a size bigger than nanobes. So even if 'some scientists claim' that bacteria found on Mars have a size comparable to nanobes, we cannot attack the premise that we are given. But why should we take the word of the scientists in (C) over the word of the speaker?

I also don't know if this is something that the LSAT would be picky over, but I don't think that we can claim that size is not necessary on Earth for life based off of an observance of life on Mars. There could be an infinite number of conditions that are necessary for life on Mars that are not on Earth that could allow these tiny bacteria to grow there but not here (and vice versa).

So the speaker's argument, is that the nanobe is too small for a reproductive mechanism. The part of the argument that we need to weaken, then, is to show that it is possible for a single nanobe to be too small for a reproductive mechanism AND still somehow capable of reproducing.

(B) opens this possibility, that maybe individual nanobes cannot reproduce by themselves but can still reproduce by some other mechanism nonetheless. I didn't like (B) at first because I didn't think that I could assume that nanobes were "single-celled," but I don't think we need to assume this. It only needs to open the possibility that this phenomenon exists. (B) could have said something outlandish, like something about magical transformation, but it would still be a better weakener than (C).

tldr: don't attack the premise!

PrepTests ·

PTF97.S2.P3.Q16

haena

Thursday, Jun 11

@superchillasian I also didn't like (A) because of "powerful elites"! I wasn't sure whether how much 'power' privileged middle-class women could even have, maybe it's talking about a relative power? Maybe in comparison to the lower working class or the law supporters?

PrepTests ·

PT10.S3.P4.Q24

haena

Edited Wednesday, Jun 10

For anyone else who is confused about the ACs!

We need to find an assumption about social psychologists that are made by political theorists. My first instinct is to go to the fourth paragraph, which discusses political theorists' criticisms of social psychologists.

(A) Participants in any given social movement have conflicting motivations.

Unsupported. And also very strong! To say that participants in ANY social movement have conflicting motivations is very hard to support from the passage. And I suppose the author also never explicitly stated that participants must have conflicting motivations; what if someone has /conflicting motivations or just one single motivation?

(B) Social movements are ultimately beneficial to society.

Unsupported. Benefits of social movements are not mentioned!

Unsupported. Although Paragraph 2 states:
When these versions of the classical theory are applied to the civil rights movement, the source of strain is identified as a change in black socioeconomic status that occurred shortly before the widespread protest activity of the movement.
it never states that social movements can ONLY be provoked by a strain of socioeconomic nature. It merely states that in this case, they identify the strain to be socioeconomic.

(D) The political ends of movement participants are best analyzed in terms of participants’ psychological motivations.

The phrase "political ends of movement participants" is very awkwardly phrased, and it took me ages to understand what it meant. Essentially it just means "political goals of protestors" and NOT the people who were politically involved at the end of a movement (think of the idiom, "the end justifies the means").
So, (D) is saying that the political goals are best analyzed from psychological motivations. At first glance, it SOUNDS correct. But are the psychologists trying to analyze the political goals? No! They're "reaching for a theoretical perspective capable of clarifying [the civil rights movement's] momentous developments," and they are proposing a change in black socioeconomic status to be a major factor in the civil rights movement.

(E) Psychological motivations of movement participants better illuminate the causes of social movements than do participants’ political motivations.

Supported! Let's go back to Paragraph 4:
[Political theorists'] arguments rest on the conviction that, implicitly, the classical theory trivializes the political ends of movement participants, focusing rather on presumed psychological dysfunctions
In other words, the classical theory downplays the political motives of protestors and instead focuses on the presumed psychological dysfunctions. And remember, the classical theory is characterized by a "causal sequence" (15) to help explain the momentous developments of the civil rights movement. So, we can reasonably assume that the political theorists believe that the psychologists put their focus on the psychological motivations over the political ones to explain the causes of social movements.

Hope this helps!! Really challenging question and passage!