Hey Everyone,

A couple of weeks ago I posted how I was down and having trouble getting back to studying. I was out for almost 3 weeks. Well, I started back this week, baby steps, and it feels good. I was behind before my downtime and now I'm really behind. According to the study schedule and @emli1000 :-) I should be finishing up the course by now. But I'm ashamed to admit I'm only about 15% through it. I'm glad I'm prepping for a retake in October instead of June I know I wouldn't be able to do it. Or at least wouldn't reach my full potential. Regardless, I was originally planning on starting PTs by now and thought about taking one this weekend. But looking at my course schedule, I think it may be more beneficial to spend that time reviewing material, getting through the course, and drilling. I don't want to cram but I do want to get through the basics. I think it may be better than wasting a PT. Any thoughts on moving forward? Thanks.

Its not all that painful... Life in law school gets easier ;)

Am I the only one that feels guilty whenever I take a day or 2 off during the week?

I feel as if I could be getting so much done but instead I'm not. lol

Do anyone in the NYC area care to meet up and study, exchange thoughts or anything? Also is there any places that are giving Practice LSAT exams that I can start taking right now for the June LSAT. I take exams by myself but I would like to take them in a different setting, more like test day.

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I have had an "Ultimate" subscription for two months but am only 30% through the core curriculum as I run a business that requires about 12-14 hours of work, seven days a week.

I am selling part of the business and will now only be required to work around 4 hours a day, 5 days a week. This now gives me way more opportunity for LSAT prep.

I am aiming for October's test. I know there are loads of variables at stake, but is six months generally considered sensible/enough prep time, if I go all guns blazing?

Cold diagnostic was 148, so there is a long way to go!

Hey People, when you end up at law school... and that pretty girl or handsome guy catches your eye... Do your self a favor and try not to be like this!!!:

Hi,

I am having trouble with the vocabulary especially for the RC section where questions ask for how the author feels about something, author's tone etc. I find that the answer choices contain words that I am don't know so I am not able to eliminate a lot of the choices.

Do you know of a resource I could use or a list of such words somewhere that I can study from? Or if someone has made a list of these words and would be willing to share :)

Thanks!

Some A's are not B's

A's -----> not B 's

(some)

What if I want to negate some A's are not B's?

would the negation be ....

B's ---> not A's some B's are not A's?

(some)

or would it be

no A's are not B's?

A->B?

Should I plan on taking the most recent PT available right before the exam (the week of the exam) or is it better to take it earlier? Any ideas for a strategy on how to best utilize the last 3 weeks before the test date?

Has anybody had an even harder time reading comments on the internet? Every time I read an article and scroll through the comments, I go through this mental process of picking apart the argument, identifying logical fallacies, facepalming really hard, and then thinking, "Omg what has the LSAT done to me?!"

I'm looking for an accountability study partner who wants to study along with me! I hope this doesn't come off as completely obnoxious but bulleted lists help me more than one giant block of text so here goes:

About Me: I've been studying for the LSAT for about a year now. I took February and scored a 166, which was 5/6 points below my PT average of 171/172 (high of 177, low of 168) and well below my BR score of 175+.

My Major Weakness:

(1) Review: I think I have a fairly solid understanding of the fundamentals. I did not review as thoroughly as I should have and paid the price on test day.

(2) Beating the brain fog: Still trying to up my mental endurance so my "off" day is no lower than my average.

My Plan: I'm going to have a cycle of (1) PT (2) review (3) drill. I'm going to actually force myself to do a very thorough review where I write out my thought process for EVERY question along with explanations for why an answer is right or wrong. The review and write-up part is super time-consuming (sample/incomplete write-up: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ivGS3XS6FSydAmNLouyewDIO9f_LmPHVEbofnuHZHJw/edit?usp=sharing), especially because I try super hard not to let myself use the words "irrelevant" or "just completely wrong." This practice forces me to really think about WHY an answer is right/wrong.

Current Schedule: Starting all the way back at PT1 and trying to make my way towards PT74 by June. Finished PT1, scored 176 (RC: -2, LG: -1, LR: -4) and reviewing every single question. Going to take a 1/2 days to complete my review and drill some games, passages, and timed LR sections and then take PT2 on Thursday/Friday.

Where You Can Come In: What I think would be most helpful for me (and hopefully you if you're up for it) is to have somebody else also do a write-up so we can see the overlap between our analyses. Typically, when we take PTs and drill, we eliminate questions because certain "triggers" in the stimulus tip us off. However, once we see 1 trigger, we tend to move on and say, "Aha! That's the reason why this answer choice is wrong." The reality that I've come to realize is that the LSAT has multiple triggers in a given stimulus. Seeing what triggers other people to identifying the correct response would broaden our understanding of not just a specific question but question types and hone our logical reasoning as a whole.

So, any takers? :)

BONUS: If you're based in Orange County, it'd be so great to study in person! I'm looking at you @ddakjiking

pt 51 sec 1 #21 MSS

Hi Everyone, I was stuck on this question, and I was wondering if someone can take a look at my breakdown of this question to provide any suggestions and feedback. Thank you!

http://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-51-section-1-question-21/

this question is interesting, i feel like for this question, you almost don't need to map out the lawgic unless you do not fully understand the question stimulus.

i didn't really understand the second part of Jon's lawgic mapping...

The effect remains quite strong during colder months if the garden is well coordinated with the room and contributes strong visual interest of its own.

Jon wrote: CM → [WC & SVI → ES]

Why did Jon put CM as sufficient condition? Wouldn't WC & SVI → ES be enough/correct?

A. A garden separated from an adjoining living room by closed sliding doors cannot be well coordinated with the room unless the garden contributes strong visual interest.

WC → SVI

Not right because WC & SVI goes together, they're not sufficient and necessary conditions.

B. in cold weather, a garden and an adjoining living room separated from one another by sliding glass doors will not visually merge into a single space unless the garden is well coordinated with the room.

SD → M → WC

This is incorrect because q stem doesn't state that it'll merge because it's well coordinated. it just says that the effect remains strong if it's well coordinated.

C. A garden and an adjoining living room separated by sliding glass doors cannot visually merge in summer unless the doors are open.

M → SD

But first sentence states that SD → M, so this is backwards, so incorrect

D. a garden can visually merge with an adjoining living room into a single space even if the garden does not contribute strong visual interest of its own

correct because the only thing that will allow it to merge is the sliding doors. visual interest just makes the effect stronger

E. Except in summer.... this is just not a good start...incorrect

How do you approach MSS questions? Sometimes, I feel like lawgic isn't necessary, as long as i understand fully what the question is saying. Sometimes, lawgic is necessary... I think LSAT is difficult because the test is dense and may lose me and I may miss one or two words, or get confused because of it's wording... what are your thoughts?

http://abovethelaw.com/2012/03/the-practice-setting-earning-and-keeping-fees-in-small-law-firms/

Sometimes I eliminate the wrong answer choice for the wrong reasons (I look at the Manhatten Explanations online and sometimes it's different reasons than why I eliminated)

Is that okay as long as I'm getting to the answer?

This is for logical reasoning.

Do law schools accept less students if their ranking goes up because they want to show exclusivity?

I read that some of you were looking for schools that offered prep courses/PTs and today I received an email from Faulkner Law. Not sure if anyone would be interested but it's on 3/21/15 at 9:30 AM.

"Maximize your test score by attending this free preparation course!

RSVP TODAY

If you can't attend this event in person, you can participate via webcast. Just RSVP accordingly.

Questions?

Call 334-386-7210"

Hey 7Sagers,

Someone emailed in with a question I thought you could help out with! Here it is:

I recently started using 7Sage, and I am currently having difficulties with identifying embedded clauses, modifiers, details and predicates. I've gone over the lessons a few times and done the practice quiz. I am looking for some insight.

Hey 7Sagers, I think it would be great to get a bunch of Calgary LSAT geeks together to work towards the June 2015 exam. PM me if you'd like to set something up!

Hi everybody,

I recently found a few courses on Coursera that might be a good supplement to LSAT prep. If you're not familiar with it, Coursera offers online courses taught by university professors about a wide range of topics. The courses have video lectures and some accompanying assignments, and you can watch many of them for free.

I just found a course called "Think Again: How to Reason and Argue," which examines arguments and reasoning. I haven't taken any lessons yet, but the topics in the course description are very relevant to the LR section. There are also various classes on logic, which may help with the LR and LG sections.

Hi Everyone -

I'm looking to collect some best practices because I work full time, so I need bang for my buck during study time. I hope this forum will benefit others in my situation!

I took the LSAT a while ago and scored in the low 160s with very little preparation. I thought - HEY! If I try really hard and use an awesome course (like this one!) I have a chance of breaking 170! By using this course, I've improved in terms of my raw score. I get almost 50% fewer questions wrong per section, but this only improves my actual LSAT score marginally.

Now, the thought that I've reached the capacity of my intelligence has crossed my mind. But I think this may not be the case - after some very serious self-reflection. Because I immediately understand why I get something wrong, I feel like this is more about synthesizing all of the skills in a test taking environment.

Can we start this discussion to share "curve breaking" tips? They can be any kind of suggestions - how to study, when to study, how to approach certain problems, strategic skipping, active reading strategies, timing strategies... Any thing you got - I'm all ears!

Thanks in advance everyone!

S

hi everyone, i was wondering how i can improve on flaw questions? I feel like sometimes they're obvious, but for the harder ones, i either get it or i don't. Any tips on how to improve? I plan to redo the flaw practice problems, but i feel like if i drill enough, LSAT may repeat those flaw, but i need to see why that is the case instead of memorizing the common flaw packet. I think this has helped, but it hasn't helped enough.

some notes i took from the lessons on flaw:

Flaw / Descriptive weakening

similar to weaken, similar to MOR questions

Descriptive

2 step test for choosing the right ac: (especially helpful for tough questions, where the wrong ac are very attractive)

1. Descriptively accurate for the argument - if it doesn’t rightly describe the argument, then don’t even bother with 2nd step, this ac is wrong

my notes on this tip above is that it may be easy or hard to spot. for example, this difficult flaw problem, which most people picked D, it is neither descriptively accurate, nor does it describe the flaw. However, the inaccuracy of D (incompatible) is so subtle, that I missed it when under timed condition. Any tips on how to improve? I guess i truly need to learn to walk before i run, but under timed condition, i feel like i'm forced to run with it... if that makes sense.

I literally watched this video 5 times in a row, and everytime i listen to it, i learn something. but can someone please give me more tips? im truly trying to improve for my June LSAT test.. thanks everyone

http://classic.7sage.com/lsat_explanations/lsat-51-section-1-question-15/

2. describes the flaw? - the ac is assuming, is that why the argument is wrong? Review 19 common argument flaws

sometimes the trap answers satisfies step 1, but not 2 (descriptively accurate, but wrong flaw)

this is hard to spot if i feel like i didn't anticipate the flaw already...but sometimes i can take a stab at the answer choices and get lucky on the harder ones.

Any other tips on how to improve on LR in general? i feel like for each test, it is a hit or a miss, some LR sections are hard, some are easy, sometimes both are easy, and RC and LG are harder. Maybe lsat tries to balance the overall difficulty of the test without giving away a pattern

Fun tidbit that I found online!!! http://www.dailycal.org/2012/08/23/study-shows-studying-for-the-lsat-can-change-brain/

Question:

What is the difference between

A-->B

______

A-->/C

and

A--->B

_____

not (A--->C)

Did you take an Adderall the day of the exam? If so, did you take your regular dose, less, or more of? I am most interested in those who the title applies to that didn't take it the day of the exam, and how it affected you, either beneficially or detrimentally.

I am taking the test in June and as you might of assumed have ADD. I have heard a variety of answers from friends/colleagues and was curious what other answer samples might conclude.

Also I was going to request accommodations for my LSAT, but time turned fragile and I ended up not going through with all of it due to the opportunity costs associated with getting re-diagnosed for LSAC standards. A part of me wishes I would of done everything required to get the accommodations, because hey more time is MORE TIME. Please share any experiences or input you have on the issue.

Good Luck in June!