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Stuck Between 155-157 - LSAT is Next Tuesday
forthewinwin
Member
My scores in each section have been:
LG: -3
LR: -12 - (-8) (-10 average)
RC: -12 - (-8) (-10 average)
Consistently my performance in LG has been -3, By coincidence, I typically guess 3 questions on each of them. So I have horrible luck at guessing and my error is from lack of speed.
I did notice if I take longer time per question, it's typically at grouping questions, especially grouping w/ repeated items.
I also run out of time at LR and RC, where I guess 3-5 questions in each. I usually get -12 - (-8) (average of -10) in each section, where very rarely my guesses are correct.
I need a score in the 160s to be admitted to the law schools I applied to . This seems within reach if I just solve my lack of time issue, turning my scores in each section to roughly -1, -7, -7, respectively.
With only 5 days left until my LSAT write, what are the best ways to improve?
Comments
If it's your first time taking the test, I would recommend you buy the score preview option. Sometimes having the pressure that you need to do well on the test off your shoulder really helps.
LR section seems promising for you to improve. Can you let us know what question types you usually got wrong?
Personally I looked back at my test to see what types I'm getting wrong. If you look at resources analytics It will tell you too. Then in combination I use PowerScore (bibles, webinars for nov lsat) to see what LR questions types are most common and I used that to organize and prioritize what types of questions I need to review.
I'm struggling with RC too. They have been harder recently in my opinion and RC is something that takes a while to train so I would focus on LR. But don't work to hard and get burnout it won't help... trust I tried. make sure to focus on quality of studying over quantity! even if that means just working on two types of questions. for example if your struggling on flaw and strengthen, then flaw is usually 4 - 5 and strengthen is 3 - 4 that could be a huge increase! if you can master the most common questions and improve speed it will help the overall section. I went from -12 to -3 on LR doing this.
Weaken, Sufficient Assumption, and Parallel Method of Reasoning. The other types I typically get correct.
For Parallel Method, I understand them well, but I just take way too long to do them, causing me to guess the ones I can't otherwise complete.
I only have some last minute tips since it's hard to incorporate new strategies without sufficient training.
Sufficient Assumption is conditional heavy, and it is somewhat similar to the MBT question type except for having the conclusion and missing an unstated premise. One strategy for this question type is to scan what is new in the conclusion but is never stated in the premise and vice versa, you can eliminate wrong ACs by doing so.
Parallel Method can be skipped to do later because just as you said, this one takes a long time. One strategy that you can do is to scan for the conclusion and if it doesn't match the structure of the stimulus that means the question is wrong. Be careful if the conclusion is the conditional statement, the contrapositive of that statement in the AC is still right. A more advanced method is to keep only the skeleton of the stimulus, like P: (1) -> (2) C: ~(2) -> ~(1) and find the correct AC that matches the skeleton. But doing so requires you to be fluent in conditional logic first.
Strategies to spot weaken is the same as spotting the sufficient assumption or flawed reasoning. More often than not, you need to identify a gap in reasoning before looking at the ACs. Weaken is also the evil twin of the necessary assumption, so weaken question type will usually wreck an argument.
For Parallel Reasoning, what I have to do is to sketch out the structure of the argument, and compare the structure to that in the available answers.
e.g. Bob likes oranges or apples. Someone who likes neither oranges or apples, likes carrots. Thus, Bob must not like carrots. ... ... The flawed pattern of reasoning in this argument is most similar to which of the following choices...?
/O, /A -> C; /C -> O/A or OA
B -> O/A
B -> /C ...
Then, I'd have to do the same sketch for all the available options, as well as reverse some of the statements so make them more obvious. This whole process is causing me to take too much time.
This may help you at least guess quicker if you are very short on time for either of the parallel types of questions, but identify and translate the conclusion in the stimulus very quickly to match it with the conclusions given in the answer choice. Also look for certainty clues like "probably"...if the stimulus says probably or might, then it will most likely also say it in the correct answer choice. Additionally, words like some and most are also good words to match up in the conclusions. Again, not an entirely foolproof way to get the right answer but at least you can make a more educated guess!! I hope this helps!! I am also taking the LSAT that day; good luck!!
Hi Forthewin, even though it is late in your timeline, it is never too late to improve. You might benefit from new concepts and approaches to LR questions in particular. Not worrying too much about precise question type categorization, and instead focusing on identifying the conclusion and looking for the gap. Good luck!
For the timing issue on LR, try to go through the first 10 questions in 10 minutes so that you have more time on the more difficult questions (#19-25/26). They're typically the easiest and most straightforward questions, so don't second-guess yourself. Something that helped me (may not be for everyone) was doing the first 10 or 11 and then jumping to 19-25 while my thinking was still fresh and not bogged down.
I'm not sure what your RC strategy is like but if you're doing a lot of highlighting/underlining, I'd scale back on that and only highlight MPs and APs (words that trigger Author's Perspective). Remember that all the answers are in the passage, if an answer choice says something that wasn't mentioned it's the wrong answer.
Hope this helps and good luck!
I'm not sure why, but my PT scores are actually going lower the more of them I do. The last several I've done have been 154-156. RC has been hurting me more than previously - somehow I actually got -14 for that on PT 48.
Over studying can do more harm than good. It sounds like you may be approaching burnout. If your scores are decreasing, you are likely taking too many PTs, and with so little time, I'd focus on skipping strategy and calming nerves. Good luck!
Yeah I figured doing primarily more PTs in the near term isn't going to help. I have been averaging 6 hrs per day (36 hours/week) dedicated to just the LSAT. I applied to a law school (the one most feasible to me, as it's 10 minutes away) that happens to take the average LSAT scores, not the best...