How to approach harder RC

daliaglomeli

I've been PTing tests in the 20's and 30's because I've done PT's in the 50's and 60's already. However after getting back to practicing in the 50's my score tanked. In the 20's and 30'Ss I am able to score -5/-6 in RC but I've gotten so many more wrong in the harder RC. Anyone deal with this and found a way to overcome? LMK. Thanks!

MyNameIsDragon

bump

tonyahardzinski

VIEWSTAMP it from Logic Bible and go slow at first. That has been a big help for me. I hate the online RC and not being able to see the entire passage at once, it throws me off so bad

kkole444

@daliaglomeli
I would work on making sure you are getting same points out of the passages that JY does. That is where I started. I would do a passage, BR then watch the video for it. The next big thing that helped me was making sure I had a efficient low resolution, that is similar to the people in the comments and what JY has. I use to spend too much time writing down the low res and I was not writing down the important parts of the paragraphs (are you writing things down that are too detailed? or not enough? missing the main point of the paragraph?). Then after I got the information out of the passages I needed I started to go -8. Then I would read the question stem to make sure I knew exactly what they are asking of me RC this is super important to do. After that I would read the answer choices and knock out the ones that I knew were wrong. Then I would look at the ones I have left and read them carefully and pick apart what they are trying to say and if they are too absolute or if they are too weak for what the question stem wants. For example 'according to the passage it will be almost verbatim what is written in the passage however if it say implied by the passage then it could be verbatim or not.
I would only do 1 passage at a time to work on those skills I would also pick apart the passage like JY in the BR at first I was not good at this but after a while I started to make the same inferences that JY did in BR and then I started to make them under timed conditions. Also when ever i find the authors voice I immediately mark it down. I would spend a lot of time doing BR this is where the learning happens. Make sure you are skipping the hard questions, like give it your best shot on the question and move on, there is no point in staying and trying to find the answer for 3 minutes when you could pick up 2 more questions elsewhere in the next passages. For Drilling I would do max 2-4 sections per day. I started with the easier ones because it is easier to pick up on the little things that the lsat wants you to know and slowly move into the harder ones. The easy passages and the hard ones are testing you on the same skills its just in the harder passages they hide things better and make them less obvious, so once I learned the basics in the easy passages and I could spot the important ideas(similar to JY's passage) I moved to harder passages and did the same. You also need to figure out if you are the person who reads slower but does not look back at the passage as often or are you the one that speeds through get the gist then knows where to look back for questions. Either is fine but you need to know so you can set your plan of attack. If you are missing main point questions try doing the main point question after you completed the other questions, this has helped people in the past.
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I use to not like writing the low res and thought it slowed me down, but I forced myself to do it and keep the words i write down to under 7, sometimes if I add tone or something it might go over by a few words. By keeping it under 7 it helped me be quick about the low res because i use to struggle getting to the last questions, and it also forces you to stop and think about the passage this helps break the story up so it is not all one blob, and it also allows you to see the structure more easily and if you need to reference the passage the low res will help guild you on where you need to look. You will get faster and you will get better at low res summaries. I use to get a little stuck on what to write in the low res(many people do) but now after doing it so much I kind of repeat the same things because the LSAT repeats.
Now I do not look at my low res that much but it forces me to keep the passages separate in my mind because I stop and write about each passage. Also you will recognize passage structure when you BR. In the first paragraph of most passages the passage will reveal what the next passages will be on. The most common and easy one to spot it say: A new economic theory it being mentioned in the first paragraph along with the old economic theory. The next ~2 passages will give examples (evidence) why the new theory is better or why it should be adopted and then the last paragraph will indicate whether we should reject or accept the new theory. this style lay out is very common. and once you catch on to the way the passages are going to be laid out and what is going to come next you will shoot down to -6/7 because you wont be so 'surprised' and will know 'okay next they will give and example of why its better' and when this happens you wont need to write on your low res 'first example X better than Y' because that will be in your head from the inherent structure of the passage and you'll be able to write things that most benefit you.
I say make your low res as close to JYs right now because he is pointing out the most critical things to know about the passage to what the average test taker needs to get out of it, but once you have been doing RC for a while you will know what YOU need to write down in general and for particular types of passages((cause effect/literary history ect.) and what you don't. For me I need to mention author tone because I will forget it as soon as I read the last word, however I have helped people who never write the tone but will write more structure things such as P2 example 1

daliaglomeli

Hi @kkole444 Thank you so much for your descriptive and detailed explanation! Sorry I took a while to reply. I disconnected for a minute and am back to studying. To answer your question, I don't write anything down anymore because I'm trying to get through all 4 passages. I do however, try to get a good understanding of the passage before going down to the questions. I connect the paragraphs as I'm reading them, asking myself, "how does paragraph 2 relate to 1?" and so on.

I noticed my difficulty is with harder passages where the answer choices are not so obvious and they have a very tempting wrong answer choice. For example, the correct answer is obscure and supported by a very specific part of the text and the wrong answer choice uses words from the text and is superficially sound, but has one word that knocks it out (similar to what you mentioned). I feel like this is going to come down to confirming my answer choices on harder RC passages and having quicker and more accurate reference points. Newer RC is a beast for sure, so I'll keep practicing. Thank you for your time!

andrew.rsn

Hey @daliaglomeli. It seems like you're on the right track in that you're identifying why you chose the trap answer choice. Do you find you're still getting these questions wrong in BR and realizing it after seeing the correct answer? I think since you have a good idea of what makes the trap answers so attractive you can expect them to pop up.

I was just reading the AC chapter in Ellen Cassidy's Loophole. While this book is focused just on LR it seems like it can also apply to RC. She goes over in this chapter all of the different types of "Red Flag" AC's. One of which is what you mentioned, called an "Alllllmost" AC, where it is 95% correct but then one word/phrase makes it wrong. That one wrong word is all you need to cross out that answer choice.

Edit: And...I just saw a post you wrote where you mentioned reading the The Loophole, 'facepalm' either way I hope this was helpful to maybe think of applying those strategies to RC

daliaglomeli

Hey @andrew.rsn that makes sense. I have read Loophole but I haven't applied it so much to RC. I'll definitely re-read that part of Loophole. I sometimes catch my mistake on BR but then again I've confidently changed a right ans to a wrong ans. So there's some practice that still needs to go on. I feel like for those answers going back to a strong reference is key because if you go based off memory alone, it's easier to fall into traps. Thanks for the reply!

SufficientCondition

Take a break. It looks like maybe you have? I think RC is trickiest to study for because there are diminishing returns to studying intensively. The passages are purposefully written poorly and so even very dedicated students end up playing proverbial whack-a-mole. In addition to the break, I would recommend upping your intake of pleasure reading.