PT Review Method

civnetn

So as some of you may know from my previous post, I've started taking full-timed PT's.

Typically, when I drilled sections of the LSAT, I'd use the Blind Review method. I'd do this immediately after I completed the section.

However, upon starting PT's, I'm wondering if any of you have found it useful NOT to BR immediately after taking the test.

Personally, I've been scoring my PT's immediately after taking them, without BR. Then I walk away, come back the next day and retake the entire test.

Upon comparing both tests, I usually find there are certain questions I get wrong both times, and other questions I get wrong simply because of stupid mistakes; either I failed to identify a quantifier in the stimulus or some other random error.

I feel this then allows me to hone in on questions that are difficult for me while at the same time taking note of the types of random errors I am prone to making.

It has also given me a better feel for what ideal timing/pacing SHOULD feel like. Typically, you're a bit faster the second time because you have some familiarity with the logical inferences being made.

Just wondering if there are any thoughts on this method or if there is any other method that is commonly endorsed for reviewing full timed PT's.

Cant Get Right

This method seems like it would reinforce the worst of my psychological tendencies. I find myself always wanting to minimalize my errors by calling them careless mistakes, which they almost never are. The inflated second score would be too tempting to ignore. If I scored well on the first one, it'd be impossible to really care about the second one. Having seen the answers, I'd almost certainly remember the answer on a curve breaker or two, but convince myself I didn't. There just seem to be so many ways for me to screw it up. I don't trust myself at all. If there are any differences that improve upon the blind review method, and I'm not sure that there are, they will certainly be far outweighed by the human brain's remarkable ability to fool itself. That's why the "blind" is so important. There's definitely value in retakes, but the more distance the better.

civnetn

Of course personal preference due to specific tendencies will play a role here, but I'm less concerned about the score and more concerned about minimizing my error rate. Personally, seeing a slightly higher score is a confidence booster, although I don't take it to heart.

Although I do OCCASIONALLY (rarely) remember a question, the answer I chose and that I got it wrong, I now have a second chance to say, "Ok. What about this answer choice is wrong?" This usually doesn't take much time and allows me to reinforce correct patterns of reasoning and discourage incorrect patterns.

If I take a test twice and get 3 of the exact same questions wrong, that's an indicator to me that SOMETHING about those 3 questions is fooling me. It's a clear sign that I have to hone in on those particular three problems and figure out what's causing me to get them wrong. Is there an inference I'm failing to make? Is there some pattern of logic common to all 3 that I'm just not understanding?

I actually just re-took a PrepTest and on one LR section I got 2 of the same questions wrong on both tests. On the second test, I also got an addition 2 questions wrong.

The value I see here is that now I can hone in on the first 2 questions to see what it is about them that I find difficult and for the other 2 questions I got right the first time, I can look at my thought process and determine how it was different (wrongly so) from the first time I took the test.

jknauf

@civnetn said:
Personally, I've been scoring my PT's immediately after taking them, without BR. Then I walk away, come back the next day and retake the entire test.

I know that's what most LSAT students do. Why’s that bad? Isn’t checking the answers obviously what you should do after you take a timed prep test?

Well, no. In fact, checking your answers right after a timed prep test is the worst disservice you can do for yourself. You've essentially just wasted the time you spent taking the prep test. Okay, I exaggerate, but not by much. Think about what you’re actually doing when you check the answers right away. Do you just want vindication that you're smart? The psychology of doing that is like placing a bet and you can't wait to find out if you've won or lost. I’m betting A, I'm betting C, and so on. The answers are right there and it's like you're at the roulette table at Vegas and you're praying "I hope it lands on red 18 (or whatever answer choice you selected)!”

But, that's kind of insane isn't it? You're not placing bets. The LSAT is not a casino. There are reasons that distinguish right answers from wrong ones. Random chance is never a factor. You, in fact, are the only factor. You're studying for this test. You're trying to improve the way you think. You're trying to get better, intellectually. And that’s completely the wrong way to go about it.

Again, to emphasize one last time, if you're immediately checking your answers, you're doing it wrong. You’re just checking whether you filled in the right circle. You’re NOT checking whether you had good reasoning.


https://7sage.com/the-blind-review-how-to-correctly-prep-for-lsat-part-1/

Alex

@"Cant Get Right" said:
I find myself always wanting to minimalize my errors by calling them careless mistakes, which they almost never are.

This is immensely accurate. I do this and I think it is the biggest argument for not scoring the test first. It just isn't going to work. And also as @"Cant Get Right" says, you're bound to remember the curve breaker answers. I've found that even if I don't remember the exact questions, I remember what I picked last time that was wrong.

I do support the idea of essentially retaking the entire test for BR untimed. I think @"Nicole Hopkins" brought to popularity the idea of using a blank test to blind review, which is essentially what you are doing. This will let you see if you are missing the same questions and if it is truly just because of misreading or some dumb mistake.

So I'd recommend going with with CantGetRight said and not throwing out the baby with the bathwater and continuing the blind review from a blank test, but without scoring first. Scoring it first doesn't give you any advantage whatsoever imo. So you're not losing anything and gaining an opportunity to honestly see your mistakes.

civnetn

I dunno guys. I've been finding this HAS been improving my error rate with LR. I do find that I make careless errors and I don't find that I have a tendency to just write things of as "careless." In fact, I think they are very easy to differentiate.

If I take a test twice and get the same questions wrong BOTH times, it's almost always because I don't understand the logic, but if I retake the test and get a question wrong because I fail to see a quantifier...I'd call that a careless error. It's not something that I usually do.

But apparently, every so often, I do in fact miss a quantifier. I wouldn't have recognized I have a tendency to make this error if I hadn't taken the test twice and graded it both times. Sure upon BR I would have noticed I missed the quantifier, but I wouldn't have noticed I have a tendency to make this mistake.

And I think the ability to see that you get a question wrong twice is invaluable. I've seen a lot of people talk about how you should try to recognize what question types you are getting wrong. But what if there isn't a pattern? Or what if your error rates for question types are very close together? Because I know that in my case, I don't get certain question types wrong more than other types. There just isn't a pattern.

It's usually that there are certain logical patterns that my mind just isn't comfortable with or doesn't fully understand. And by seeing that I got a question wrong twice, this allows me to identify that there is some logical pattern I'm not comfortable with and tear it apart.

Moreover, if I get the same question RIGHT during each test, that reinforces that I'm getting these questions right because I'm thinking right, not just because I stumbled across the correct answer.

I do still BR my answers after the second test. And I'm not advocating that you shouldn't BR. I just feel like there is this dogmatic belief that there's one way and one way only to study for the LSAT and it's BR and I think that's a little misguided. BR definitely is invaluable and is necessary in order to succeed at the LSAT, but why not a combination of different approaches based off your particular needs?

Personally, although I intend to continue BRing, I feel like a combination approach is warranted because I'm starting to plateau and BR isn't helping that.

Cant Get Right

@civnetn said:
But apparently, every so often, I do in fact miss a quantifier. I wouldn't have recognized I have a tendency to make this error if I hadn't taken the test twice and graded it both times. Sure upon BR I would have noticed I missed the quantifier, but I wouldn't have noticed I have a tendency to make this mistake.

I just don’t see why you wouldn’t have this realization in BR. If you notice you missed a quantifier in BR how is that any different than noticing you missed a quantifier on a second take? Are you saying that you only consider it a tendency if you miss it twice? I know for me that’s an excellent way to overlook and avoid acknowledging a lot of bad tendencies.

@civnetn said:
And I think the ability to see that you get a question wrong twice is invaluable.

Again, I just really don’t see how this does anything that BR doesn’t. I’ve missed tons of questions in BR that I missed under time. For that matter, I’ve missed tons of questions in BR that I got right under time.

@civnetn said:
I do still BR my answers after the second test.

If you've seen the answers you are no longer blind reviewing.

I just know that, for me, this creates way too many opportunities for me to pretend I’m doing better than I am. I would use this to make myself feel good about myself when I really need to be facing the harsh truths of just how under prepared I am. I mean, it’s taking a test after seeing the answers and then using that test as a part of my evaluation. That just seems inherently flawed. The second test is going to lie to me, and I’m going to eat those lies up.

civnetn

@"Cant Get Right" said:
@civnetn said:
But apparently, every so often, I do in fact miss a quantifier. I wouldn't have recognized I have a tendency to make this error if I hadn't taken the test twice and graded it both times. Sure upon BR I would have noticed I missed the quantifier, but I wouldn't have noticed I have a tendency to make this mistake.

I just don’t see why you wouldn’t have this realization in BR. If you notice you missed a quantifier in BR how is that any different than noticing you missed a quantifier on a second take? Are you saying that you only consider it a tendency if you miss it twice? I know for me that’s an excellent way to overlook and avoid acknowledging a lot of bad tendencies.



Right. I'm saying that if I hadn't taken the test twice, I probably wouldn't have realized I have a tendency to misread quantifiers. Sure I would have BRd it and thought, "Oops missed a quantifier," but I don't think I would have recognized it's a pattern. Especially if it's only happening 1 out of every 2 LR sections I take. I don't think you're going to notice tendencies like that unless you're keeping EXTREMELY detailed notes on every wrong answer you make and then cross referencing those notes against other test notes - which is a LOT of work. Now whenever I come across a question that stumps me, as a last resort I can question whether I read all the quantifiers correctly.

@"Cant Get Right" said:
If you've seen the answers you are no longer blind reviewing.

But that's not necessary true is it! By saying that you're assuming you're going to actually remember the answer you saw. I don't remember ANY of the answer I see. And that's because I'm not look at the questions and saying, "Oh right, yup, I remember that question and I chose B and B is wrong." I'm just ticking them right or wrong on my bubble sheet. So when I retake the test a second time, I don't really know whether I got a particular question right or wrong.

@"Cant Get Right" said:
@civnetn said:
And I think the ability to see that you get a question wrong twice is invaluable.

Again, I just really don’t see how this does anything that BR doesn’t. I’ve missed tons of questions in BR that I missed under time. For that matter, I’ve missed tons of questions in BR that I got right under time.



Because if I BR something, sure I'll recognize I got it wrong. But there's a difference between getting a question wrong because you were in the wrong head-space or because of a careless error and getting a question wrong because you fundamentally don't understand the logic behind the stimulus or the answer choices. By retaking a second time, you can determine not only which errors you made due to the latter, but which errors are pervasive in you reasoning. And that is what I think is invaluable - the ability to determine what logical structures my mind tends to have trouble processing.

Because I find that I'm getting 2 to 3 problems wrong each LR section and they're not question type related. They usually share a logical structure that my mind isn't comfortable with. Sure you could just BR and recognize this, but who knows whether you got those questions wrong just because you were stressed due to time, in the wrong head-space,etc. This really eliminates those possibilities and lays bare what's causing you to get a few questions wrong.

But hey, like I said, I don't expect everyone will be comfortable with this. I've just been finding that over the past couple days my LR scores have gone by doing this.

Cant Get Right

[Game of Thrones Spoilers, so read at own risk. I needed it for a metaphor.]

@civnetn said:
I'm just ticking them right or wrong on my bubble sheet. So when I retake the test a second time, I don't really know whether I got a particular question right or wrong.

So, this is the crux of my issue. So if you're checking the answers but not referring to the questions, what purpose does this serve? Why grade the test? The only answer to my mind is that you want the instant gratification of knowing your score. There's just no other explanation. Believe me, I understand. Waiting on a score sucks.

But grading it does not provide you with any benefit to studying. And knowing how you performed really does do serious damage. If you know you only missed one question, for example, that is going to significantly skew your mentality. Going -1 on LR is really good, and you should and will feel great about it. On your second time through though, you will recognize your original answers, and until you get in the neighborhood of your miss, you will act as though you've confirmed those answers because you have. (Same goes for BR.) You're taking the test after you've just shown it who's boss. If you've just owned an LR section you can not both take it again and show it the respect it demands. And when you stop respecting the test it will punish you severely. It's like when Oberon thought it'd be a good idea to toy with The Mountain. Don't be like Oberon. The LSAT Mountain will gouge out your eyes while ironically complying with your requests from when you were toying with it, and then crush your score-skull into pulp. Brutal.

If you want to do a retake before your BR, then I can live with that. That's an extra step to the process, that's going above and beyond. Just maybe don't grade it until you've finished with both takes and your BR? It takes a lot of discipline to wait, but you really can do it, and you really will be better off.

civnetn

I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree. I'm not advocating you HAVE to check your scores before you retake the test, although personally after taking a 3.5 hr test I'd like to know what I scored.

I'm not going -1 per section so

@"Cant Get Right" said:
If you know you only missed one question, for example, that is going to significantly skew your mentality.

I really don't think it is. First, I'm not going -1 so I don't have to worry about recognizing the one answer I got wrong. Sure it's going to tell me I got the majority of them right, in which case great. I don't see the issue with that. If I go -1 on a PT it's not going to be chance it's going to be because I know what I'm doing. So when I retake the test, even with that knowledge that I scored -1, I'm still going to pick according to what I think is proper logic.

@"Cant Get Right" said:
On your second time through though, you will recognize your original answers, and until you get in the neighborhood of your miss, you will act as though you've confirmed those answers because you have.

I've course I'll recognize what I picked last time. I don't see what's wrong with that. I'm not just picking answer because I picked them before. I'm picking them because I follow a logical procedure that leads to those answers.

Cant Get Right

Haha, yeah, I guess we will have to agree to disagree. Everybody learns in their own way, so if this works for you, then good.

jknauf

@civnetn

Watch these couple YouTube videos

BR overview:


Step 1:


Step 2:


Step3:


Good luck =]

MrSamIam

I'm a tad confused. Are you saying that you're taking a PT, scoring it, then retaking it without BRing? If so, I would stop utilizing this method. The point of BR is to hone in on your mistakes, and learn from them. If you're simply retaking PTs without BRing, all you are doing is 1) wasting time, and 2) Making the same mistakes you made before (there's no learning involved in that).
Here's what I do:
1) Take my PT
2) Step away, grab lunch, and take a 30 min - 1 hour break
3) Start BRing my PT (usually I'll BR RC and LG, then come back to LR the next day since it tends to be the section that requires the most brain power).