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Knockglock wrote:

jr1886 wrote:Knockglock, I been following your post lately and I admire you dedication to the LSAT. I thought i was too obsessed with preparing for this test, seeing how hard you been working i don't feel too bad.

I'm taking in October and i already finished both LR & LG bible. I'm now doing section by section practice of LR. In PT 25, I found the second LR to be considerably harder than the first one.Yet, Looking at your PT 25 results, it seems you had a good and balance performance on both sections. Can you tell me what question numbers did you miss if you don't mind in PT25. In PT 25 LR1 today, I missed questions 5,10,13,21 and in LR2 i missed 8,12,14,16,18,22,23,26.
And, how you go about it when you have a bad section like I did today?

Haha...well I'm a man on a mission . And I don't think you can be too obsessed with something this important.

As for how to deal with a bad section, everyone's different, but for me, I let myself get upset for a minute or two, and then shut it down completely, and remember that it's all about the learning experience. Better to miss a bunch now and know what questions your less than solid on, so you can work on them, than get lucky on some questions, and not realize until later that you're knowledge of a particular question type is less than solid.

Here is my review write-up for PT #25, it has all the questions I missed, and you can check out my review strategy as well:

PT #25 Review

Section 1: -0 RC

Section 2: -2 LR

#10: Correct answer was E, I chose D. I circled this question as uncertain when I answered it.

Stimulus: Insects can see ultraviolet light and are known to identify important food sources and mating sites by sensing the characteristic patterns of ultraviolet light that these things reflect. Insects are also attracted to Glomosus spiderwebs, which reflect ultraviolet light. Thus, insects are probably attracted to these webs because of the specific patterns of ultraviolet light that these webs reflect.

Question Stem: Which one of the following, if true, most strongly supports the argument?

Incorrect answer:
D: When Drosophila fruit flies were placed before a Glomosus web and a synthetic web of similar pattern that also reflected ultraviolet light and both webs were illuminated with white light containing an ultraviolet component, many of the fruit flies flew to the Glomosus web. This answer is incorrect because, if true, this answer choice tells us that the fruit flies are attracted to the Glomosus web for reasons other than the ultraviolet light. Because both webs reflect ultraviolet light, that variable is held constant, and thus can not be responsible for why the fruit flies are attracted to the Glomosus web.

Correct answer:
E: When Drosophila fruit flies were placed before two Glomosus webs, one illuminated with white light containing an ultraviolet component and one illuminated with a white light without an ultraviolet component, the majority flew to the ultraviolet reflecting web. This is the correct answer because the argument concludes that the insects are probably attracted to these webs because of the ultraviolet light that these webs reflect. Since the webs were the same type, and only the variable of whether ultraviolet light was reflecting off the web, we know that that the ultraviolet light was the reason for why the fruit flies chose one web over another.

#25: Correct answer was D, I chose C.

Stimulus: Jack's aunt gave him her will, asking him to make it public when she died; he promised to do so. After her death, Jack looked at the will; it stipulated that all her money go to her friend George. Jack knew that if he made the will public, George would squander the money, benefiting neither George nor anyone else. Jack also knew that if he did not make the will public, the money would go to his own mother, who would use it to benefit herself and others, harming no one. After reflection, he decided not to make the will public.

Question stem: Which one of the following principles, if valid, would require Jack to act as he did in the situation described?

Incorrect answer:
C: One must choose an alternative that benefits some and harms no one over an alternative that harms some and benefits no one. This answer choice is incorrect because if Jack made the will public, there is no indication that it will harm some, it would just simply not benefit anyone else.

Correct answer:
D: When faced with alternatives it is obligatory to choose whichever one will benefit the greatest number of people. This answer choice is correct, because this principle, if valid, would require Jack to act as he did in this situation.

Section 3: -9 LG

Missed a key inference on game two, causing me to go 0/7, which was the numerical distribution. It either had to be 1-1-2-2 or 1-1-3-1.

#6: Correct answer is C. Because of numerical distribution, K and M can't both speak Russian.

#7: Correct answer was A. Numerical distribution again.

#8: Correct answer was B. Numerical distribution again.

#9: Correct answer was E. This answer comes as a byproduct of knowing about the numerical distribution.

#10: Correct answer was B. ND.

#11: Correct answer was E. Answer comes from the rule that is Klaus is assigned to Xerxes, then Michael speaks French.

#12: Correct answer was E, comes from the above rule.

Section 4: -2 LR

#11: Correct answer was D, I chose E. I also circled this one as uncertain during the test.

Stimulus: Taken together, some 2,000 stocks recommended on a popular television show over the course of the past 12 years by the show's guests, most of whom are successful consultants for multibillion-dollar stock portfolios, performed less successfully than the market as a whole for this 12-year period. So clearly, no one should ever follow any recommendations by these so-called experts.

Question stem: Each of the following, if true, weakens the argument EXCEPT:

Incorrect Answer:
E: The stock portfolios for which the guests were consultants performed better for the past 12-year period than the market as a whole. This answer is incorrect because this does indeed weaken the argument that no one should ever follow any recommendations by these so-called experts, by demonstrating that they are capable of choosing stocks that can perform better than the market as a whole. The correct answer needs to be neutral or strengthen the idea that no one should ever follow any recommendations by these so-called experts.

Correct Answer:
D: Performance of the stocks recommended on a television show was measured independently by a number of analysts, and the results of all the measurements concurred. This answer is correct because it is neutral to the argument that no one should follow any recommendations by these so-called experts.

#23: Correct answer was B, I chose D. I also circled this question as uncertain.

Stimulus: Only computer scientists understand the architecture of personal computers, and only those who understand the architecture of personal computers appreciate the advances in technology made in the last decade. It follows that only those who appreciate these advances are computer scientists.

Question stem: Which one of the following most accurately describes a flaw in the reasoning of the argument?

Premise 1: Only computer scientists understand the architecture of personal computers
(UAPC → CS)
Premise 2: Only those who understand the architecture of personal computers appreciate the advances in technology made in the last decade.
(AAT → UAPC → CS) Here is the flaw, just because they understand the architecture of personal computers (UAPC), and therefore are computer scientists (CS) doesn't mean they appreciate the advances in technology made in the last decade (AAT).

Conclusion: It follows that those who appreciate these advances are computer scientists.
(AAT → CS) FLAWED

Incorrect answer:
D: The premises of the argument are stated in such a way that they exclude the possibility of drawing any logical conclusion. This answer is incorrect, because you it is possible to draw at least 1 logical conclusion from the premises, such as SOME people who AAT are CS.

Correct answer:
B: The argument ignores the fact that some computer scientists may not appreciate the advances in technology made in the last decade. For reasons stated above.

Hope this helps...I'd be glad to answer any more questions to the best of my ability. We're all in this together...we got to help and support each other!

This is great! you are more than thorough in replying and your reviewed of the questions are sound. I noticed, in the questions we missed in common. We shared the same incorrect answers. However, I'm not where you are yet but I'm working on it as you are my hero,lol.
One small anecdote, it seems to me for the LR, question #23 is the hardest for me in all of them. Out of the five LR sections i have taken so far, I missed question #23 eighty percent of the time(1/5). Have you see strong a strong pattern with a single question? i know you have taken way more Pts and might have a larger sample.

knock glock, i have also been reading your thread and it is inspiring.
I am truly jealous and also amazed at your calculated + dedicated curriculum.

I have a feeling you already responded to a thread I asked earlier but I'll just ask more specifically + updated i guess.

I probably started the LSAT seriously around March. I took a course starting february but the teacher was BS and he
gave us like...5 questions to do a week (wtf?) at the time i just took his advice so it wouldnt "ruin prep tests"
but when your mind is not particularily trained for the LSAT, and when you arent just naturally amazing with it,
5-6 questions a week does NOT do much.

So i took PT 46 last week and was pleasantly surprised. 2 wrong each total on LR, 6 wrong on rc (eww), and i think 1 wrong
on games which amounted to a 169. I got 2 wrong each on LR because for one of the wrongs, i wasnt able to finish. so in terms of the LRs i actually finished it was 1 wrong each. not justifying myself but just trying to explain the situation

THEN, i took PT 40 and bombed it completely, i missed like 3 LRS on the first one (miss meaning i skipped it or didnt get to it). and also didnt even freakin get to like 7 of them on the second one. and RC was -6 again.

I wondered wtf was the problem, trying to see if there was some traceable cause ie. i saw a lot of questions on the pt 46 which i did well, etc.) but its not that i saw the questions at least. one HUGE thing i noticed was that on the first PT, everything went more or less smoothly, meaning i didnt run into questions much where i was like WTF?

it just boggles my mind how my scores can be this erratic, cuz this isnt the first time it happened. It made me think, can PTs REALLY be this different? i thought LSAC makes these so that they somewhat result in similar results for someone of a particular level.

however, i thought that maybe it may be this problem, i REALLY hope so. The first PT i took in the afternoon, fairly relaxed and such. Whereas the second PT i took probably with about 3 hours or so of sleep? and it was early in the morning. So i asked one of the instructors and she told me how your condition can result in up to 10 point differences. ANOTHER THING
that bothers me like CRAZY was that i freakin got a -1 on a reading comp once, but most of my scores seem to hover around -3 to -6...URGH..a big problem of mine is that i inevitably run into questions where i get somewhat stuck. So
I get pissed and try to solve it no matter how much time goes by, which isnt hte best strategy.

Anyways that was one hell of a long post to hijack your thread but i truly wanted your opinion on this, seeing as your scores seem to be the same. Im actually guessing that for you it doesnt even matter if youre scoring in the upper 170s, since it means your mind can comprehend this stuff so well regardless of the situation, different pt etc.


i am SO contemplating right now whether i should take this in october or june..


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DGLitcH wrote:Hey knock, could you post a sample review for RC as well? Your PT #25 was a very nice review but you had -0 for RC. Could you post one where you had to do an intensive review for RC? Reviewing for RC has been the biggest trouble for me and I would love to see how it could be done. Thanks!

PT49 wrote: Section 3: -2 RC

#3. Correct answer was E, I put C. C is incorrect because re-creating an accident is not similar to predicting the future. E is correct because the passage states that re-creation technology allows people to see things as if they were there, which is reflected in answer choice E.

#14. Correct answer was A, I put C. C is incorrect because although the point emphasized by the author is that women doctors were common enough that the texts did not pointedly comment on the existence of women doctors. A is correct because it describes the range of textual evidence for women doctors in ancient Greece and Rome.

PT31 wrote: Section 4: -6 RC

#1. Correct answer was D, I put A. D is correct because the passage mentions that current technology is often inadequate to the task (of having an economically viable role for ever product of a manufacturing process).

#2. Correct answer was D, I put C. D is correct because the author asserts concerning standards of living that all countries could enjoy a high standard of living if they implement an ideal industrial ecosystem.

#13. Correct answer was C, I put D. C is correct because D is too broad, it is not about the history of women in science, it is only about one women's take on the relationship between science and nature.

#20. Correct answer was C, I put D. C is correct because the paragraph talks about the failure to separate internal and external issues, and deems this approach innovative, which answer choice C fulfills.

#22. Correct answer was B, I put A. B is correct because A is too pessimistic, and B correctly reflects the development of the passage towards the end.

#24. Correct answer was B, I put A. A is incorrect because it is a reversal of subjectivist and objectivist beliefs. The passage clearly implies that subjectivists believe that objectivism restricts the kinds of experience from which philosophers may draw knowledge.

Knockglock wrote:Ugh, the curve on the newer tests is pretty harsh. Took PT 50, thought it was pretty difficult, and it only had a -10 curve. I went -3 RC (only missed 1 on riddled basins of attraction passage though, on the bright side I guess), -0 LR, 1 LG (doh ), -3 LR for 93 raw, 173 scaled. If I had stuck to my newfound -0 LG skills, I would have scored a 175, since there was no 174 on this test. I want to blame this on my roommate, who came home for the last 2 sections and started loudly watching television in the living room like usual, but I know i can't make excuses. Still, I will bitch/vent! . It's super annoying and frustrating . He never has anything to do, and he is never in his room! grrrr. I can literally hear ever single word on the television no problem. I wonder how much this contributed to my score on the last two sections. Sigh, I can't wait until I can take the test in actual relative peace and quiet; I guess if I'm used to taking PT's with the TV glaring in the background, it will only be beneficial on test day. Kind of annoying too, if I had just nailed that 1 LG question I would be sitting at 175 and would be a happy camper, now i'm just in a bad mood. Okay enough whining for now lol, I just needed to vent a bit, hope you guys understand!

On this test, I think 2 of my RC mistakes and 2 of my LR mistakes were after I narrowed it down to 2 choices, with 1 of those the correct one but I chose the wrong one, so i'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

Summary:
50 -- 05/11/10 ----- -3 RC -0 LR -1 LG -3 LR ------ 93/173 ----- 5 sections

Knockglock wrote:Ugh, the curve on the newer tests is pretty harsh. Took PT 50, thought it was pretty difficult, and it only had a -10 curve.

CryingMonkey wrote:I just took PT 32 and there was a question removed from scoring, but the raw scores were still out of 101. How do they handle this on an actual test? It seems like it'd be a little whack to penalize everyone if LSAC decides their question sucked. I'd assume they probably adjust the scaled scores accordingly, but it was a bit hard to tell from the scale whether they'd done so.

Also...

Knockglock wrote:Ugh, the curve on the newer tests is pretty harsh. Took PT 50, thought it was pretty difficult, and it only had a -10 curve.

...what exactly does "a -10 curve" mean?

Moving along, on PT 32 I went LR -1, RC -2, LG -0. I got lucky on the LG - had timing issues, which have been a consisten problem, and managed to guess right on the question I didn't get to. The RC was disappointing, I've gotten pretty consistent with -0s and the -2 was my worst showing since I've started taking PTs. I got 2 and 19 wrong. #2 was dumb, but #19 I'm still not sure about. While there is support in the passage for the idea that an individual could be represented by a pictograph, there really isn't a discussion of what types of symbols could be used to represent an individual. Given that the passage goes into depth about how each individuals identity and autobiography reflects their position in the tribe - and given the specific mention of taking new names to reflect deeds and events in one's life - I felt it was more consistent with the author's ideas about Native American identity that each individual in a community would have a unique name.

So I'm still trying to figure that one out.

Knockglock wrote:

CryingMonkey wrote:I just took PT 32 and there was a question removed from scoring, but the raw scores were still out of 101. How do they handle this on an actual test? It seems like it'd be a little whack to penalize everyone if LSAC decides their question sucked. I'd assume they probably adjust the scaled scores accordingly, but it was a bit hard to tell from the scale whether they'd done so.

Also...

Knockglock wrote:Ugh, the curve on the newer tests is pretty harsh. Took PT 50, thought it was pretty difficult, and it only had a -10 curve.

...what exactly does "a -10 curve" mean?

Moving along, on PT 32 I went LR -1, RC -2, LG -0. I got lucky on the LG - had timing issues, which have been a consisten problem, and managed to guess right on the question I didn't get to. The RC was disappointing, I've gotten pretty consistent with -0s and the -2 was my worst showing since I've started taking PTs. I got 2 and 19 wrong. #2 was dumb, but #19 I'm still not sure about. While there is support in the passage for the idea that an individual could be represented by a pictograph, there really isn't a discussion of what types of symbols could be used to represent an individual. Given that the passage goes into depth about how each individuals identity and autobiography reflects their position in the tribe - and given the specific mention of taking new names to reflect deeds and events in one's life - I felt it was more consistent with the author's ideas about Native American identity that each individual in a community would have a unique name.

So I'm still trying to figure that one out.

-10 curve means that you can miss 10 questions and still get a 170.

------

Took PT 12 today, went -2 LR -0 LG -1 RC -2 LR. Felt pretty good that I can do the LG from these early tests basically on time and get a -0. I'm starting to feel VERY confident on LG. I glanced at my trends, and i've gone 0/-1 on my last 15 PT's, with only 6 misses total. So I know one thing for certain, i'm going to kill the LG come test day. Everything else though, still needs some work. I did solid with a -1 RC, even with a pretty difficult science passage, not bad, my goal is to get 0/-1 on RC. But LR...well I missed -2 on each section, despite feeling very confident after the first section. It's like whack-a-mole. Everytime I do good at one or two sections, the other ones I don't, and then vice versa. I'd like to get LR to <-2 a PT, but it's hard for me to make a consistent improvement here. 26 days left...here's hoping that I can make solid improvements in RC and esp. LR.

Summary:
12 -- 05/12/10 ----- -2 LR -0 LG -1 RC -2 LR ------ 96/175 ----- 4 sections

Here's my averages for my last 10 PT's.
LR: -3.09
LG: -0.45 (!)
RC: -2.55 (ugh...my diagnostic was a cold -3...and I got my average down into the ~-1.8 range, but now it's gone up a lot)

honestabe84 wrote:

Knockglock wrote:

CryingMonkey wrote:I just took PT 32 and there was a question removed from scoring, but the raw scores were still out of 101. How do they handle this on an actual test? It seems like it'd be a little whack to penalize everyone if LSAC decides their question sucked. I'd assume they probably adjust the scaled scores accordingly, but it was a bit hard to tell from the scale whether they'd done so.

Also...

Knockglock wrote:Ugh, the curve on the newer tests is pretty harsh. Took PT 50, thought it was pretty difficult, and it only had a -10 curve.

...what exactly does "a -10 curve" mean?

Moving along, on PT 32 I went LR -1, RC -2, LG -0. I got lucky on the LG - had timing issues, which have been a consisten problem, and managed to guess right on the question I didn't get to. The RC was disappointing, I've gotten pretty consistent with -0s and the -2 was my worst showing since I've started taking PTs. I got 2 and 19 wrong. #2 was dumb, but #19 I'm still not sure about. While there is support in the passage for the idea that an individual could be represented by a pictograph, there really isn't a discussion of what types of symbols could be used to represent an individual. Given that the passage goes into depth about how each individuals identity and autobiography reflects their position in the tribe - and given the specific mention of taking new names to reflect deeds and events in one's life - I felt it was more consistent with the author's ideas about Native American identity that each individual in a community would have a unique name.

So I'm still trying to figure that one out.

-10 curve means that you can miss 10 questions and still get a 170.

------

Took PT 12 today, went -2 LR -0 LG -1 RC -2 LR. Felt pretty good that I can do the LG from these early tests basically on time and get a -0. I'm starting to feel VERY confident on LG. I glanced at my trends, and i've gone 0/-1 on my last 15 PT's, with only 6 misses total. So I know one thing for certain, i'm going to kill the LG come test day. Everything else though, still needs some work. I did solid with a -1 RC, even with a pretty difficult science passage, not bad, my goal is to get 0/-1 on RC. But LR...well I missed -2 on each section, despite feeling very confident after the first section. It's like whack-a-mole. Everytime I do good at one or two sections, the other ones I don't, and then vice versa. I'd like to get LR to <-2 a PT, but it's hard for me to make a consistent improvement here. 26 days left...here's hoping that I can make solid improvements in RC and esp. LR.

Summary:
12 -- 05/12/10 ----- -2 LR -0 LG -1 RC -2 LR ------ 96/175 ----- 4 sections

Here's my averages for my last 10 PT's.
LR: -3.09
LG: -0.45 (!)
RC: -2.55 (ugh...my diagnostic was a cold -3...and I got my average down into the ~-1.8 range, but now it's gone up a lot)

I'm just curious - Have you always been a big reader? I assume with RC scores as good as that, you must be.

Ragged wrote:I've been hitting LR really hard, I've done around 600 questions in the past 5 days and still encounter questions that trip me up usually because of carelessness or overlooking something and sometimes miss as many as 4 per section, which pisses me off espessially since all of the quesitons I'm doing now are not entirely new for me since I used all the PTs when I was studying the first time around. On my first real test I missed 6 LR total and I would like to see that number drop to 2 or less in order to give me a chance of hitting 175+.

Ok back to doing LR sections. /vent

Knockglock wrote:

Ragged wrote:I've been hitting LR really hard, I've done around 600 questions in the past 5 days and still encounter questions that trip me up usually because of carelessness or overlooking something and sometimes miss as many as 4 per section, which pisses me off espessially since all of the quesitons I'm doing now are not entirely new for me since I used all the PTs when I was studying the first time around. On my first real test I missed 6 LR total and I would like to see that number drop to 2 or less in order to give me a chance of hitting 175+.

Ok back to doing LR sections. /vent

I feel the same way. I've taken 36 full length PT's, plus gone through the LR Bible. I still get tripped up because of small tricky things.

Have you thought about doing the 400 hardest questions from Cambridge LSAT? I'm not sure if they're only LR, but I'm thinking about doing this. Only thing is I don't want to spoil material, so I might wait a little while.

CryingMonkey wrote:Have you noticed any trends on which sections (1-4) tend to give you the most trouble? I seem to be doing the worst on Section 2 (26.2% of the questions I've answered have been in Section 2 but 41.2% of my mistakes have been on 2). I don't have a huge sample size at this point, but it seems like an interesting thing to look at, and you do have a pretty big sample!

BigA wrote:question: have you found it weird jumping around between older and newer PTs? I have 1-6 sitting here but I'm afraid to do them, because I don't want them to throw me off. So I am just finishing up with the most recent tests heading into test day. Is there any method to your ordering?

sangr wrote:what do u mean by ur learning how to reason thru the hard ones?
do u approach these with a certain mindset