Only doing 3 of the 4 RC passages??

Comments

• 2 Likes

  AllezAllez21 Member Inactive Sage Inactive ⭐

  August 2017 edited August 2017 1917 karma

  I think this is a bad strategy.

  There are usually easy and hard questions in every passage. I average just under -2 for RC, and it's not uncommon for me to get a hard question wrong on an easy passage.

  I think the better strategy is to make sure you don't spend too much time on hard questions, regardless of in which passage they appear. If you limit yourself to a strict 1 minute on the hard questions, that frees up enough time to read the final passage and get those 2-4 easy questions right on that final passage.

  My general advice for RC:
  Spend time in the passage, not the questions.
  Don't compare answer choices to one another, compare them to the passage.
• Paul Caint Alum Member ⭐

  August 2017 3521 karma

  Agree with @AllezAllez21. Great idea to "[not] compare answer choices to one another, compare them to the passage."

  Just work on timing and your fundamentals. Grind grind grind and don't give up hope!
• Alex Alum Member ⭐

  August 2017 edited August 2017 23929 karma

  I also agree with @AllezAllez21 that planning on only doing 3 passages is probably not the best strategy for those reasons. Though it may be something that works for you ... try it out!
• 1 Like

  apawalter Member

  August 2017 357 karma

  Thank you everyone!! That all makes sense, I will work on implementing those strategies
• 1 Like

  lsattaker10 Free Trial Member

  August 2017 76 karma

  Hi Apawalter! I recently been able to finish all 4 passages, when in the past, I would only finish the 3rd passage at the 35 min mark. I started off with getting -12 on RC, now I get -6 or -3. A friend told me to start pleasure reading to rebuild reading skills. I found this helpful - but mainly I think you need to find the right reading pace. I read the passage once through, focusing on understanding all the main concepts and not going to wrapped up on the little details (like names of bacteria etc).

  Try practicing just the reading part. I used the Powerscore RC bible and it was great! Try those passages and time yourself to see how long it takes you to read a passage. Ideally, you should finish reading a passage once through with understanding within 2 minutes. Keep practicing reading passages this way, and you will get a good idea of what kind of reading pace you need to be at to finish all 4 passages!

  Another thing I found helpful, was the Compare and Contrast (CC) explanation in Powerscore. Basically it outlines that alot of RC passages use an technique of writing where it rapidly compares two/three concepts sentence by sentence. For example, in PT 10 which I did today, three difference social theories are compared sentence after sentence (Rising expectations theory, Relative Deprivation Theory and the J curve theory). When it comes to these, I quickly note on the side RE, RD and J respectively as I'm reading. It takes a glimmer of a second, but it really helps when you look back and have to quickly pinpoint where a certain perspective is. I hope this helps! It is possible to improve in RC!
• apawalter Member

  August 2017 357 karma

  Thank you @lsattaker10 I will look into doing those things too And thanks everyone for the encouragement!!
• dennisgerrard Member

  August 2017 1644 karma

  @lipsitz DM you.
• lsat 1101 Alum Member

  August 2017 267 karma

  @AllezAllez21 said:
  I think this is a bad strategy.

  There are usually easy and hard questions in every passage. I average just under -2 for RC, and it's not uncommon for me to get a hard question wrong on an easy passage.

  I think the better strategy is to make sure you don't spend too much time on hard questions, regardless of in which passage they appear. If you limit yourself to a strict 1 minute on the hard questions, that frees up enough time to read the final passage and get those 2-4 easy questions right on that final passage.

  My general advice for RC:
  Spend time in the passage, not the questions.
  Don't compare answer choices to one another, compare them to the passage.

  Great tips, thank you, I agree with you
• lsat 1101 Alum Member

  August 2017 267 karma

  @lsattaker10 said:
  Hi Apawalter! I recently been able to finish all 4 passages, when in the past, I would only finish the 3rd passage at the 35 min mark. I started off with getting -12 on RC, now I get -6 or -3. A friend told me to start pleasure reading to rebuild reading skills. I found this helpful - but mainly I think you need to find the right reading pace. I read the passage once through, focusing on understanding all the main concepts and not going to wrapped up on the little details (like names of bacteria etc).

  Try practicing just the reading part. I used the Powerscore RC bible and it was great! Try those passages and time yourself to see how long it takes you to read a passage. Ideally, you should finish reading a passage once through with understanding within 2 minutes. Keep practicing reading passages this way, and you will get a good idea of what kind of reading pace you need to be at to finish all 4 passages!

  Another thing I found helpful, was the Compare and Contrast (CC) explanation in Powerscore. Basically it outlines that alot of RC passages use an technique of writing where it rapidly compares two/three concepts sentence by sentence. For example, in PT 10 which I did today, three difference social theories are compared sentence after sentence (Rising expectations theory, Relative Deprivation Theory and the J curve theory). When it comes to these, I quickly note on the side RE, RD and J respectively as I'm reading. It takes a glimmer of a second, but it really helps when you look back and have to quickly pinpoint where a certain perspective is. I hope this helps! It is possible to improve in RC!

  Thank you for this!
• 1 Like

  StrangerThanFiction175 Free Trial Member

  August 2017 edited August 2017 99 karma

  Take your time and only do three if that's all you are able to get to without compromising accuracy. There are four incorrect responses to any given question. You can only eliminate them if you understand what you just read and rushing through to get to all four sections if you aren't a strong reader just leads to best guesses. Statistically speaking it is much easier to guess incorrectly than correctly.
• apawalter Member

  August 2017 357 karma

  @zmeeker91 Thank you, you're totally right!
• TheMikey Alum Member

  August 2017 4196 karma

  It's true that if you truly cannot finish all 4 passages even with a huge amount of practice, then I guess you could try just taking your time with 3 passages but you MUST aim for full perfection on them since you will be guessing on the last passage.

  People have done this, and depending on your goal score you can get away with it. But if you are trying to get in the 170's then this MAY not be the best approach but at that point you kinda leave it up to luck in some respects.

  Either way, best of luck!
• 1 Like

  Alex Alum Member ⭐

  August 2017 23929 karma

  @TheMikey said:
  It's true that if you truly cannot finish all 4 passages even with a huge amount of practice, then I guess you could try just taking your time with 3 passages but you MUST aim for full perfection on them since you will be guessing on the last passage.

  People have done this, and depending on your goal score you can get away with it. But if you are trying to get in the 170's then this MAY not be the best approach but at that point you kinda leave it up to luck in some respects.

  Either way, best of luck!

  Yeah this is solid advice, op.

  As far as aiming to do 3 of 4 RC passages:

  1. You will get some points by guessing. Usually 1-2 for the final 7-8 questions.
  2. You can usually answer 1-2 specific detail questions without reading the passage.
  3. You can likely get near perfect on the first three passages if you take ~11-12 minutes each on them.

  With this in mind, here's a strategy, in steps

  • Finish first three well, guess on final passage
  • Finish first three perfectly, guess on final passage
  • Finish first three perfectly, guess on final passage, answer 1-2 specific detail questions

  Those are steps. The goal is to get the first three passages down solidly. Then you expand outward from there. Note that by "perfection" I really mean -2 to -0. You may make some mistakes on genuinely hard questions, but the goal is not to leave questions where you are in doubt, and could answer with more time.
• apawalter Member

  August 2017 357 karma

  @TheMikey yeah I totally get that, I think I am going to continue doing all 4 of the passages rather than switching to doing just 3 because I don't think I can answer the other 3 accurately enough to compensate! But hopefully eventually I will get better at RC the more I practice!

  Best of luck to you too
• 1 Like

  apawalter Member

  August 2017 357 karma

  Thanks for the tip @"Alex Divine" I can work on doing those stages too