The Final Stretch for Feb! How (or if its possible) to make the jump from 165ish to 170

LARamsNation

Whats up team sage.

Question for those of you in a similar position. I've studied like crazy this past year and have managed to raise my score from the low 150s to where Im consistently PT'ing between 165-168. However, I can't seem to get over the final threshold to hit 170. I don't have any issues in particular that stick out with LR, and I go -2.7 on games. RC is the true problem where I average around -7 per section. Were any of you in a similar situation and have any recommendations on what I should focus on for the next month? I feel like it may be a little late in the game for a drastic change to my RC approach, but if there are any particulars some of you think I could consider within that section I'd really appreciate the input! That being said, I guess the next step is to master the substitute/equivalency question on LG for another point, but any other advice is also greatly appreciated!

Sprinkles

The webinar that @"Cant Get Right" hosted a few weeks ago could answer your question. Hopefully it will be uploaded soon.

Alex

@montaha.rizeq said:
The webinar that @"Cant Get Right" hosted a few weeks ago could answer your question. Hopefully it will be uploaded soon.

Definitely looking forward to this one! So much great stuff the first time that I didn't take all the notes I wanted

twssmith

As you are closing in on Feb, take your hit on the LG substitution if needed - many times they are easy by POE - focus on skipping strategies and check out the older webinars (sure to be updated by current Sages) but for now check them out, they have helped me immensely to move quicker through the sections and "bank" more time to spend on the hardest questions.... Any way to get LR down is optimum at this point, imo:)
https://7sage.com/webinar/timing-and-levels-of-certainty/
https://7sage.com/webinar/weaken-strengthen/

For RC - I agree that you do not want to drastically change your approach - but more exposure to sections could help you to identify the more cookie cutter argument methods. Also recommending a more thorough BR for RC questions to understand more about the traps that LSAC is throwing at us:)
Hope this helps and all the best:)

Cant Get Right

Have you done any repeat sections on RC? My most productive work in RC came on doing sections I'd previously done a month or two before. I'd remember just enough about the passage content that I could free up a little mental energy to really see the underlying structure and mechanics.

DumbHollywoodActor

Come to BR groups https://7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/9732/new-february-test-study-group-weekdays-12pm-est

napita13

On RC focus on eliminating the wrong answers. Especially when in comes to the Main Point questions. To find the credited answer in this section you often have to look beyond the things that are correct in the shell answers, and focus on what could be wrong like overtly broad/exaggerate language. In other words, look for flaws in the answer choices when all else fails. Good Luck!

LARamsNation

@DumbHollywoodActor said:
Come to BR groups https://7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/9732/new-february-test-study-group-weekdays-12pm-est

I'll be there next weds!

@"Cant Get Right" said:
Have you done any repeat sections on RC? My most productive work in RC came on doing sections I'd previously done a month or two before. I'd remember just enough about the passage content that I could free up a little mental energy to really see the underlying structure and mechanics.

This. Funny you should bring that up, I've notice a trend in passages I've seen before and an easier time identifying structure. Hopefully that pattern continues and builds more confidence going into test 81.

@twssmith said:

For RC - I agree that you do not want to drastically change your approach - but more exposure to sections could help you to identify the more cookie cutter argument methods. Also recommending a more thorough BR for RC questions to understand more about the traps that LSAC is throwing at us:)

Thanks for the advice, definitely implementing this!

zkchrumz

I was in a similar situation about 4 months ago. RC always killed me. Rarely did I get -4 or less. I started using RC sections from PT 1-20 as my experimental in timed PT's. I read a 180'er a long time ago did the same thing. To really drill RC, even though I hated it and found it boring, you should double up on it on test day. Especially if 2 RCs come up on test day, you will be super stressed. Anyway, after several months, a lot of BR'ing and some note/markings style changes, I go 0-3 wrong. I took PT 36 a few days, but was super burnt out by this time (too much warm-up... I actually have a post about that ha ha), and I got a -3, even though I expected more like a -7...

In summation, one month isn't very long. I would recommend using ONLY RC as your experimental sections from now on. And BR RC EXTREMELY thoroughly. Also, as @"Cant Get Right" says, repeat sections are key. On my BR, I pretty much redo each RC section more or less timed (I allow myself to go over, if I need to) and I write line references for each right/wrong answer. THEN I go over each question untimed if I feel it's not 100% right or if I need A LOT of time to think on said question.

Best of luck. I'm sitting in Feb too.

cam

Thanks for making this post!

I was curious as well. Since my weakest section is LG, I'm doing all of my experimental sections as repeat LG's. For RC, I've been reading more dense material outside of my prep, and then during sections I focus on eliminating the wrong answers.

full.moon.howler94

I definitely feel you on the RC struggles. Personally, I don't think its too late for you to at least tweak your approach if you feel you need to, but I also agree with what others are saying in that an essential way to get good at RC is to just do RC, a lot of it, on repeat. I was getting an average of around -4 by December, so I'm still far from a master hahah, but I made some changes in the section in early November that really helped me:

First, finding the notation style that worked for ME was essential. For a while I tried a pretty structured style, that really works for some, but eventually I found that it had me thinking about the physical words too much and not the whole structure of the paragraph/passage. I ended up adopting a style that kept some rules for notation (like circling dates), but also letting my pencil just flow and do what it wanted, which helped my personal processing.

Next, I learned to think about the authors purpose the whole way through the reading. This was a big one. As I read through the passage, I think about why this sentence is here, what is this sentence doing in relation to what i've already read and where is it leading the passage. This really helped me stay active in the reading (so much so that I forgot how nervous I was during the Dec LSAT). At the end of each paragraph I would do like a split second sum up in my head of the major details and purpose of that paragraph in relation to the passage.

That's all just what worked for me. As I said Im still a long way from mastering RC, but doing these two things helped me see the section with greater clarity and confidence. Maybe visiting these with your own style will help if you haven't done so already. Also hey, when you get tired of RC and need a break, throw in that work on logic games, I find switching between the two conveniently refreshes my brain.

Best of luck for February! (to us all hahah)