How to make the final jump from 167 to 170? Taking test this month!

Princess

Hi guys! I'm trying to make the jump from 167 to 170. My BR score right now is 177. I missed 16 on PT 68 and missed 18 on 71. What is your advise? I'm planning to take the LSAT this November. I'm aiming for the top 14, so I don't know if 167 would still be a decent score. I really do want to break into the 170s if possible though. I'm studying full time so please give me your tips

PT68 S1 2019-10-30 1 week ago RC -4 -3
PT68 S2 2019-10-30 1 week ago LR -4 -1
PT68 S3 2019-10-30 1 week ago LR -5 -1
PT68 S4 2019-10-30 1 week ago LG -3 -1

PT71 S1 2019-11-07 6 mins ago LR -5 -3
PT71 S2 2019-11-07 6 mins ago LG -1 -0
PT71 S3 2019-11-07 6 mins ago LR -6 -2
PT71 S4 2019-11-07 6 mins ago RC -6 -1

RealLaw612

My biggest jumps at the stage you're in came from time management strategies. For example, when doing Logic Games, answer the orienting question then skip ahead and answer all the "if" questions before coming back to the others. "If" questions leave your scratch paper full of possible scenarios that the universal questions might ask for. The resulting time saved will give you a cushion for more difficult games.

In LR, similarly, when you come to any time-consuming question-type (like parallel flaw, etc...) or a type you know you are weaker with, just mark a random answer choice, flag it, and skip to the next. This may seem counter-intuitive at first, but there is a psychological benefit I've found that translates into better scores. When you waste a lot of time on a difficult question, and you know you still have 15 to go, it is normal to feel more pressure and, at least for me, the tendency is to try to rush the answers in the rest of the questions. By skipping the hardest ones, I always find myself at the end of the section with around 15 minutes left to work through 3 to 5 flagged questions after having confidently answered the other 21 or so questions. My average at LR is currently -1.

Good luck and I hope this helps!

Mike_Ross

Totally agree with skipping to save time on LR. To add to that piece of advice: It became more important to me to maintain my momentum in LR. For example, say I encounter lots of weaken/strengthen/flaw questions and I’m moving smoothly, then the next question is MBT or parallel flaw question that is often mechanical and will require me to diagram. If so, I just automatically skip it because I I don’t want to break rhythm. I’ll just get it alluring the second round,after knowing I’m done with most of the test. That takes away the pressure of thinking “shit it’s only question 16 and I’m burning almost 2 mins”

Another thing is to have clear and ready made strategies for as many LR flaws as possible. Say you’re given an argument by analogy and asked to weaken, you should be able to immediately default to ‘look for something that shows analogy is not so analogous’

There are also many many cookie cutter responses to flaw types.

Do this well and you can save time to use on more time consuming questions!

Princess

Thank you so much! I will definitely try your tips!

umich101

The above were super helpful - thank you!!
Struggling with this as well

MichaelScottRegionalManager

@ericauhunmwangho I saw your other post and thought this post might help!

ericauhunmwangho

@MichaelScottRegionalManager said:
@ericauhunmwangho I saw your other post and thought this post might help!

Wow, thank you so much this definitely helps!Especially since I have been finding it hard to skip think thats my biggest mistake while doing LR. Thank you!!!!!

ericauhunmwangho

@99thPercentileOrDieTryin said:
My biggest jumps at the stage you're in came from time management strategies. For example, when doing Logic Games, answer the orienting question then skip ahead and answer all the "if" questions before coming back to the others. "If" questions leave your scratch paper full of possible scenarios that the universal questions might ask for. The resulting time saved will give you a cushion for more difficult games.

In LR, similarly, when you come to any time-consuming question-type (like parallel flaw, etc...) or a type you know you are weaker with, just mark a random answer choice, flag it, and skip to the next. This may seem counter-intuitive at first, but there is a psychological benefit I've found that translates into better scores. When you waste a lot of time on a difficult question, and you know you still have 15 to go, it is normal to feel more pressure and, at least for me, the tendency is to try to rush the answers in the rest of the questions. By skipping the hardest ones, I always find myself at the end of the section with around 15 minutes left to work through 3 to 5 flagged questions after having confidently answered the other 21 or so questions. My average at LR is currently -1.

Good luck and I hope this helps!

Hi someone tagged me in this and your advice is pretty sound. I was wondering what tips do suggest for when deciding when to skip and question? I found that when I try to skip, in my head theres a voice saying "just try it, it may be easier than you think" or "you've already read the stimulus twice and waisted the time, might as well look through and pick an ac." But what ends up happening is by the time I'm at question 18 short of time I panic and I CAN'T think straight at all and my mind goes in shambles and that the end of it for me. So pretty much any advice on deciding when to skip I would really appreciate.

For some reason I have this notion that if I skip It will be detrimental and I will end up skipping and still not have enough time to go back which clearly is incorrect , please any advice would be great thank you!!!!!

taschasp

@ericauhunmwangho said:

@99thPercentileOrDieTryin said:
My biggest jumps at the stage you're in came from time management strategies. For example, when doing Logic Games, answer the orienting question then skip ahead and answer all the "if" questions before coming back to the others. "If" questions leave your scratch paper full of possible scenarios that the universal questions might ask for. The resulting time saved will give you a cushion for more difficult games.

In LR, similarly, when you come to any time-consuming question-type (like parallel flaw, etc...) or a type you know you are weaker with, just mark a random answer choice, flag it, and skip to the next. This may seem counter-intuitive at first, but there is a psychological benefit I've found that translates into better scores. When you waste a lot of time on a difficult question, and you know you still have 15 to go, it is normal to feel more pressure and, at least for me, the tendency is to try to rush the answers in the rest of the questions. By skipping the hardest ones, I always find myself at the end of the section with around 15 minutes left to work through 3 to 5 flagged questions after having confidently answered the other 21 or so questions. My average at LR is currently -1.

Good luck and I hope this helps!

Hi someone tagged me in this and your advice is pretty sound. I was wondering what tips do suggest for when deciding when to skip and question? I found that when I try to skip, in my head theres a voice saying "just try it, it may be easier than you think" or "you've already read the stimulus twice and waisted the time, might as well look through and pick an ac." But what ends up happening is by the time I'm at question 18 short of time I panic and I CAN'T think straight at all and my mind goes in shambles and that the end of it for me. So pretty much any advice on deciding when to skip I would really appreciate.

For some reason I have this notion that if I skip It will be detrimental and I will end up skipping and still not have enough time to go back which clearly is incorrect , please any advice would be great thank you!!!!!

Oh hey haha I just commented on your thread. Well, to respond to this--I think the key is time. If you spend more than X amount on a question, you need to guess, flag, and move on. What "X" is depends on how you're doing, how many questions are left when you run out of time, etc. In LR, when practicing, I'd glance at the clock and aim to spend 1 min per question; if I ever spent more than 2 to 3min˜, I circled it and went back to it; and as I neared the last 10, I aimed to have like 12min left for the last 8 questions or so. Personally, going back to a circled question was often really nice--because half the time, the problem wasn't my reasoning, it was that I'd misread a word in the stimulus or something, so coming back to it again from semi-scratch meant re-reading it and having a greater chance at spotting my mistake.

I also always skipped parallel reasoning questions, or anything with an insanely long stimulus, and saved them for the end--those ones, I didn't even read the prompt, so the 2 minute thing doesn't apply.

~ I say 2 - 3 because, well, firstly I wasn't timing how long I spent on each question, and secondly I had a sense of the fact that some questions deserve a bit more time than others. If it was a question that felt like it deserved 2 minutes, then I'd cut it off at 2. If it felt like it deserved 3, I'd cut it off at 3. That's subjective, but I think you just need to train yourself with practice to realize when you've spent "too long" on a question, and what too long means to you.

BranTwice

I would recommend getting the Loophole LR. In that book, Ellen puts all of the LR questions into two categories based on the answer choices: Powerful and Provable. Once I went through the book and had a solid purchase on the information, I started saving a bunch of time by going through the first ten questions of a section normally, and then I did the remaining 15-16 by doing all Provable, and then going back and doing all Powerful. It keeps your brain focused on correct answer choices, and it definitely mitigates damage caused by trap ACs. It cut about 5 minutes off of my timing and my accuracy went from missing 3-5 to 0-2 on LR. I was at 167 avg and now I am at 170 avg.

ericauhunmwangho

@taschasp said:

@ericauhunmwangho said:

@99thPercentileOrDieTryin said:
My biggest jumps at the stage you're in came from time management strategies. For example, when doing Logic Games, answer the orienting question then skip ahead and answer all the "if" questions before coming back to the others. "If" questions leave your scratch paper full of possible scenarios that the universal questions might ask for. The resulting time saved will give you a cushion for more difficult games.

In LR, similarly, when you come to any time-consuming question-type (like parallel flaw, etc...) or a type you know you are weaker with, just mark a random answer choice, flag it, and skip to the next. This may seem counter-intuitive at first, but there is a psychological benefit I've found that translates into better scores. When you waste a lot of time on a difficult question, and you know you still have 15 to go, it is normal to feel more pressure and, at least for me, the tendency is to try to rush the answers in the rest of the questions. By skipping the hardest ones, I always find myself at the end of the section with around 15 minutes left to work through 3 to 5 flagged questions after having confidently answered the other 21 or so questions. My average at LR is currently -1.

Good luck and I hope this helps!

Hi someone tagged me in this and your advice is pretty sound. I was wondering what tips do suggest for when deciding when to skip and question? I found that when I try to skip, in my head theres a voice saying "just try it, it may be easier than you think" or "you've already read the stimulus twice and waisted the time, might as well look through and pick an ac." But what ends up happening is by the time I'm at question 18 short of time I panic and I CAN'T think straight at all and my mind goes in shambles and that the end of it for me. So pretty much any advice on deciding when to skip I would really appreciate.

For some reason I have this notion that if I skip It will be detrimental and I will end up skipping and still not have enough time to go back which clearly is incorrect , please any advice would be great thank you!!!!!

Oh hey haha I just commented on your thread. Well, to respond to this--I think the key is time. If you spend more than X amount on a question, you need to guess, flag, and move on. What "X" is depends on how you're doing, how many questions are left when you run out of time, etc. In LR, when practicing, I'd glance at the clock and aim to spend 1 min per question; if I ever spent more than 2 to 3min˜, I circled it and went back to it; and as I neared the last 10, I aimed to have like 12min left for the last 8 questions or so. Personally, going back to a circled question was often really nice--because half the time, the problem wasn't my reasoning, it was that I'd misread a word in the stimulus or something, so coming back to it again from semi-scratch meant re-reading it and having a greater chance at spotting my mistake.

I also always skipped parallel reasoning questions, or anything with an insanely long stimulus, and saved them for the end--those ones, I didn't even read the prompt, so the 2 minute thing doesn't apply.

~ I say 2 - 3 because, well, firstly I wasn't timing how long I spent on each question, and secondly I had a sense of the fact that some questions deserve a bit more time than others. If it was a question that felt like it deserved 2 minutes, then I'd cut it off at 2. If it felt like it deserved 3, I'd cut it off at 3. That's subjective, but I think you just need to train yourself with practice to realize when you've spent "too long" on a question, and what too long means to you.

Haha yes I just responded, on my thread, thank you. You are really helping me out I'm eager to now incorporate your advice and methods, bc I really feel like it will help with my timing!!

ericauhunmwangho

@BranTwice said:
I would recommend getting the Loophole LR. In that book, Ellen puts all of the LR questions into two categories based on the answer choices: Powerful and Provable. Once I went through the book and had a solid purchase on the information, I started saving a bunch of time by going through the first ten questions of a section normally, and then I did the remaining 15-16 by doing all Provable, and then going back and doing all Powerful. It keeps your brain focused on correct answer choices, and it definitely mitigates damage caused by trap ACs. It cut about 5 minutes off of my timing and my accuracy went from missing 3-5 to 0-2 on LR. I was at 167 avg and now I am at 170 avg.

I have heard about the book and I was tempted, but I don't think I have much time to incorporate it into my studies, I did the LSAT Trainer about almost 2 months ago and I am registered for the January I feel as if the remaining time I should really dedicate to PT's, BUT I will look into it. Thank you!!!

RealLaw612

@ericauhunmwangho said:

Hi someone tagged me in this and your advice is pretty sound. I was wondering what tips do suggest for when deciding when to skip and question? I found that when I try to skip, in my head theres a voice saying "just try it, it may be easier than you think" or "you've already read the stimulus twice and waisted the time, might as well look through and pick an ac." But what ends up happening is by the time I'm at question 18 short of time I panic and I CAN'T think straight at all and my mind goes in shambles and that the end of it for me. So pretty much any advice on deciding when to skip I would really appreciate.

For some reason I have this notion that if I skip It will be detrimental and I will end up skipping and still not have enough time to go back which clearly is incorrect , please any advice would be great thank you!!!!!

How to know when to skip ahead in LR:
My experience was to use 7Sage's analytics to understand my weaknesses. I attacked my deficiencies as hard as I could but, even after extensive study there were just some question types that took me longer to "get" than others. For example - I knew that any "parallel" question was an automatic skip. If I came to one of those question types I would automatically flag it, mark answer choice "C" and know I was going to come back to it if I had time.

Additionally, I would skip any question if I was still working on it after about two minutes. Why? Because the other questions count for the same amount of points as that one and why waste the same time getting one hard question wrong when I can use that same time to get two easier questions right? If I was feeling "stuck" or like I wasn't understanding the material, that was my cue to flag, mark, and skip.

What was consistent for me was that, using this method, I would always have only three to six flagged questions to come back to and, usually, there would be one or more that turned out to be not-so-difficult. Plus, when you come back to review three flagged questions and there are still ten minutes left on the clock, it's a great psychological confidence-booster.

The bottom line is that, while at first it seems counter-intuitive to purposely skip questions, it's a method that resulted in several immediate benefits for me. First, it instantly and permanently improved my scores. Next, it enabled me to finish LR sections much faster than before. Finally, it reduced my anxiety about the LR sections in general which helped conquer my stress about the LSAT as a whole.

ericauhunmwangho

@99thPercentileOrDieTryin said:

@ericauhunmwangho said:

Hi someone tagged me in this and your advice is pretty sound. I was wondering what tips do suggest for when deciding when to skip and question? I found that when I try to skip, in my head theres a voice saying "just try it, it may be easier than you think" or "you've already read the stimulus twice and waisted the time, might as well look through and pick an ac." But what ends up happening is by the time I'm at question 18 short of time I panic and I CAN'T think straight at all and my mind goes in shambles and that the end of it for me. So pretty much any advice on deciding when to skip I would really appreciate.

For some reason I have this notion that if I skip It will be detrimental and I will end up skipping and still not have enough time to go back which clearly is incorrect , please any advice would be great thank you!!!!!

How to know when to skip ahead in LR:
My experience was to use 7Sage's analytics to understand my weaknesses. I attacked my deficiencies as hard as I could but, even after extensive study there were just some question types that took me longer to "get" than others. For example - I knew that any "parallel" question was an automatic skip. If I came to one of those question types I would automatically flag it, mark answer choice "C" and know I was going to come back to it if I had time.

Additionally, I would skip any question if I was still working on it after about two minutes. Why? Because the other questions count for the same amount of points as that one and why waste the same time getting one hard question wrong when I can use that same time to get two easier questions right? If I was feeling "stuck" or like I wasn't understanding the material, that was my cue to flag, mark, and skip.

What was consistent for me was that, using this method, I would always have only three to six flagged questions to come back to and, usually, there would be one or more that turned out to be not-so-difficult. Plus, when you come back to review three flagged questions and there are still ten minutes left on the clock, it's a great psychological confidence-booster.

The bottom line is that, while at first it seems counter-intuitive to purposely skip questions, it's a method that resulted in several immediate benefits for me. First, it instantly and permanently improved my scores. Next, it enabled me to finish LR sections much faster than before. Finally, it reduced my anxiety about the LR sections in general which helped conquer my stress about the LSAT as a whole.

I agree with this especially during blind review many of the questions I get wrong it was because I read wrong or was rushing and my anxiety it was not as difficult as I initially expected. I really feel as though this will be a game changer for me!! Thank you for your advice, I'm very appreciative

Jay Hawlader

@Mike_Ross said:
Totally agree with skipping to save time on LR. To add to that piece of advice: It became more important to me to maintain my momentum in LR. For example, say I encounter lots of weaken/strengthen/flaw questions and I’m moving smoothly, then the next question is MBT or parallel flaw question that is often mechanical and will require me to diagram. If so, I just automatically skip it because I I don’t want to break rhythm. I’ll just get it alluring the second round,after knowing I’m done with most of the test. That takes away the pressure of thinking “shit it’s only question 16 and I’m burning almost 2 mins”

Another thing is to have clear and ready made strategies for as many LR flaws as possible. Say you’re given an argument by analogy and asked to weaken, you should be able to immediately default to ‘look for something that shows analogy is not so analogous’

There are also many many cookie cutter responses to flaw types.

Do this well and you can save time to use on more time consuming questions!

@Mike_Ross said:
Totally agree with skipping to save time on LR. To add to that piece of advice: It became more important to me to maintain my momentum in LR. For example, say I encounter lots of weaken/strengthen/flaw questions and I’m moving smoothly, then the next question is MBT or parallel flaw question that is often mechanical and will require me to diagram. If so, I just automatically skip it because I I don’t want to break rhythm. I’ll just get it alluring the second round,after knowing I’m done with most of the test. That takes away the pressure of thinking “shit it’s only question 16 and I’m burning almost 2 mins”

Another thing is to have clear and ready made strategies for as many LR flaws as possible. Say you’re given an argument by analogy and asked to weaken, you should be able to immediately default to ‘look for something that shows analogy is not so analogous’

There are also many many cookie cutter responses to flaw types.

Do this well and you can save time to use on more time consuming questions!

@Mike_Ross said:
Totally agree with skipping to save time on LR. To add to that piece of advice: It became more important to me to maintain my momentum in LR. For example, say I encounter lots of weaken/strengthen/flaw questions and I’m moving smoothly, then the next question is MBT or parallel flaw question that is often mechanical and will require me to diagram. If so, I just automatically skip it because I I don’t want to break rhythm. I’ll just get it alluring the second round,after knowing I’m done with most of the test. That takes away the pressure of thinking “shit it’s only question 16 and I’m burning almost 2 mins”

Another thing is to have clear and ready made strategies for as many LR flaws as possible. Say you’re given an argument by analogy and asked to weaken, you should be able to immediately default to ‘look for something that shows analogy is not so analogous’

There are also many many cookie cutter responses to flaw types.

Do this well and you can save time to use on more time consuming questions!

Would you happen to have a list of cookie cutters?

caffeine powered human

@BranTwice said:
I would recommend getting the Loophole LR. In that book, Ellen puts all of the LR questions into two categories based on the answer choices: Powerful and Provable. Once I went through the book and had a solid purchase on the information, I started saving a bunch of time by going through the first ten questions of a section normally, and then I did the remaining 15-16 by doing all Provable, and then going back and doing all Powerful. It keeps your brain focused on correct answer choices, and it definitely mitigates damage caused by trap ACs. It cut about 5 minutes off of my timing and my accuracy went from missing 3-5 to 0-2 on LR. I was at 167 avg and now I am at 170 avg.

This is so interesting! I would love to hear more about this. Do you then read the question first for all of the remaining 15-16 questions and mark them by Powerful/Provable? Do you mark anything on the answer sheet?

BranTwice

@"caffeine powered human" said:
This is so interesting! I would love to hear more about this. Do you then read the question first for all of the remaining 15-16 questions and mark them by Powerful/Provable? Do you mark anything on the answer sheet?

I usually read the stimulus before I read the question stem. I do that on the first ten questions (since they are usually the easiest). Once I get to #11, I briefly glance at the question stem to see if it is Powerful or Provable. If it's Provable, without thinking about the specific objective of the question stem, I go back in to the stimulus and read. Then I fully read the question stem and move on to the answers. On #12, if I immediately see that the question stem is Powerful, I just skip the question and go to the next Provable I can find. Once I am done with them, I go back and do the rest of the unmarked Powerful question types.

I find this approach very easy on the digital test. If it was still a paper test, this method would be a bit trickier.