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I'm trying to decide whether or not I want to write my LRS on timed sections or if I want to do them in my head. What do you do? I'm trying both out but just curious to know what everyone else has done.

In my head. Writing it out might help it stick in your mind, but like everything on the test there are opportunity costs. Just remember, that the more time you spend on one thing the less time you have for another thing. Most importantly, do what makes you feel comfortable!

When you do them in your head do you pause and make out a high resolution summary? Or do you make a LRS in your head and move on? In instances where you have to revisit, do you automatically recall not only the LRS but the general structure of the passage overall?

I have a pretty good memory but I'm just worried the test day anxiety might cause things to go differently than I hope.

I honestly am not fast enough at RC to really pause at all. As I read a passage I'm trying to figure out whether the author likes or doesn't like a thing (a hypothesis, a literary figure, a law or whatever) and what evidence the author uses to support her or his position (empirical data, observation, appeals to philosophy etc.). I try to form an LRS in my head as quickly as possible and make it extremely simple, like "hypo 1 sucks.. hypo 2 is better and the reasons why are over here," so I can immediately jump into the questions when I get done reading the passage. I don't worry about remembering every detail but I make a point to remember where to find the details if I need them for a question.

I can't say my method is the best because my average for RC on my last 5 PTs is -2.4, but I just got a -0 on my last one, so it can't be completely worthless.

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I don't think I saw anybody mention http://www.top-law-schools.com/

some interesting stuff to look at there

I would pay more attention to old posts on that site. They had some sort of corporate takeover and most of the best users went over to law school life at the start of this year. A lot of them deleted their posts leaving incomplete posts after they started getting censored and edited.

There is definitely irreplaceable good advice in the older TLS forums though.

If you want people to try to talk you out of being a lawyer(which happened frequently on TLS) you could always ask for advice on the forums at JD Underground.

Thanks for the heads up! I actually just checked that site out myself for the first time the other day, so that's good know before I got too deep into it.

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Hello Everyone,

I have been taking practice tests and I notice that I am overwhelmingly getting necessary assumption questions wrong. I understand the basics for solving them such as finding the gap. However, are there any patterns with solving necessary assumption questions. I found noticing patterns for weaken/strengthen to be very helpful and they’ve become my stronger question type. I greatly appreciate any feedback. Thank you!

Wrong ACs are almost always too strong or just straight up irrelevant. You're usually looking for some weak statement that has to obviously be true, like if I say productivity is going to improve because I'm going to implement something that improves productivity it must obviously be the case that the actual implementation or set up of the new measure doesn't end up being a net loss for productivity in the long run. Wrong ACs will say stuff like, the new method is the BEST method for improving productivity (why couldn't it be the second best?) or MOST employees will be more productive under the new measures (why couldn't it be only 10 or 20 percent of employees?).

NA questions can definitely be tricky because sometimes the correct answers are literally so obvious that you don't give them enough credit when reading them. Perhaps, you've experienced this feeling of reading an AC and glossing over it because it seems like some random, obvious, and not necessarily argument or detail specific thing. For me, that's a cue that I need to re-read it because I'm probably looking at the right answer.

I don't think I saw anybody mention http://www.top-law-schools.com/

some interesting stuff to look at there

Also, just wanted to add that almost the entire test (besides argument part type questions) is trying to get you to call out those types of assumptions regardless of whether it is a weaken, strengthen, sufficient assumption, necessary assumption or whatever. Don't think of weaken questions as anything unique about the test. JUST CALL OUT THE ASSUMPTIONS.

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Hi guys,

One question ! I am actually not understanding how I should approach Weakening questions. I understand that you have to identify the premise (s) and conclusion of the stimulus, but from there I blank out as soon as I see the answer choices. Any advices ? Also, JY says that we should not attack the premise and conclusion of a stimulus, but when studying off of Power Score the book said to weaken an argument by attacking a premise or conclusion. I am very confused. Please help ! Thanks .

Does Power Score really say that because that seems like really dumb advice? You can't really attack the argument by attacking a premise or conclusion. The premises and conclusion independently don't constitute an argument. The way the premise attempts to support a conclusion is the whole crux of what defines an argument.

If an argument has a conclusion of "X" because of "Y," you don't negate "X" or "Y." You negate the relationship between "X" and "Y." For instance, if I say, Alice must have gone swimming because she is wet, I wouldn't try to wreck the argument by saying "she didn't go swimming" or "she's not wet." What I would do is say something like, "She's wet because she walked home in the rain," which concedes the premise but calls out the assumption that being wet equals having gone swimming. So, don't say Alice isn't wet, but use your imagination and try to think of other explanations for why she might be wet that don't involve swimming.

To be sure, Alice still could have gone swimming because it could be true that she was in the rain and then went swimming, but you can no longer say Alice must have gone swimming BECAUSE she is wet.

Hope that makes sense.

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I'm going to vent a little bit on here. At the start, I took the initial PrepTest June 2007 and got 144. I missed 51 questions then. Now, I took my first PT 62 from December 2010 and got 144. I missed 57 questions. I feel defeated. My logic games did go up, so I am happy about that. I just want to prepare effectively for September and I am not sure whether I should take Kaplan? So far, I just finished the CC and took the first test, so maybe I need to do the drilling too. What suggestions do you have? Thanks for the help, guys!

Well, what about your blind review? I mean, if you've got a pretty high blind review score, then you just need to work on getting faster. If not, you should take note of your confidence (under and over) errors and figure out what made you make them.

I cannot emphasize enough how conducive properly doing the blind review method can be to seeing gains in your scores, especially in the beginning.

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I do not understand why b is correct. Can someone help me understand why b is supported. Thank you for the help

Before we found out that Halley's comet was made up of certain type of material, scientists assumed that it took less mass to reflect a certain amount of light. Scientists then discovered that it takes more mass to reflect the light that they had been observing.

It is implied that scientists had underestimated the mass of Halley's comet because they were just wrong about how much light the material of Halley's comet reflects per unit of mass.

Think about if scientists used to think Halley's comet was made out of a super shiny material like aluminum or even a mirror. Now, think about if we found out that Halley's comet is made out of something was less reflective like wood (I know that sounds crazy but just follow me lol). The point is that once scientists found out that Halley's comet was actually made out of wood they would go, "woah, this thing must be bigger than we thought since it is made out of wood and still reflecting a brightness we assumed was for a much more reflective material like aluminum."

To reflect the same amount of light as something in spite of being made of a material that is less reflective per unit of mass, it must have a bigger mass.

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The July LSAT is upon us.... and despite my satisfactory gains in LG and LR (thanks 7sage), my reading comprehension is still dismal.

So I'm asking my fellow 7sagers.. throw it all out on the table! What last ditch attempts could I try to pick up a few extra points in RC? I don't think there's much that could hurt me in terms of RC at this point so hit me with your best shot lol.

I know there are many long term study strategies to build a more sustainable understanding of RC and I'm committed to retaking and mastering RC the RIGHT way. But as for now, if you have any test taking tips that have helped you to gain a few extra points on RC I would love the hear them!

Good luck to all my fellow July test takers. May the wind be at your back and the odds in your favor!

When you choose answers for questions you must make sure you can find support for them from the passages. Outside knowledge can help you understand passages either, but the LSAT writers don't care about testing your knowledge in regards to oil drilling or 17th century Renaissance art. They only care about your ability to read the words on the page and your ability to draw inferences or implications that stem from those words.

To this point, be aware that the LSAT writers will try to constantly bait you with trap answer choices that have very little to do with the actual passages but perfectly fit in with our idea of how the world works. Like, if a passage talks about how lions are animals who hunt and like to eat zebras, then when you're confronted with a MSS type you can't choose the answer that talks about how lions hunt giraffes. That might seem obvious but under timed conditions it can be easy to get trapped into the thinking of, "oh yea lions are hunters and of course they must eat giraffes occasionally." It simply doesn't matter though unless you can find support for it in the passage.

TLDR version: use outside knowledge when you can to help make things make sense, but throw all that out the window when it comes to actually supporting answer choices.

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Can I make a suggestion? (I'm guessing your answer is "go ahead".) Obviously, if we were all more altruistic, it would be a top priority of ours to help others. But some of us are not that altruistic. If there was an incentive to help others, that may increase the student participation in answering others' questions. Is this a possibility?

How about this for an incentive? Helping others with questions will help you yourself get better at the test.

100%!! Answering questions has worked wonders for reinforcing CC lessons and showing me what I need to brush up on. As Einstein is rumored to have said "If you can't explain it simply, you do not understand it." Additionally, what makes 7Sage so amazing is that most 7Sagers are altruistic and understand that we are all in this together.

Spot on, right there. I even like to explain LSAT questions to people who have no interest in taking the LSAT just to see if I can explain my reasoning about a question in a coherent way that makes sense to them.

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Can I make a suggestion? (I'm guessing your answer is "go ahead".) Obviously, if we were all more altruistic, it would be a top priority of ours to help others. But some of us are not that altruistic. If there was an incentive to help others, that may increase the student participation in answering others' questions. Is this a possibility?

How about this for an incentive? Helping others with questions will help you yourself get better at the test.

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"Justify the reasoning" is another term for PSA, so that's my assumption. (See what I did there?) The "except" question sounds like and "MSS Except" question, and the first one seems like a standard "principle" question.

I wouldn't call the except question a MSS except because the wrong ACs in that question don't have to be supported by the stimulus. The wrong answers just have to not violate either of two principles whereas the right one is a contradiction of one or both principles (MBF).

Like if I say, "People who physically harm others should be punished," it would be consistent to say that "People who vandalize another's property should be punished," even though the second statement draws no support from the first statement. Applying the question stem to my made up principle, a correct AC would say something like, "Tim punched Mark and deserved no punishment for it." The wrong ACs don't have to be supported by the principle; they just can't violate the principle.

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So I am looking for some guidance on the hard Logic Games I should practice. This section is by far my strongest section. The past couple of PTs I have scored my worst -3 and best -0. Because of this I have really backed away from working on LG so I can focus on LR and RC. I am concerned though that if I don't practice some then I will end up with a game I am not familiar with in September. Does anyone have a list of some of the hardest games that I can use to practice? I had some notes on advice someone gave on another post that said to practice PT27G2, PT29G2, PT33G3, PT79G4, and PT70G3.

I wouldn't say I have mastered them by any means but I actually genuinely enjoy doing them and have done very well after going through the CC and some fool-proofing. If only I could say the same about LR and RC.

Have you checked out the games from PTs 1-15? I'm pretty the last games in all of those sets were really weird.

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I'm just curious as to whether any of you go through the CC all the way through before taking another PT after having taken the diagnostic test in the beginning. If you do/did take PTs throughout the CC, how often do/did you take them and are there certain points within the CC that you think would be a good point to take one.

I would highly recommend finishing the CC before taking more tests after your diagnostic. Otherwise, you're kind of wasting tests. The point of the CC is to get you ready to take PTs and from there you work on timing strategies and getting better at them. Without the CC, unless you're already proficient in the type of logic the LSAT tests (which in itself would be hard to know until you go through the CC or something similar), you're probably going to have questions that you straight up just have no idea how to answer. The problem is that the CC is going to eventually help you gain the skills to answer those questions, but you will have killed an opportunity to practice those questions on a test because you've already seen them. Fresh PTs are a limited resource, so I have to recommend taking them only after you've gotten a comfortable grasp on all the fundamentals.

skipping a question won't kill you, but working with those hard questions for as long as it takes until you understand the reasoning is how you get good at the test.

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I've noticed that there are some LR question stems I can't identify. Can anyone help me out?

-Which one of the following principles is best illustrated by the study described above?

-Each of the following assignments of computer programmers is consistent both with the principle expressed by Vanessa and with the principle expressed by Jo EXCEPT:

-Which one of the following principles, if valid, most helps to justify the consumer advocate's argumentation?

I would think of the first and last stems as pseudo sufficient assumption type questions and the second stem sounds like a must be false question.

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Hey all,

When I skip a question with the intention of coming back to it after, I lightly circle the question number on the answer sheet. If I don't do this, find myself wasting a bit of time when going back for bubbling in round 2 as I can't see instantly where the 'missing' bubble is. I know it says 'make no stray marks' on top of the AC sheet, but was just wondering if this would interfere with the scantron, or the proctor would pull me up on it?

Thanks

I've heard people lightly marking the AC sheet for round 2 purposes and having no problem if they make sure to erase the markings. I don't do it personally, but it shouldn't be an issue if you erase well enough.

I knew something was happening to my brain.

https://classic.7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/16729/in-case-anyone-wanted-to-know-which-lg-from-pt-1-35-are-taught-in-cc

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Hi everyone,

I've just started on the logic games section of the course, where Jy recommends printing out ten clean copies of each game. Unfortunately I've not yet found a way to do this without noting and listing the games he is using in the practice sessions and then going into all the logic games materials and picking them out one by one. Since I mostly use the mobile platform, this is time consuming and clunky to do. Does anyone have the full list of example logic games used in the course in order of when they were used?

Happy studying,

Maria

I don't know about order, but I think someone posted a list yesterday of all the games used in the CC.

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Do you look at all the answer choices if you know you are 100% certain on an answer choice before getting to E? There are many LR questions that I know are 100% right at choices A, B, or C (if I get to answer D I will go to E regardless, even if it goes against what this question is asking). I was thinking of just circling these questions and going back to them if I have time. Any thoughts would be much appreciated it.

Personally, if I'm in hunt mode and I find what I'm looking for then I just circle it and move on because I want that extra time just in case I come across a really difficult curve breaker question. Also, like you said, if you have enough time you can go back and double check.

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Can someone please help me understand what the stimulus is saying.

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-23-section-2-question-14/

Admin note: edited title

Kim is basically saying that people changed their attitudes about something, specifically death, and she attributes this change to life expectancies being increased during that time. Lee calls out an implicit necessary assumption of Kim's argument, which is that people would have had to been aware their life expectancies were increasing to affect their attitudes. Lee, himself, implies (to my understanding) that it would be really hard to know anything about a major increase in life expectancies before one actually died or were nearing the end of one's life (even then, just because one was outliving current life expectancies wouldn't tell that person anything about an overall trend over something that takes multiple generations to confirm).

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I understand the last sentence of the stimulus which states that higher temperature = higher molecule movement. The second sentence states 'rhodopsin molecules sometimes change shape because of normal molecular motion, thereby introducing error into the visual system'. J.Y links this second sentence with the last sentence, stating that higher molecular movement = more error-prone. What I am confused about is how the second sentence shows this. As in for me, the second sentence seems to say that molecular motion = errors; it doesn't mention anything about more molecular movement equaling more errors. I must be missing some vital connection somewhere.

Admin note: edited title

https://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-34-section-3-question-19/

The correct AC only talks about the proneness to errors. I think you can make a commonsense assumption that if molecular motion = prone to errors then more molecular motion = more prone to those errors.

Like, if getting in a car wreck makes one prone to breaking her or his neck, then someone who is involved in a lot of car wrecks is more prone to breaking her or his neck versus someone who has only been in one. It doesn't necessarily mean that the person in more car wrecks is guaranteed to have more neck injuries, but you can't deny she or he is more susceptible to such injuries.

Or, like smoking makes one vulnerable to getting cancer and smoking a lot makes one more vulnerable.

That's how I would justify the correct AC, but you can also get the correct answer for this question by process of elimination because the other choices are pretty terrible, in my opinion.

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I feel like I am heading towards burnout territory.. but I am in complete denial and I do not want to take a break. Is it possible to recover from burnout without taking one/two weeks off?

Unless you're planning on taking the test at the end of this month, I would suggest taking as long as a break as you need. It's like working out really hard and then taking a break; you have to rest to truly see the gains from working so hard.

You don't have to take one to two weeks off though, if you don't want to. Maybe take the rest of this holiday week to relax and not even think about the test. It is better to take as much time off as you need rather than study inefficiently by ignoring and trying to push through your burnout.

I've got a stupid question. When I activate my extension it extends it from my expiration date, not the date I activate it, right?