Did every single preptest? My journey from 160s to 175

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• doyouevenLSAT Core Member

  January 2018 610 karma

  @LSATGarbageMan
  how did you utilize retakes? how many a week? or did you largely do explanations? and which areas did you focus on more?

  thanks in advance
• 2 Likes

  LSATGarbageMan Member

  January 2018 93 karma

  @doyouevenLSAT

  Hey there!

  I would pick up a Preptest and retake it in the morning, and I would do that once every 2 or 3 days. The point of the retake is not to calibrate your score and what not, but to thoroughly look at what's causing you problems. Sure, I can remember what the correct answer choice for Q25 of the logical reasoning section for Preptest 77 is, but can I explain it? More often than not, I found myself lacking the LSAT vocabulary/awareness to answer it and so I would type out my explanations on a computer. It was hard to start at first, but over time, I found myself getting better at eliminating wrong answer choices and getting to the correct ones.

  Also, if I am not retaking a Preptest in the morning, I would be doing 2 logical reasoning sections, 1 reading comprehension section, and 1 logic games section in the morning. I would use the afternoons/evenings to work on the explanations. I chose to devote the bulk of my time and effort to looking at Preptests in the 62 to 82 range as I think that the test has changed somewhat over time and the more recent ones seem to be more relevant.

  The explanations are more for the logical reasoning sections - I don't think writing explanations was that helpful for RC sections as, well, it's RC. I also chose to focus on questions that were harder, so I wouldn't write explanations for Q1 thru 25/26 for the LR sections, but I would look at 4 to 5 questions for each LR section and really think about how I can do better next time.

  Finally, do check out 7Sage's list of flaws, here's the link: https://7sage.com/19-common-lsat-argument-flaws-that-students-overlook/ You would have to do the hard work of sorting questions according to that yourself (that's what I did anyways), but it helped me a lot so it's something that I would recommend looking into.

  P.S. English is not my first language, so apologies in advance if this post isn't clear. Also, in case you are wondering, I took the September LSAT abroad, and that is why I called it Preptest 82. Hehe.
• 1 Like

  goingfor99th Free Trial Member

  January 2018 edited January 2018 3072 karma

  Yeah, 'taking a PT' is only one of the many LSAT preparation tools, but it's not even close to the most useful/critical. I wouldn't even consider it something you need to do, if you're so averse. Most people are lulled into thinking that a PT a day will keep a low score away, or even that a PT alone will lead to improvement. There is perhaps no myth more counterproductive to LSAT preparation, except maybe the one that goes, "It's impossible to study for the LSAT!"
• LSATGarbageMan Member

  January 2018 93 karma

  @goingfor99th

  Hey there,

  Yeah, it was the most crucial mistake I made in my prep for the September LSAT. I was literally doing 1 PT per day for about a month prior to the actual September LSAT, and it does foster an unhealthy obsession with your preptest score. I mean, yeah it's great that sometimes I can score 170+ in a preptest but what does that prove?

  I really wished that I had read more about this back when I was preparing for the September LSAT, but I guess I made up for that during the December one.

  Good luck for the LSAT if you are taking it!
• goingfor99th Free Trial Member

  January 2018 3072 karma

  @LSATGarbageMan said:
  @goingfor99th

  Hey there,

  Yeah, it was the most crucial mistake I made in my prep for the September LSAT. I was literally doing 1 PT per day for about a month prior to the actual September LSAT, and it does foster an unhealthy obsession with your preptest score. I mean, yeah it's great that sometimes I can score 170+ in a preptest but what does that prove?

  I really wished that I had read more about this back when I was preparing for the September LSAT, but I guess I made up for that during the December one.

  Good luck for the LSAT if you are taking it!

  I'm in the application process right now, but thank you for your kind wishes!

  Huge congratulations on your score, btw!
• 1 Like

  LSATGarbageMan Member

  January 2018 93 karma

  @goingfor99th

  Same to you! God I hate those application essays. Haha.
• Positive Alum Member

  January 2018 edited January 2018 426 karma

  Thanks for positing this very helpful post.

  What was your initial RC score range when you first started LSAT?
  Did you do any specific drils to improve RC?

  Thanks : )
• westcoastbestcoast Alum Member

  January 2018 3788 karma

  Inspirational story! Congrats! What was your diagnostic
• 2 Likes

  LSATGarbageMan Member

  January 2018 edited January 2018 93 karma

  @"Kings Never Die"

  Hey!

  When I first started, my RC score range was in the -8 to -12 range.

  RC is that one section that's always quite variable. Even towards the end of my prep, I was having performances on RC ranging from -5 to -0, and it was that one section where it decided whether I was a high 160s to low 170s or a solid 170s.

  I think a lot of RC prep boils down to practice - it is one of the few sections where you might not remember what you read and the questions that tricked you, and so redoing former preptests was quite useful. After 80+ passages, I was able to predict where a passage was going and oftentimes getting the gist of what the passage is saying is sufficient to do well on RC.

  Oh, and don't be shy about drilling passages on topics that you always seem to mess up on - mine was art passages. I am not a very artistic person, and I distinctly recall getting almost everything wrong on the Noguchi passage in one of the preptests. I would make it a habit to keep looking at passages that I am weak at. Sure, you can hope that something you don't like doesn't appear on the LSAT but that is leaving too much to chance, methinks.

  I also think that there is a serious bias against older preptests, and while that might be justified for certain things, RC isn't one of them. I recall the RC in the Preptest 29 to 38 range being pretty challenging and no less harder than the recent ones that are supposedly a lot harder.

  Finally, there was one key difference between my September LSAT and December one when it came to RC - for the September one, I underlined my passages and it really took up a lot of time. The worst thing about that, however, was that you get tunnel vision from it and so for the December one I simply didn't underline anything and just read things more carefully and appreciated the gist of each passage. 7Sage's Memory method works, but if you are looking for a high score on the LSAT, it must become second nature to you.

  Hope this helps, and good luck!
• 1 Like

  LSATGarbageMan Member

  January 2018 edited January 2018 93 karma

  @westcoastbestcoast

  Hey there!

  I wished I moved to the West Coast - bloody East Coast always freezes over for some reason hehe.

  My diagnostic was 159. I did it under timed conditions and it was the June 2007 LSAT, you know, the free one.

  I am going to predict what you want to ask next, and that's the rate of improvement - I was averaging about 165 for a long time, maybe about 1 and a half months, and then I was in the high 160s to low 170s range for a month or so. Obviously I got my butt kicked in the September LSAT, so it was back to the drawing board and for the remaining Preptests that I had I was able to score in the mid 170s to high 170s.

  Hope this helps, and don't let the LSAT beat you! It's a piece of trash so just throw it out and stuff it in the garbage can...
• 1 Like

  Rev_Lefe Member

  April 2019 385 karma

  Congrats! Thank you for this post. It truly reaffirms my belief that I also felt learning tons of great stuff by doing my used prep tests. Hope I would be able to break my 160s plateau!