Can someone help me understand what is a blind review

Jesse Pinkman

Here is what I know:
1. take a timed PT
2. while I am doing the timed PT, I circle the Q's I am uncertain of
3. check answers without knowing what the correct answer is
4. redo the Q's I got wrong as well as the Q's I circled

I feel like I am missing something here. This may be a stupid question but before I continue with the course I would really like a full understanding of how to do blind review and what its ultimate goal is.

Thanks a lot.

drbrown2

Basically you revisit the test, but without time constraints. When you’re first starting out you should probably just do every question on a freshly printed test (circled and non-circled questions). Really break down the questions, label the stimulus, understand the conclusion and support structure, and most importantly write out your own explanations for the correct and incorrect answers for each question.

For RC make summaries and write down the main point and the structure of the passage, along with the tone, purpose of the passage, and various viewpoints.

For LG redo the games and try to make sub game boards, figure out better ways to diagram/split, and understand the inferences.

Before you check the answers give the questions you’re still unsure of a second or third look and try changing your approach until you get it.

Then check answers, watch video explanations, and compare your line of reasoning to J.Y.’s and othe 7sagers who have commented on that question. This process takes a long long time but is what will help you improve. The act of taking a PT doesn’t really help you improve other than exposure to more questions and timing practice. Real understanding (which leads to better timing and accuracy) comes through BR.

Cant Get Right

@noorkhaled said:
3. check answers without knowing what the correct answer is

I'm not entirely certain what you mean here--you have to see the correct answers in order to check the answers--but regardless, you should not be doing any checking of answers until after you've completed your BR.

Another important aspect of BR is writing out your reasoning. Don't just rework the questions; explain your understanding in writing. Otherwise, you'll be constantly saying "Oh okay, I see," without any clue of what is actually going on. If you do see, then writing out a report shouldn't be much more work. The first time people start writing out explanations, however, they tend to discover that they actually have no idea what to say.

When you've finished BR, go back to all of your errors and evaluate what went wrong. For anything you missed in BR, diagnosing the issue is relatively direct: you're lacking in some essential skill or understanding. Identify what that skill or understanding is, and then go and develop it. What I think is really more interesting are the ones that you miss under time but get correct in BR. That means you possess the necessary fundamentals, and yet you missed it anyway. Find out what you misunderstood there, and "careless mistake" is not an answer. If you understood something to mean something other than exactly what it meant, what did you think it said? Why did you think it said that? What logical or grammatical quirk was at the crux of the misunderstanding? This is some of the most vital work you will do in your studies. This is where you'll really learn how to apply the lessons from one error to questions in the future; this is where you learn to recognize underlying problems in a universally applicable framework.