not seeing much improvement in PTs

skaplan9190

So I started doing my PTs after finishing the core curriculum and while I initially saw some improvement (started with my diagnostic at 152, then started getting high 150s now low 160s), I don't feel like I'm really improving. In fact, while before I wasn't running into time issues and was able to finish on time for the LR and Reading Sections, I'm now finding it harder to finish those sections on time. The games is the one section that is consistently getting better but that's just about it. I'm averaging somewhere around -11 to -15 total in LR and around -5 in Reading

Any suggestions? I'm wondering how much I should expect to be improving with each test. My goal is for a 172/173 but if I'm in the low 160s now with a high score of 169 (untimed though) I'm worried that between now and the June test I won't be able to reach my goal. So far I have done 6 timed PTs besides my diagnostic and 1 untimed. My Blind Review is in the high 170s.

Any input is appreciated.

learn2225

Do you need a study partner?

Nicole Hopkins

You're fine—par for the course. Practice a lot and come to the webinars--that's where there's a lot of high level advice ripe for the taking. 7sage.com/webinar—especially check out the skipping panel and timing strategies.

June may very well be a stretch. I say plan for October if you're serious about scoring in that range. It just takes time and a lot of self-care

runiggyrun

Looks like you ARE improving. 10+ points after the curriculum and 5 PT's is not something to scoff at. Your BR scores show that you have a very good understanding of the material, you just need to go from command to mastery - committing the basic reasoning steps to "muscle memory", so they are second nature, freeing up time for the higher level stuff.
A few things to be mindful of:
1. Avoiding time sinks/skipping questions to maximize your points (especially since you said you're struggling a little with timing). There's an excellent webinar on just that https://7sage.com/webinar/skip-it
2. Developing an internal clock to know when it's time to move on from a question (practice helps a lot with this)
3. Developing confidence in your correct answers, so you don't waste time triple checking an answer that you are pretty sure is right. BR helps greatly - if most of your uncircled questions are actually right, then you can rely on your instincts. In time you'll learn to circle fewer questions because you'll become better at recognizing when you're sure vs not sure.
4. Drill the games. Those are points not to be left on the table. Use @pacifico's method https://7sage.com/discussion#/discussion/2737/logic-games-attack-strategy
5. Don't fixate on a date. Going from 152 to 172 in less than 6 months would be quite an accomplishment. Not impossible, but not very probable. After all, only 1% of test takers score in the 172+ band. It takes time for new habits to cement themselves and become second nature. If you're not PTing in your desired range by June, you should think about September - it would give you an extra few months of practice, during which you can bust through another plateau or two, and it would still be quite early in the application cycle.
If however you reach a point where you "click" with the test in the next couple of weeks, by all means, take June and you'll have an awesome story to tell. Set your hopes high, but keep your expectations in check - improvement takes as long as it takes, and no two people are the same.
Best of luck!

Cant Get Right

The better you get, the harder those extra points become. The questions you have to answer correctly to jump from a 150 to a 151, for example, are much easier questions than the one/s required to jump from a 170 to a 171. The difficulty increases almost exponentially, so it’s not at all weird to find that improvement slows down.

My guess is that you’re slowing down because you’re actually comprehending a lot more now and are taking more time to think about it. That just takes practice and reinforcement to make the application of that new knowledge more second nature. And don’t hesitate to go back to the general curriculum when you need to refresh yourself on something.

I agree with @"Nicole Hopkins” and @runiggyrun that June may be a bit ambitious for you. It’s not impossible, it’s just more ground than the vast majority of people can cover in that amount of time.

Good luck!

skaplan9190

Thank you everyone for these great pieces of advice and input. I am definitely looking more seriously at the late September date (it looks like there is no October this year??). The thing I'm finding so tough about prepping for this test is the psychological component. Reading your comments helps keep things in perspective. I will check out the webinars for sure and @"Can’t Get Right" I think you might be right regarding the timing issues.

Also do any of you have suggestions for improving on a specific question type in LR? I find that I'm having a lot of difficulty on NA questions. Intellectually I understand what these questions are asking, yet for some reason I consistently under perform on them and they are by far my lowest accuracy question in the LR sections. Suggestions for how to get better? Thanks again to all of you!

skaplan9190

and @learn2225 maybe I do? I didn't think I would want one in prepping for this test but perhaps I should look into it...

runiggyrun

NA questions are tricky because the authors have a lot of ways to make wrong answers attractive and can pick tiny little necessary assumptions that don't even seem that important.
The ultimate test for a correct AC is the negation test : if the opposite of this answer is true, does the argument fall apart?
Some pointers to help with wading through attractive traps:
The correct answer choice doesn't need to be important to be necessary.
It doesn't need to strengthen the argument by a lot
It doesn't need to make the argument valid.
Trap choices can strengthen the argument by a lot, but negating them doesn't destroy the argument
Trap choices can make the argument valid, but their opposite doesn't ruin the argument.

For example if I say: I'm of European descent. Therefore I'm a great singer.
A correct NA would be "at least one person of European descent is a great singer". It's not a very compelling argument, it's something you would probably be tempted to dismiss as "well, of course there are some, doesn't mean she is", doesn't make the argument any stronger, and yet it's a necessary assumption. If the opposite is true "no persons of European descent are great singers", it ruins the argument.
An attractive trap would be "all people of European descent are great singers". This is a Sufficient assumption, and guarantees the conclusion, but it's not necessary. Even if "some people of European descent are not great singers" I could still be.
In my dreams...

skaplan9190

So the negation of 'All people' is 'Some people are not'? I thought it was 'No people' - that might indicate that I need to go back to review negation lessons.. and it might also explain why my negation of AC's for these questions is not helping... Thanks for the detailed response!

runiggyrun

Yes, the negation of "all are" is "some are not". And some can be as little as one.
I believe JY has a very detailed chart about all these indicators and their negations, with a hypothetical pool of 0-100 elements, and how many of them are in each of the "some, most, many, all, none, not all, etc"

Cant Get Right

Yep @skaplan9190. Remember, you’re creating binaries- dividing the world into two all encompassing pieces. "No people" is the polar opposition to "All people,” not the negation. For a negation, you just slap a “not” in front of whatever it is. Works every time. From there, it’s just a matter of translation into what that really means. What does it mean to refer to “not all people?” Does that equate to “no people?” See, the difference there? If I make a claim that “all people have brown eyes,” do you have to prove to me that “no actually, ‘no people’ have brown eyes.”? Of course not. If you can produce a single individual with blue eyes, my claim is utterly destroyed.

MrSamIam

Do not, under any circumstance measure improvement by "each test." Doing so would set you up for disappointment. Improving on PTs happens gradually. Not overnight, and certainly not after each test.
This is where BR comes in. You take a PT, BR that PT, realize that X is giving you trouble, then drill more of X to improve. Doing so will help you better understand whatever it is that is giving you trouble. Thus, helping bring up your overall scores. Again, this doesn't happen overnight.
I know how frustrating it is to score in the high 150's, then to realize that your BR score is in the high 170s. Chances are that timing is throwing you off. Am I correct in assuming that you're blindly guessing on quite a few questions? If so, work on efficiency - which, fortunately, increases as your level of understanding of the LSAT increases.

Are you taking PTs untimed? If so, stop. That isn't called "PTing." It's called drilling...which you should only be doing with older PTs.

If you're scoring in the low 160s, high 150s and have only done 6 PTs, you're doing fine. Plenty of people were 10 PTs in and still scoring in the low 150s. As long as you BR, and BR PROPERLY, you'll eventually learn your weaknesses, address them directly, and ultimately improve your overall score.

stepharizona

@MrSamIam said:
As long as you BR, and BR PROPERLY, you'll eventually learn your weaknesses, address them directly, and ultimately improve your overall score.

^This!!! Dont be tempted to look at answers and then BR or BR the ones you know you got wrong, or BR everything... Proper BR teaches you when to trust your gut about when you "know" somethings not right and when "nerves" have kicked in. Knowing when to cut your losses and skip to come back is perhaps one of the most important skills you can learn and BR is a huge part of that process.

MrSamIam

Oh yeah...I probably should have elaborated on what proper BR is. Glad @stepharizona had my back on this one!

skaplan9190

Thanks so much @runiggyrun @MrSamIam @"Can’t Get Right" and @stepharizona - really appreciate all the feedback. Those are all helpful pieces of information. And no, I'm not doing them untimed -they've all been timed and that's one of the issues. I'm finding that I've been running out of time on some of the tests more than on others, and I'm not sure if it's because of the day/my state of mind/etc.. but it's throwing me off because I'll think I have more time and then all the sudden I hear the 5 minute mark, then I have a hard time refocusing because I realize how much more I have to do in such a little amount of time. I do think that correctly Blind Reviewing though is something I need to employ more. If I'm being totally honest I haven't done it exactly right on a few of the tests because I'm impatient. I can only imagine that that is actually hurting my progress though. I just need to keep in mind what you and others have pointed out and that is to slow down and really let the material seep in and take it's effect.

Again, thanks everyone for the valuable input!

MrSamIam

@skaplan9190 Don't beat yourself up about it...we've all been there. After taking my first real PT (not counting the diagnostic) I remember "peeking" at the answers. Needless to say...I ended up checking all of my answers, then BRing...be sure not to do that.

You need to develop a sense of what 1 minute, 5 minutes, 35 minutes, etc. feel like. There are tons of suggestions here. @"Nicole Hopkins" had great suggestions regarding the matter (wish I would have saved that post!).

Here is what I always do:
1) Set a timer for 1:25 seconds (this number is somewhat arbitrary, you can play around with it but try not to exceed 1:45 for single-question runs).
2) Pick out a few easy, medium, and hard questions. Do 5 of each using your timer - 1 question at a time.
3) Eventually you'll start to get a sense of what 1:25 "feels" like.

skaplan9190

Thanks @MrSamIam for the suggestion - I'll definitely go ahead and give that a shot.

twssmith

Timing tips from the past that might help:)
https://7sage.com/discussion#/discussion/comment/33418

I saved this post - http://7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/comment/29555
She provides a strategy but also notes that increased experience and understanding of the fundamentals will increase your speed. Hope it helps:)

@cjones76 said:
I had a similar problem. This is what I did to get myself to answer more questions.

I set small incremental goals each test. So next test try to reach 18/19. Once you reach that try to reach 20/21.

I calculated how much time that allowed me per question and knew that if I was going over I needed to move on. So, for 18 questions it'd be about 1 min 55 seconds. Then I used a loop timer to plug in that amount of time and periodically look up at my computer to see what loop I should be on and how that measured up to what question number I was at. Therefore, I knew I was spending too much time or if my speed was improving. Allowing myself to visually see where I should be really helped develop a sense of timing. Because prior I was allowing myself spend way to long on easier questions, but wouldn't realize it. This forced me to focus on increasing my speed.

Obviously, you won't have that benefit during the real test, so once you get to where you want to be or close to it I would stop using the loop timer.

And to echo what everyone else said, you need to learn how to devote less time easy question and to not spin your wheels on hard questions. When a question is easy don't question it and second guess yourself (real thought process: "that was way too easy, I need to redo that to confirm thats right"). Instead take it and run- move on to the next question. When you can't figure out what a stimulus is telling or can't figure out the answer circle it answer move on. Don't sit there and compare answer choices to each other.

Increasing speed is also about hounding in fundamentals, so they come more as second nature.

http://www.online-stopwatch.com/loop-countdown/ <--- loop timer

and too great not to re-post:)

@nye8870 said:
I have this play when I take over two min.