Making stupid mistakes.. Any Ideas?

ZaTabler

I took the DEC lsat and scored 146 (Used Blueprint LSAT course), Now I'm scoring around 155-160 on the practice exams. The questions I'm missing are stupid mistakes however. I always have it narrowed to two possible choices on LR and I'm choosing the incorrect one. My goal is to score 160+ on the Sept test. Any ideas on how I could resolve this issue?

LSATcantwin

Recently I have noticed that I have been making a ton of these kinds of mistakes as well.

The number one thing I have found to help, and it seems counter intuitive, is to slow down. I quickly read answer choices or stems and end up choosing one that is not what the question is asking for. This is a common trap that the LSAT seems to use.

One example that really made me say DOH! was a question stem that said something like;

• Which one of the following is the main conclusion that can be logically inferred from the statements above.

My dumb ass saw "Main Conclusion", got excited and picked an answer choice that matched the conclusion.

2 major take aways from this.

1.) Read the entire stem slowly, it's easy to get trapped. That was a SA question that I answered like a MC question.

2.) The test makers KNOW people will do this. They had a trap answer choice ready for me.

BONUS it was the last question in a section - even more proof they are out to get you with tricky little things!

If I had slowed down, just a little bit my score would have been 1 point higher.

ZaTabler

Its funny you say that... I've been missing the last 2 in each section. I know how to arrive at the right answer, but I'm in such a hurry I miss it. I always have 1-2 min remaining as well.

TheLSAT

Can you elaborate on your mistakes? What do you consider a "stupid" mistake? And when you narrow your answer choices down to two, why do you think you're selecting the incorrect one?

Alex

@TheLSAT said:
Can you elaborate on your mistakes? What do you consider a "stupid" mistake? And when you narrow your answer choices down to two, why do you think you're selecting the incorrect one?

Yes, also wondering this. The best universal approach is try to find the answer that is wrong, first, when you're stuck between two answer choices. There's usually a phrase or a quantifier that is making it wrong, or perhaps you misread something in the stim.