"Mathy" Questions drilling?

karenkaren

Sharing this in hopes that it might be useful to some:

In an effort to feel more comfortable with "mathy" questions (involving proportions, percentages, averages...), I searched the discussion forum for a list of such questions and it seems that only @dannyshaw had looked for something similar.

I quickly realized that there were lots of them, at least 4-5 questions in each PT. I found them by searching "proportions", "percent", or "average" in my digital PTs. Does anyone have any suggestions of what other keywords to search? I can also come up with "number", "incidence", and "prevalence", but those don't seem to come up as frequently.

Has anyone else drilled these types of questions? Is it more useful to read something like How to Lie with Statistics than drill?

These are several "mathy" questions I found just in PTs 1 and 2.
PT01.S3.Q11 - proportion
PT01.S3.Q21 - proportion
PT01.S3.Q12 - average
PT01.S4.Q04 - percent
PT02.S2.Q04 - average
PT02.S2.Q14 - average
PT02.S2.Q16-17 - percent
PT02.S4.Q05 - proportion
PT02.S4.Q15 - percent

Cheers!

NotMyName

oh nice! I might add PT01.S3.Q07 to this as well.

I struggle with these two and will be drilling them soon. The book may be helpful, but I think the list of tricks the writers use with numbers/percentages is not so long. Maybe we can overcome them just by becoming for comfortable them. Like LG, if we see enough and establish the inferences then we're more hip to it in the future. Not sure though.

tanes256

@karenkaren I have a whole list of them. They're all flaw questions though. I can't upload what I have right now but you can go to The LSAT Blog, click on free stuff and then LR. It's a spreadsheet that divides question types. If you scroll down to flaws you'll see the numbers questions. I'm not sure how the other question types are listed and I think if o my hoes up to PT 39??

Nikkkkkkk

I struggle with these questions too!

@tanes256 Great suggestion. I went through the entire page (http://lsatblog.blogspot.ca/2009/06/lsat-logical-reasoning-spreadsheet.html) and came up with the following list. For some reason it doesn't include the questions mentioned already in this thread. He may have skipped the first few PTs? The numbers in brackets are the page numbers where you can find them in the official LSAC books. But I may just continually update this post with links to 7sage video explanations for each question:

Flaw

PT 12, S1, #14 (155)
PT 13, S2, #24 (197)
PT 14, S4, #18 (245) 
PT 16, S3, #24 (307) 
PT 19, S2, #7 (21)
PT 21, S3, #19 (101)
PT 22, S2, #25 (133)
PT 23, S3, #16 (168)
PT 26, S3, #5 (267)
PT 26, S3, #19 (271) (numbers/percentages) 
PT 27, S1, #2 (288) (numbers/percentages) 
PT 27, S1, #23 (294) (numbers/percentages) 
PT 30, S2, #13 (57)
PT 30, S2, #17 (59)
PT 33, S1, #12 (155)
PT 36, S3, #21 (276) 
PT 37, S4, #17 (312)
PT 44, S2, #21 (24)
PT 47, S3, #16 (29) 
PT 50, S2, #3 (19) (overgeneralization)
PT 50, S4, #22 (36)
PT 51, S1, #4 (10)
PT 51, S1, #18 (14) 
PT 51, S3, #4 (25)
PT 52, S3, #16 (26)
PT 59, S2, #20 (10)

MBT/MSS

PT 12, S1, #8 (154) (MBT)
PT 13, S2, #18 (195) (MSS)
PT 14, S2, #16 (228)(MBT)
PT 15, S2, #9 (264) (MSS)
PT 16, S2, #9 (294) (MBT)
PT 16, S2, #20 (298) (MBT)
PT 18, S2, #20 (332) (MSS)
PT 20, S1, #24 (57) (MBT)
PT 22, S4, #12 (141) (MSS)
PT 26, S3, #15 (270) (MSS)
PT 27, S1, #9 (291) (MBT)
PT 27, S4, #14 (312) (MBT) 
PT 30, S4, #22 (76) (MSS)
PT 32, S1, #18 (124) (MSS)
PT 44, S4, #3 (31) (MSS) 
PT 46, S3, #11 (28) (MBT)
PT 55, S3, #12 (29) (MSS)

NA
PT 10, S4, #4 (104)
PT 16, S2, #14 (296) 
PT 19, S2, #13 (23) 
PT 20, S1, #3 (50) 
PT 20, S1, #11 (52)
PT 54, S2, #9 (20)
PT 54, S4, #24 (37)

Weaken
PT 16, S2, #16 (296) 
PT 26, S3, #24 (273)
PT 28, S3, #11 (336)
 PT 58, S1, #24 (16) 
PT 59, S3, #13 (16) 

SA
PT 12, S1, #22 (158) 
PT 14, S4, #7 (242)
PT 19, S2, #18 (25)
PT 19, S4, #11 (38)
PT 29, S1, #20 (21) 

Parallel Reasoning
PT 14, S2, #25 (231) (flawed) 
PT 49, S4, #24 (36) (flawed)

Strengthen
PT 7, S1, #23 (22)
PT 12, S1, #19 (157)
PT 30, S2, #4 (55)
PT 34, S3, #21 (207) 
PT 46, S3, #22 (32) 

Resolve the Paradox/Explain the Phenomenon
PT 16, S2, #1 (292)
PT 18, S2, #11 (329)
 PT 22, S2, #21 (131) 
 PT 24, S2, #18 (199)
PT 58, S1, #17 (14)

Method of Reasoning
JN 07, S2, #20 (12) 

Principle
PT 44, S2, #17 (23)

EXCEPT
PT 9, S2, #17 (62) (could be true) (numbers/percentages) 
PT 43, S3, #15 (31) (resolve the paradox)

Main Point
PT 30, S2, #23 (60) (structured to lead to which conclusion?)

Point at Issue
PT 30, S2, #10 (56)

Sami

Paging @BinghamtonDave. I think he has done some extensive work trying to figure these type of arguments out and would probably offer the best advice and information.

karenkaren

Awesome!! Thanks for the suggestion @tanes256 and all your work finding and linking those @Csuposki!

I agree @jkatz1488, hopefully through exposure we will see some concrete rules and inferences pushed out of these dreaded questions. Would be great to keep each other posted on any breakthroughs.

Nikkkkkkk

Just wanted to bump this thread up. I've recently been going over the PowerScore LR Bible and it has a section on these questions appropriately enough titled "Numbers and Percentages." I haven't read the entire chapter yet, but so far it's been very helpful in getting a handle on what to look out for when faced with these kinds of questions.

Alex

@Csuposki said:
Just wanted to bump this thread up. I've recently been going over the PowerScore LR Bible and it has a section on these questions appropriately enough titled "Numbers and Percentages." I haven't read the entire chapter yet, but so far it's been very helpful in getting a handle on what to look out for when faced with these kinds of questions.

Might have to revisit the ol' Bible in that case