Retake study advice over next month?

til354567

Hi, any advice on how to best prepare for a retake at the end of August? I think I can do better than my July Flex score which was sub-165. I have done LSAT trainer, skimmed Loophole, and did most of the CC over the last 3 months. I also took PTs 73-89, C2, 61, and 50 (20 PTs) as part of my July prep. My 20 PT avg was 170. My most recent 10 PT avg was 172. Most recent 5 was 174. I diagnosed my July results as caused by a combo of 1) semi-external-being-at-home-factors which I plan to mitigate next time plus 2) nerves plus 3) a tough games section (cabinets...) which sort of mentally rocked me ( I may have gotten more than 5 wrong in LG) having gotten used to the -0/-1 LG feeling plus 4) just not my day.

I plan to drill a hard game problem sets daily (3 star plus games) and drill LR & RC sections. Any other "canonical" advice for re-take refinements for test takers who are pretty close to their ceiling but failed to execute on try 1?

Any advice on which remaining PTs to use as full PTs? I was probably going to only do 71 and 72 (whose games I have unfortunately already seen) in the last ten days or so.

Also, this is just me looking for encouragement/needing gas-up but my PTs do indicate I can do better on this thing, right? sigh... Good luck to everyone prepping for this thing. The highs and lows! Onwards!

Thank you!

cmwilliams585

following - same issue! You can definitely do better on this based on your PTs! I think staying calm and keeping your confidence up will be important.

Heinz Doofenshmirtz

It sounds like you can definitely reach your upper threshold! Don't be discouraged. How have your habits outside of studying looked like? I found myself missing a lot of questions just because I was stressed I had one month left until my exam. I went from scoring -1 or -2 on LR to -6 because I was panicked. In the pressure of the real exam it's easy for all our hard-fought habits to fly out the window and disregard the process we've drilled so often.

Once I starting adopting habits outside of studying to relax me and increase my focus, I've returned to my usual scores. For me, deleting my social media apps and turning my phone off for almost the entire day have increased my attention span for "boring" RC passages. I also adopted meditation and hiking without music. If I can get myself in the zone in activities outside of studying, it makes it easier for me to become deeply immersed within the actual test itself--regardless of conditions like noise distractions, or nerves from testing.

Maybe try reflecting on what you're doing outside of studying? I only say this because it sounds like you have a good grasp on the content, and at this point it's more a psychological game.

Let me know if this helps!

til354567

@Deepika7 said:
It sounds like you can definitely reach your upper threshold! Don't be discouraged. How have your habits outside of studying looked like? I found myself missing a lot of questions just because I was stressed I had one month left until my exam. I went from scoring -1 or -2 on LR to -6 because I was panicked. In the pressure of the real exam it's easy for all our hard-fought habits to fly out the window and disregard the process we've drilled so often.

Once I starting adopting habits outside of studying to relax me and increase my focus, I've returned to my usual scores. For me, deleting my social media apps and turning my phone off for almost the entire day have increased my attention span for "boring" RC passages. I also adopted meditation and hiking without music. If I can get myself in the zone in activities outside of studying, it makes it easier for me to become deeply immersed within the actual test itself--regardless of conditions like noise distractions, or nerves from testing.

Maybe try reflecting on what you're doing outside of studying? I only say this because it sounds like you have a good grasp on the content, and at this point it's more a psychological game.

Let me know if this helps!

I think this nails a big part of it. The last few weeks I may have leaned too much into the LSAT. I think the last few weeks of checking out from it and now forcing prep into much more tightly defined time buckets with a lot more structure and good outside pressure will pay off. I have always found that I get the most done when different commitments run up against each other. Hoping it is the same thing here! Very helpful, thank you. (I love the turning the phone off idea)

dos_cool

I have been drilling the early games (PT 1-15) and have found this super helpful. Some of them are WEIRD games. I feel like if you can handle the earlier games in a timed setting, it makes it easier when you get thrown a weird one on test day.

til354567

@dos_cool said:
I have been drilling the early games (PT 1-15) and have found this super helpful. Some of them are WEIRD games. I feel like if you can handle the earlier games in a timed setting, it makes it easier when you get thrown a weird one on test day.

Great idea and can second that some of them are strange. I've been doing the same thing. I've actually been going a step further and making "synthetic" games of 3+ star difficulty games. Figured that if I can trudge trough those I can trudge through whatever mud I get in on test day.