Most of us come into the LSAT having a level of familiarity with standardized tests. Whether you’ve taken the ACT, SAT, or other academic qualifying exam, you have likely learned to reliably memorize equations and anticipate section content.
The LSAT isn’t your typical standardized test. Instead of testing our ability to recite facts and navigate ideas, the LSAT demands we use our logical reasoning skills to prepare for content we cannot anticipate. This inability to anticipate content encourages familiarity with the rationale, making the content superfluous. This is why we need to value quality over quantity in the study process.
This is where the Wrong Answer Journal comes in—a document where you keep a detailed list of questions you missed with your explanation for why you picked it.
Though this can be a tedious exercise, it is also the key to identifying your weaknesses.
For instance, your Wrong Answer Journal reveals your tendency to misread the stimulus of Flaw questions. You can take this information and assign yourself 10 untimed Flaw questions focusing on summarizing the conclusion and premises. The following week, compare new data to old to identify a trend and formulate a plan for the following week and so on. This is why trends from our Wrong Answer Journal are invaluable.
The next time you take a practice test or set of questions, make sure you are completing thorough written analysis of the reasoning behind each option before continuing on to a new exercise.