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A thank you to 7Sage
kraft.phillip
Free Trial Member Inactive Sage
I scored a 173 on the September test, and 7Sage had a significant contribution to that happening. I just want to say thanks to the admins at 7Sage, as well as everyone in the community here. I started studying the LSAT last year, and my diagnostic was a 158. While I never actually purchased 7Sage due to my inability to afford it, I've benefited immensely from the free logic games explanations and the community writ large. It's simply amazing that these resources are free, and I truly believe 7Sage's mantra of making law school possible for low income students. You provide a space for individuals like me who otherwise cannot afford the costs of law school admission to even imagine that they could succeed if they work hard. That imagination is so unbelievably important because it mitigates the ideology deterministic poverty that so many individuals face. Thank you for your mere existence. I hope you know how important it is.
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For PTs, I always used at least 5 sections. often I would do more though, and I think this helped me with endurance on test day. I did about 3 PTs a week, tried to do them in the morning at the time I'd be taking the actual test, and BR the same day. Often BR would stretch out over another day as well. I'd always redo all of the LG before grading it (that's basically how I BRd LG, since you can't BR in the same way you do LR or RC). I tried to BR to the point that I believed I got a 180 BR score, and then I graded it. Then I did a second round of BR if I missed any by marking the questions I got wrong and trying them again without knowing the correct answer (just knowing that my first choice was wrong). Then I typed up a review of the PT on the lsat subreddit. This included a few things: I had a brief background of what I ate that day, if I got enough sleep, etc.. Basically anything that could ostensibly causally impact my score. Any weird test conditions. Then I would type up explanations for the questions I missed, and attempt to categorize the mistake I made into at least one of three categories, which encompass all possible mistakes. Those are
1) reading mistakes, which are just that I misread an answer or a question. Often these are the "dumb mistakes" people talk about, and as such I tried to fit my mistakes into one of the two other categories.
2) failure to apply process. This will make more sense if you read the LSAT Trainer. I implemented a very strict process for each LR question that I had, with the help of the trainer, reasoned through was the best way to approach each question type. failure to adhere to this process often leads to mistakes, like picking an answer without confirming it against the question or the stimulus, etc.
3) failure of understanding. This is simply if I didn't know how to do a question. If I didn't know, for example, what a right answer to a sufficient assumption question was. These are actually great because they are the easiest things to fix. This is really the only mistakes that most prep books are designed to prevent, and the reason the LSAT trainer is great is that it focuses on the other two as well.
So after I break down the task, analyze the stimulus, explain why each wrong answer is wrong, and why the right answer is right, I tried to synthesize what I learned from the experience. You can actually find my old reviews on the LSAT subreddit if you want to see what those look like.
Lastly, I found it helpful to sometimes take a day off before a PT. Like literally just sit around my apartment doing nothing. I might read a bit or watch an interesting show, and I'll go running. I'd sleep in though and not worry about the LSAT. Often this would be a friday. That would recharge me for testing on Saturday.
I hope all of this helps; I realize it might be a bit longer than you were expecting. Feel free to ask me if you have any questions on my methods. As a side note, I'm also starting to do some LSAT tutoring via skype, so message me if you are interested in that.
I'm curious to see an example of what you mean by this - is there any way you could link it? @kraft.phillip
Thanks for all the info you've shared!
I changed my approach a couple times to this, but it was really helpful typing out explanations that, in theory, were supposed to be read by other people. That made me hold myself to a higher standard of explaining than I would have otherwise. Unfortunately, these didn't work out the way I was hoping--I hoped that people would take tests the same time as me, and we could discuss specific questions we had trouble with. I still think it was valuable though.
Also, how close to your PT average was your actual score?
Sorry for all the questions!
I have one question for you, if you don't mind answering: How did you minimize careless errors (i.e. misreading the stimulus/answer choices)?
One component of the Trainer is developing mental discipline (i.e. sticking to the technical process). When I first read it, I didn't really understand how important it is until I realized how mentally undisciplined I was - I don't adhere to the problem solving process as systematically as I should.
How do you think this could be rectified?
Blind review by circling the questions you aren't perfectly sure about as you go through the test and returning to them after the test is finished. Focus on the process you use to solve the questions. Categorize your mistakes into at least one of these three groups:
mistakes of understanding-If it's this, you need to brush up on how to approach the question. If you don't understand what necessary assumption questions are asking, for example, then you know that going forward requires you to review that chapter in whatever test prep you use.
mistakes of failing to apply the process of solving the particular question. This happens when you know how to solve, e.g., necessary assumption questions, but you failed to do a part of the process. Maybe you didn't identify the support/premise. Maybe you didn't prephrase an answer. Maybe you didn't eliminate answers first. Maybe you didn't check the answer against the stimulus to confirm. These mistakes often happen due to time pressure, but it is essential that you approach every question methodically if you are to see any increases in your score. How are you to guarantee your work will pay off if you apply your knowledge haphazardly and irregularly? Ensuring adherence to a tried and true process is necessary for improvement. If you find yourself making these mistakes, then slow down and do some drills that involve walking through, step by step, what you are doing. Write out the steps you take for each question type.
other mistakes, such as having misread an answer or the stimulus. These mistakes are the least instructive, but they do happen. They tell you two things; try to be more exacting as you read. Basically, pay attention more. Unfortunately, that's a difficult thing for one to control, which leads to the second thing: you likely are not exercising and maintaining a healthy diet, or you are testing in otherwise non-ideal conditions (conditions referring both to environmental and mental). These mistakes indicate you need to start taking care of yourself.
So that's mainly for LR.
For LG, I think you should redo all the games and questions prior to grading. That's how I blind reviewed for the games.
For RC, Blind review similar to LR-circle questions you aren't sure about, and go back to them prior to grading. After you grade, obviously review and figure out why you got the questions wrong. The only thing I would add is to spend some time leisurely reading through RC sections-both the passages and questions. Try to think about how the passage is structured, and where the questions refer to in the passage. You'll start to develop instincts of what is important when reading new passages because of this. Lastly, RC review should involve specific line references proving correct answers and disproving wrong ones. This is to teach you that everything is in the passage, and that you should be referring back to the passage often while you are taking the test.
I still have a couple tutoring slots open as well if you'd like me to spend some time helping you through these processes. Just PM me you skype name if you are interested.
That's a part of the trainer that I thought was really important. There are a couple of things I did to help with mental discipline. I wrote out the processes I use to solve every single LR question type, and what I do in certain contingencies. This write up helped me solidify a commitment to a process, and I had to mentally justify every aspect of the process to myself. This was important because, since it was MY process, and I had argued with myself over it, and I've made a decision, aberrating from the process was always clearly a bad decision-I had already thought through why my process was best, in all situations. So that helped me believe that my process really was best, which decreased the likelihood of abandoning it in the face of various contingencies, like feeling like I just know the answer, or finding an answer that is really attractive, etc. I'd still stick to the process because I'd been burned before by cutting corners. I hope that makes sense.
Second thing that helped me to avoid careless errors was judging policy debate- the exercise of flowing a debate round forces you to pay attention to every argument, and missing or misunderstanding an argument is really bad. I tracked that my scores actually jumped up after I had been to debate tournaments. That's something that's not really applicable to your situation, I'd imagine.
Third maintaining your diet and exercise-stay healthy. Your brain wanders when you pump flamin hot cheetos in it.
Fourth is to schedule in breaks. leading up to a saturday PT, I'd take a 6 section test on Wednesday, BR, grade it, do some extra sections and drill hard on Thursday and finish the write up for the PT, and I'd really push myself to completely being exhausted. I'd eventually get a headache, and then I knew I'd worked hard enough. In fact, I told myself that the pain was neurogenesis. Then I'd take friday off to sleep in to like 10 or 11 ish and do exercise. I think this pattern helped sort of expand the boundaries of my brain, then gave it rest, and then on saturday, by actually taking a PT, solidify the new brain cells and connections I've developed. But I noticed that forcing yourself to get to the point that you have trouble concentrating anymore(the headache stage) helps you be able to concentrate better in the future, which decreases those careless mistakes you talk about.
Last is to develop a strategy to try to identify the scenario during the test you are taking that you likely misread something. So if all answers seem correct, you likely misread something, and you should start the problem over. Same if they all seem incorrect. The last indicator is if you find yourself frozen or stuck, not knowing what to do next. And I truly mean start over. You have no idea where your mistake was, so you really do need to go back and start the process anew to have the best chance of finding the mistake and not repeating it. Most people just freeze up at this point, which wastes way more time than just starting the problem over.
Hopefully one or more of those coping strategies helps!
Thanks for the tutoring offer, I'm OK for now, but I will keep it in mind! Congrats again on your awesome score!
For those studying for the June test--best of luck!
Good to see you again! Hope you're doing well.