Hi All!
For those who work full-time and study before/after/during (lol) work, I'm curious: How many PTs do you take per week and how do you schedule them?
I've been studying since January, finished the course in about March but have only taken about 10 PTs. I'm only able to take 1/week (usually on a Saturday) because I find myself unable to concentrate after a long day at work. I once took a PT on a Friday after work and my goodness, it was AWFUL.
I'm taking the October test and would really like to manage my time for PTs in the best way possible. Any tips?
Thanks!
Comments
I think if you're going to do more than one a week, taking after work one of the days is really the best option. Otherwise you'd have to get up at what I presume is an abnormally early hour and, again, many x-factors. Perhaps pick one day in the week as a PT day; do you have a slow day at work? Is there a day when you typically get off earlier? Etc.
There are still 4 full months until October, and I find that when I force studying, I learn less. I would rather do one 35 min section, BR it and learn something over a rushed full preptest that I barely have enough time and mental capacity to BR. In between all that, reading the economist and so on will have a positive impact on your RC mostly so that is also something non LSAT related that can help. And finally, on those days you're really tired and you come home late and all you want to do is chill, I just stream a documentary about one of the RC topics. Knowing subject matter in RC helps. So these are just some methods and some "workarounds" I guess that I use.
Anyway I didn't edit this at all so if it seems disjointed my apologies just take what you can from it as this seems to be working for me quite well so far.
I did about 1 or occasionally 2 PTs in a week, varying the time (unintentionally) to fit it in whenever I had a couple of hours. Sometimes I'd stay late after work and use an empty seminar room, sometimes close the dining room door at home and work before dinner (I have teens/older kids, so dinner time is sacred). The craziest was when I started a test at 11:30 p.m. The only correlation I ever found was that the busier/more hectic my day was, the better I did. Go figure... One time I never PT'd: Saturday or Sunday mornings. Several people above mentioned taking them in non-ideal circumstances, which I would wholeheartedly recommend. With that in mind, I took a couple of tests even on buses down the east coast (my lowest score was on a bus: 157. One of my highest was, too: 168. Scratching my head...) And @"Dr. Yamata" is totally right: anything you can do to disadvantage yourself when PTing is wise to do. Never baby yourself during PTs - the world isn't kind enough to return the favor on test day...
Closer to the test, I did practice 3 times a week (M,W,Sat or Sun). Whatever weekend day I did not do a PT, I would review questions.
I would also like to point out that I work a second job on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and every other Sunday, so I was working about 60-70 hours a week.
This time around, I asked for all Sunday shifts off and will probably PT with the same schedule, but have some more time for BR -- which I did not do last time. It is tough but totally doable.
Hope that helps!
I think it's important to ramp up, as others have said. Ease into it—don't start with a fully booked schedule. It's pretty easy for me to do 3 PT's a week now because I have gotten into the habit of doing a certain number of LSAT hours a week. A few months ago, this would have toasted me real quick.