Speed!

Comments

• sniemanmba Alum Member

  October 2014 37 karma

  I ask because I'm testing around 154 and maybe only getting through 80% of each section, so after blind reviews my scores are much higher. I figure that if I'm spending that much time on a question that I probably need to go back and review the basics or do a better job at determining when to skip questions. Does anyone time individual questions or is that just going too far?
• 6 Likes

  synergy_101 Alum Member

  October 2014 180 karma

  Just a quick summary of what helped me improve with my timing:
  
  1. RC - Read faster and retain a quick sentence summary of each paragraph while trying to understand the big picture/Main Point. Check out 7sage's Memory Method for retaining more and Blake's guide on improving speed (http://lsatprep180.com/the-lsat-and-reading-speed-change-headline/)
  
  2. LG - Quick way to improve on speed (IMO) is to get a stronger grasp on the notations and sufficient/necessary chaining where it becomes almost second nature. The chaining is essential when going through IN/OUT and sequencing games and knowing when rules trigger and when they don't saves time. Also, practice, practice and practice the games you already did (http://7sage.com/how-to-get-a-perfect-score-on-the-logic-games/). This is key in understanding inferences and intuitively seeing patterns that often appear in other games
  
  3. LR - Rule of thumb is if you're spending more than 2 minutes (subjective) on a question, better just skip it because you'll prolly end up getting it wrong anyways. Really understand the core argument for each question: Premise, conclusion and how the premise really supports the conclusion while seeing the apparent flaws. Honestly, it all comes down to practice and understanding why the other four questions are wrong and why the right answer is right. This form of reasoning used is often repeated throughout the different LSAT's.
  
  Um hope this helps :S
• 1 Like

  alexroark5 Alum Member Inactive ⭐

  October 2014 812 karma

  I think for all three sections, LR, LG, and RC, it comes down to pattern recognition. You can start to see patterns in the LR questions, or patterns in how certain game types tend to work, or patterns in the structure of RC passages. Pattern recognition, especially in LR ( seeing a casual flaw, seeing a necessary/sufficient confusion, seeing numbers and percentage shifts, seeing demorgan's law, the contrapositive, etc.) can allow you to basically shut off your brain and stop thinking and just select the right answer because you've seen this pattern before. You just take the question for what it is at that point and destroy it and move on.
• ENTJ Alum Inactive ⭐

  October 2014 3658 karma

  Casual?
• 3 Likes

  alexroark5 Alum Member Inactive ⭐

  October 2014 812 karma

  haha casual flaws are hard to spot
• 1 Like

  Drackedary Member

  October 2014 239 karma

  As synergy_101 mentioned already, practice, practice, and more practice is essentially, especially for logic games. The fool proof method really works: http://7sage.com/how-to-get-a-perfect-score-on-the-logic-games/
  
  I've been able to stay within 5 minutes for easy games and get hard ones done between 7-8 minutes using this method.