RC timing

dwillzkay

Folks,
I'm at the point where I understand the RC...I'm not doing too bad at -4 or -5 if I have 40-44 minutes. But unfortunately we only get 35 minutes, so my question is: How do I close this gap?
When I do the timed version, I either relax and miss a whole passage or rush and miss 10-13...that's a pretty big delta.
Anyone got any advice?

shrek takes the lsat

You should be practicing timed sections at least as often as you're doing untimed. You may be doing that already - just giving you some info. I am currently at -3/-4 on RC, and the best thing I did was simply drilling. I did an RC set every single day. At the beginning, I ran out of time and guessed the last 2/3 questions. Now, I am ending sections with about two minutes to spare. So, make sure you're forcing yourself to do a timed set very regularly. I think part of the challenge of RC is simply getting used to RC.

Also, I use Spreeder. I use this site to practice speed reading for 30 minutes daily. That's also helped. Finally, you need to be able to move on when you don't understand something 100%. One of the biggest areas I improved in was just going with my gut or choosing to continue past a part of the passage I was 95-98% on instead of 100%. I spend a long time reading the passage, too - about 3.5 minutes with a LOT of highlighting and notation.

The first questions are, what is your notation system like? how long do you spend on the passages? How long are you spending on individual questions?

Tristan G

Hey Shrek, its very inspiring to see your posts as I've continued to go through the 7Sage course, and then seeing your progress and advice in later discussion posts. I want to say thank you for inspiration you give me toward improving my score, and the methods you used to achieve that improvement. If you don't mind me asking, did you find the "fool-proof" method for logic games to be effective? I've been studying LG for about a week now, maybe slightly less, and I am getting so frustrated with how long it takes me to get through some of the games, or how lost I feel when I miss inferences. Do you have any suggestions for spotting inferences yourself, or should I save my worries till after I get through the core curriculum games and problem sets?

cpeaks13

@"shrek takes the lsat" thanks for your input! i downloaded spreeder as well a while ago based off a recommendation but i am not sure how to appropriately use it. Do you just pick passages and read them or is there more to it im missing?

dwillzkay

@"shrek takes the lsat" said:

Also, I use Spreeder. I use this site to practice speed reading for 30 minutes daily. That's also helped. Finally, you need to be able to move on when you don't understand something 100%. One of the biggest areas I improved in was just going with my gut or choosing to continue past a part of the passage I was 95-98% on instead of 100%. I spend a long time reading the passage, too - about 3.5 minutes with a LOT of highlighting and notation.

I end up taking about 3.5-4 minutes, but I try to be mindful of the time. For example, in my head after the first passage, I'm thinking "oh that took 8 minutes...I should keep this pace going," or "oof, that took 10 minutes...I better speed it up."
I think this is a problem because once I speed it up, I lose focus of the point of the passage and completely miss what's going on.

You should be practicing timed sections at least as often as you're doing untimed. You may be doing that already - just giving you some info. I am currently at -3/-4 on RC, and the best thing I did was simply drilling. I did an RC set every single day. At the beginning, I ran out of time and guessed the last 2/3 questions. Now, I am ending sections with about two minutes to spare. So, make sure you're forcing yourself to do a timed set very regularly. I think part of the challenge of RC is simply getting used to RC.

I just did a timed version and was doing well until P3 where I started thinking "I've got it down to AC 1 or AC 2, but I'm running out of time and don't need to check the passage. I'll just pick one" and I move on only to realize on BR that a quick glance over and the answer would've given me the correct answer.

The first questions are, what is your notation system like? how long do you spend on the passages? How long are you spending on individual questions?

>

I highlight, but as far as notations go, I'm not writing anything down. I figured that would just take time away from the passage and questions.

luckysat1

Read more. It's a cliche, but it's true. RC is the easiest section if you are a good reader, the hardest if you are not. Reading is a skill, not an arcane ability, and it needs to be ingrained. You should be reading thousands of words daily of material whose language and subject matter is equivalent to that which is on the LSAT. While reading outside of LSAT prep, be conscious to, where practical, employ the same general skills as you would in the LSAT -- consider things like MP, biases, POV, etc.