For those who have received accommodated testing- Practice tests/study strategy

Comments

• plantbaseddiya Alum Member

  August 2017 83 karma

  Anyone?
• 10000019 Alum Member

  August 2017 3279 karma

  I don't have accommodations, but I'll weigh in.

  I don't practice finishing sections in 17:30, so I wouldn't expect someone with double-time to be practicing with 35.

  Work with the time you are going to be given, and if you're regularly not finishing in time then you can work on a tighter time schedule.
• 1 Like

  AnthonyScalia Alum Member

  August 2017 330 karma

  Hi, @plantbaseddiya

  I'm only speculating here as @10000019 did, but I am a private ACT/SAT/AP tutor, and I'll share my thoughts based on what I know from my own students studying after approval of accommodation. Overall, I think it depends on the section, in addition to your own strengths and weaknesses.

  I personally think that extra time for RC makes the biggest difference. Skill drives speed in LR and LG, but without the technique and skill itself, even unlimited time couldn't substitute for those core requirements. That's not to say that RC doesn't require skill or technique, but we all have years of experience with literacy that can still often "get the job done," albeit less efficiently than with RC-specific skills. Practicing with extra time lets you get used to "getting the job done."

  I think practicing with the full time makes sense for RC. Make sure to read the passages, and don't hesitate to take your time in rereading things if your time budget allows. I don't see any benefit associated with practicing under time conditions shorter than what you'll have to work with on the real thing.

  Practicing with full time makes sense for LR too, but for different reasons. While the core logic skills of the LSAT play a larger role in LR than in RC (in my opinion,) even (and especially) top scorers will miss points from misreading, overlooking, or misunderstanding text in the prompt or answer choices. Cutting yourself short in LR is going to inhibit your development of LR skills, as you're invariably forced to be less thorough unless you're already finishing well before the 35 minute mark.

  That said, you'll need to be more conscientious of how you're treating the section after the time change. While a good amount of RC can be completed less efficiently with extra time, your technique for handling LR questions shouldn't change much. Even with extra time, you should skip questions that prove to be time sinks. Even if the LSAT was untimed, skipping long and challenging questions has a myriad of benefits on the cognitive side of your performance as a test taker. Feeling stuck on a tricky question can hinder your mood, sharpness, and mental stamina even if you end up answering the question confidently and finishing the entire section with time to spare.

  Skipping questions boosts your confidence, and helps keep pace which is essential for marathonesque mental tasks like the LSAT. It also reinforces proper technique, and gives a chance for the unconscious brain to process. I'm sure everyone reading this has experienced a situation where a question stumped them on a test in high school or college, then randomly, seemingly out of nowhere, the right answer and understanding pops into your head at a random time hours or days later. If nothing else, skipping questions lets you approach questions with a refreshed and partially resetted mindset. You may be able to see the question differently or recognize caveats that just weren't clicking before. In aggregate, practice with extra time, but use the same techniques that you would use if you were on the 35 minute clock.

  I think the nature of logic games creates a nice continuum in tandem with RC and LR. I think you have the least to gain practicing with the time adjustment for LG, and there are even more precautions to be taken than those mentioned in the LR paragraph.

  Logic Games is the section most reliant on your skill and preparation. Fortunately, this means Logic Games presents the greatest opportunity for section mastery, and LG section mastery is pursued, for the most part, independently of time limits. I think that when performing at high levels on logic games, practicing with additional time can end up holding back development, pushing it backwards in some cases.

  I won't say that you shouldn't practice with the time accommodations, but you should start low and work your way up. If you haven't already, start your practice untimed and make sure you have the fundamentals down. Go through blind review, work through the CC, and make sure your basics are solid. Then, I would start at the 35 minute timer, and work your way up to 53 from there. This will force you to both actively and passively seek inferences, and it will condition you to always use the most efficient problem solving methods instinctively. The danger of starting right at the full time allowance is that it invites your brain, deliberately or unknowingly, to rely on time in lieu of strategy and proactive thinking. Reactive thinking works on a lot of LG questions, but it takes longer and makes you more prone to mistakes. A sudden, stark rise in time makes it easy to slowly begin to replace upfront inferences and diagramming with bruteforcing questions that should be answered before you look at the questions. Even if you are super diligent and cognizant of your technique, jumping into an added sense of time security can take away from your innate proactive thinking.

  Even now being a month away from the September LSAT, I set a timer for logic game but typically never look at it until I'm already done. I know that if I truly have my skills where they need to be and follow my game plan with discipline, I'll always have time to spare. The equivalent time marker might be always finishing before 50 minutes instead of 30, but the principle and preparation that leads up to it is the same. If you aren't consistently finishing with time to spare without feeling rushed by the clock, you're at risk for going over on the real thing.

  I'd love to hear about what you end up doing, and I hope my advice, though not derived from experience, is valuable to you. Cheers!
• plantbaseddiya Alum Member

  August 2017 83 karma

  @AJordanMD Hi! WOW, thank you so much for your feedback and advice. That was very thorough and you made some great points. I completely agree with you, that LR and LG sections test core skills, so it's important to focus on the accuracy and being refining those skills because timing adjusts according. Whereas on RC, having the extra time is where it is really helpful. I took some timed sections and found this to be true as well. Thanks again for your tips! Will let you know.