October 2010 Test Prep Forum

[RFKScott]

I noticed some of you mentioned that the most recent tests the games start getting tough again. How tough do you think compared to the earlier 50s? Im really relying on my typical -1, -0. Do you see more rare game types or what? If youve noticed the games getting harder has the RC begun to get easier to compensate?

[Sandro]

Was anyone else pretty good (im talking -2 or so avg) per LR section in the 20's and 30s and see that double+ in the 40s and 50s? Im trying to nail down what exactly is causing me to miss so many now. Seems as if I can usually blaze through 1-10, 13-18 slow me down and i do okay on the last 5 but run out of time.

In the 20s and 30s I was sometimes finishing LR with 5-6 minutes left and getting -2. Seems like I need to find a different strategy that works better for attacking the newer LR, and quick.

[vttran9]

Was anyone else pretty good (im talking -2 or so avg) per LR section in the 20's and 30s and see that double+ in the 40s and 50s? Im trying to nail down what exactly is causing me to miss so many now. Seems as if I can usually blaze through 1-10, 13-18 slow me down and i do okay on the last 5 but run out of time.

In the 20s and 30s I was sometimes finishing LR with 5-6 minutes left and getting -2. Seems like I need to find a different strategy that works better for attacking the newer LR, and quick.

Same happened to me. I usually finish with 5 minutes to spare but could barely finish the LR in the 40's and 50's. Guess its worded differently? I just kept practicing and reviewing. Seeing some improvement now.

[Sandro]

whats hurting me is okay, i breeze through 1-10 in ~10 mins. Inevitably a question around 15 will just not click with me and ill get stuck on it. Throw in another one like this and ill have very little time to attack the last questions which *usually* arent terribly hard. I need to I guess skip these harder middle questions and come back... i just need to figure out how to decide to skip them earlier.

[Patriot1208]

Was anyone else pretty good (im talking -2 or so avg) per LR section in the 20's and 30s and see that double+ in the 40s and 50s? Im trying to nail down what exactly is causing me to miss so many now. Seems as if I can usually blaze through 1-10, 13-18 slow me down and i do okay on the last 5 but run out of time.

In the 20s and 30s I was sometimes finishing LR with 5-6 minutes left and getting -2. Seems like I need to find a different strategy that works better for attacking the newer LR, and quick.

I think it's pretty widely accepted that LR and RC is harder in the newer tests than the older ones.

[Sandro]

I know it is easier to find a correct answer when you know you missed a question, but maybe if during the tests on questions I wasnt too sure of I could just pretend I missed the question and am reviewing it. Its amazing how fast the right answer jumps out at you when reviewing

[Patriot1208]

whats hurting me is okay, i breeze through 1-10 in ~10 mins. Inevitably a question around 15 will just not click with me and ill get stuck on it. Throw in another one like this and ill have very little time to attack the last questions which *usually* arent terribly hard. I need to I guess skip these harder middle questions and come back... i just need to figure out how to decide to skip them earlier.

I think the general rule of thumb for a lot of people is to do the first two pages, then the last page, then the third page. That gives a general outline for breaking them up.

[Sinra]

I noticed some of you mentioned that the most recent tests the games start getting tough again. How tough do you think compared to the earlier 50s? Im really relying on my typical -1, -0. Do you see more rare game types or what? If youve noticed the games getting harder has the RC begun to get easier to compensate?

The games aren't harder per se in the 50s. More like different. In the 40s they are ridiculously easy. The 30s are hard IMO. In the 50s they just get kind of weird. I found that just practicing absolutely all of them makes a huge difference. My biggest improvement came when I did a bunch of the super-early mapping/pattern games and things like that. Keeps you from focusing only on linear, grouping and hybrids of those two types of games. I drilled all types (e.g. the people around a table types) and I found that it helped me immensely with the weirder new ones in the 50s. Just keeps you from thinking to rigidly when you approach it. I hope that makes some sense.

[Sinra]

Im livid, I somehow cannot do well on RC at all, I dont understand how I am missing the subtleties. My buddy had the idea of breaking it up by passage and doing them individually within 8:45, but the point being that they are broken up. All in all, it didnt help and I somehow managed to stoop to a new low, -10.

the only thing in my verbal vocabulary for the past day and a half has been WTF.... anyone with tips, links, wise words, please throw them at me!

I started doing this:

http://lsatblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/ls ... sages.html

and it helped. A lot. I was spending way too much time going back to the passage. I also started doing something someone mentioned in one of the 180 articles. He calls it the puzzle theory. Every correct answer in RC will "go together" to make sense as a whole. I've been doing it. Went from -5 -6 to -0 with some outliers.

[Hedwig]

I was explaining a logic game to my friend today. It was one of the 20's ones, so not super easy, but not horrendously weird. It was one I'd done before, and struggled with. And I realized that I was diagramming MUST BE TRUE questions much quicker and thus knowing how to pick the one right answer out of the wrong ones. Before I was more going through, process of elimination. If you know xyz, then you write what you can know based on your diagram and that answer is usually the correct one.

Maybe that's something really obvious, but I just didn't DO IT during my first run throughs of these games. Of course, these games are repeats, so that might skew my approach, but I don't really remember them specifically.

Anyways, I'm feeling better about logic games, although I don't have my 10 actual so I can't even double check them haha, so who knows, I could be totally wrong here.

[RFKScott]

I noticed some of you mentioned that the most recent tests the games start getting tough again. How tough do you think compared to the earlier 50s? Im really relying on my typical -1, -0. Do you see more rare game types or what? If youve noticed the games getting harder has the RC begun to get easier to compensate?

The games aren't harder per se in the 50s. More like different. In the 40s they are ridiculously easy. The 30s are hard IMO. In the 50s they just get kind of weird. I found that just practicing absolutely all of them makes a huge difference. My biggest improvement came when I did a bunch of the super-early mapping/pattern games and things like that. Keeps you from focusing only on linear, grouping and hybrids of those two types of games. I drilled all types (e.g. the people around a table types) and I found that it helped me immensely with the weirder new ones in the 50s. Just keeps you from thinking to rigidly when you approach it. I hope that makes some sense.

Thanks! Ya I have copies of the earlier rare game types and will probably drill those hard and make sure I understand them. Cant afford to not ace the LG section.

[Pleasye]

whats hurting me is okay, i breeze through 1-10 in ~10 mins. Inevitably a question around 15 will just not click with me and ill get stuck on it. Throw in another one like this and ill have very little time to attack the last questions which *usually* arent terribly hard. I need to I guess skip these harder middle questions and come back... i just need to figure out how to decide to skip them earlier.

I think the general rule of thumb for a lot of people is to do the first two pages, then the last page, then the third page. That gives a general outline for breaking them up.

What's the reasoning for breaking them up this way?

[Patriot1208]

whats hurting me is okay, i breeze through 1-10 in ~10 mins. Inevitably a question around 15 will just not click with me and ill get stuck on it. Throw in another one like this and ill have very little time to attack the last questions which *usually* arent terribly hard. I need to I guess skip these harder middle questions and come back... i just need to figure out how to decide to skip them earlier.

I think the general rule of thumb for a lot of people is to do the first two pages, then the last page, then the third page. That gives a general outline for breaking them up.

What's the reasoning for breaking them up this way?

Generally, the toughest questions are grouped in the middle of the LR sections. The first ten are supposed to be easiest and then a few easy ones at the end. It's supposed to trip people up with timing and missing some easier questions near the end. This way you are roughly do the questions in order of difficulty.

[ND'10]

Any tips on how to attack new vs. old LR problems?

I did two more sections of PT 30s LR today and got -1 on each one, but in the 50s I almost always miss 3 or 4 a section. I just seem to fall apart towards the end of new sections and miss 2 or 3 from questions 20-25.

Is there some sort of difference between them and some trick to the new questions or is this just some odd occurrence?

[Blumpbeef]

Seems to be a trend. The obvious solution is to practice and maybe redo 50s tests until you aren't missing any more. I think on the high teens they use confusing wording to get you to waste time, and those are the ones you should focus on moving through faster.

I don't think they are necessarily more difficult though, just different. My best LR scores ever were on 58.

[Eugenie Danglars]

Just did PT 45 after having skipped it a week or so ago:

LR -2, RC -4, LR -2, LG -1 (and the LG was a bubbling error, alas) 91 raw/174 scaled

I feel like I've got a good handle on the LR now...and the RC -3 or -4 never bothered me before, but I suppose I should work on it. no reason not to improve. I'm also running out of PT's- I don't have all the way to 60 I think the next few days I'll do some analyzing of past PT and review some tough games. I'm getting complacent with all these easy ones, and it would suck if they're much harder in October.

[carpquiet]

Hi Eugenie,

I feel you on the LG. I was pretty mediocre (-5 avg.) at them until I hit these mid-40s. Granted, I think I was improving at the same time, but they just feel like the easiest things ever. My first 170+'s are coming in this section, and it feels great. But damn, need to get back to the roots on LG.

[downing]

PT 56
raw: 88/101
score: 169

AR: -3
LR: -3
LR: -3
RC: -4

graaahh so close but so far! Guess it's time for another review.

[Lasers]

well i've been averaging around -9 or -10 in LR in all the recent practice tests i've taken, so for practice i did the LR for PT 21 and got -4 and i finished 2 minutes early in both sections.

geezus. LR, from my perspective, has seemed to have gotten a LOT harder in the newer PT's, which people around here also seem to agree with.

[Hedwig]

Anyone else feeling a little disbelief that it's SO CLOSE?

[Eugenie Danglars]

Anyone else feeling a little disbelief that it's SO CLOSE?

I'm excited. It'll mean I can submit, and it will be out of my hands and I can get back to a life. Have some free time. (Free time...what's that again?)

[downing]

Anyone else feeling a little disbelief that it's SO CLOSE?

meh
already took it once. Just want to effing get it over with. -_- But this time with much better results than last time.

[Patriot1208]

Anyone else feeling a little disbelief that it's SO CLOSE?

meh
already took it once. Just want to effing get it over with. -_- But this time with much better results than last time.

Same I need to get this shit over with so I can focuse on classes. My classes are suffering right now.

[jfb]

Anyone else feeling a little disbelief that it's SO CLOSE?

I'm excited. It'll mean I can submit, and it will be out of my hands and I can get back to a life. Have some free time. (Free time...what's that again?)

+1, I am really looking forward to that - Assuming I don't feel the need to start studying for December right after I get home from the Oct test.

[Adjudicator]

I'm a retaker so for me it's just like "Bring it on already!"

There are a lot of other interests that I've had to put on hold because I needed to stay focused on the LSAT.