Stuck at 163! Help! Forum

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AParee06

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Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by AParee06 » Mon Apr 02, 2012 2:45 pm

I'm stuck at 163. I did get a 164 on the last test that I took but scoring 1 pt higher doesn't really mean that much to me. It's so insignificant.

Here's my studying background. I started reading the PowerScore LG and LR bibles in Jan-Feb and did the Manhattan RC book. I started taking practice tests in March. I take one every Saturday and then I go through the test. I spend the week after that working on the types of questions in LR that I got wrong on the previous week, since I have noticed that I have problems with the same type. Every day I also do one LG set and one RC set. I have been getting -2 in LG because of stupid mistakes so the practice is just to avoid making them and RC is a section I just need to practice on because I absolutely hate it. There isn't anything specific in RC that I have an issue with. I work full time as a paralegal with unpredictable hours so my schedule is usually test on Saturday and then 1-3 hours a night throughout the week (it depends when I get home from work - or if I'm too tired to focus too late into the night).

I am stuck at 163! I got a 163 on the first practice test that I took and then a 161 was my lowest. I can't seem to get past the 163 (except for my last test, but after all of the practicing I did last week on specific question types, I expected to at least be at 165). Are there any other suggestions that anyone may have about how to push my score up? My goal is to be PTing at high 160s by June. I'm taking the June test. Also, any RC advice is helpful. Thanks!

Any advice is appreciated!

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princeR

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by princeR » Mon Apr 02, 2012 2:50 pm

Well, you said it's a particular type of question(s) that is giving you problems, what type is it, maybe we can offer some guidance. As for RC, if you go in with that attitude that you hate it than you will perform poorly, learn to love it and I am confident that your score will increase.

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puppylaw

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by puppylaw » Mon Apr 02, 2012 2:55 pm

Try taking sections with 45 minutes instead of 35 to get your score up. Work on really understanding the questions and developing a good feel for why the right answer is the right answer. Then start moving back towards 35 minutes (or less if you start getting really good) while maintaining the gains you made at 45 minutes per section.

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princeR

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by princeR » Mon Apr 02, 2012 4:44 pm

puppylaw wrote:Try taking sections with 45 minutes instead of 35 to get your score up. Work on really understanding the questions and developing a good feel for why the right answer is the right answer. Then start moving back towards 35 minutes (or less if you start getting really good) while maintaining the gains you made at 45 minutes per section.
I'd suggest doing a stopwatch timer instead of a countdown. Just focus on getting every question right without any concern for the time and see how long it took at the end, this will help develop some good timing habits.

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twenty

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by twenty » Mon Apr 02, 2012 6:03 pm

My answer's going to be the opposite of prince and puppy, but not because I think they're wrong by default, it's just that I've done that, and it didn't work for me.

Two big reasons why, and a small reason why.

First, I felt like a kid in a special ed class, and by the end of the section, I felt terrible, I hated the LSAT, I hated law school, and I hated God. Also I hated Steve Carrell. That's how bad I felt.

Secondly, I didn't think it actually improved me. Sure, maybe I can get an answer right if I had unlimited time to go through the passage, but will I get the same an question correct when I have to quickly skim over the passage? Going timed on everything meant I could analyze how I was doing in actual testing (ish) conditions.

Though there's obvious easy solutions to this problem, I actually looked at the clock MORE than if I hadn't had unlimited time -- probably having something to do with the first issue.
LR that I got wrong on the previous week, since I have noticed that I have problems with the same type
This is what tells me you should, instead, get the Manhattan questions by type PDFs for the type of question you got wrong.

Again, none of this is to say that other posters are wrong, just that it didn't work for me, and it may not work for you, either.

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NYC2012

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by NYC2012 » Sat Apr 07, 2012 2:16 am

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Last edited by NYC2012 on Mon Dec 25, 2017 12:40 am, edited 1 time in total.

hiscottie

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by hiscottie » Sat Nov 04, 2017 12:20 am

NYC2012 wrote:I was stuck in the low 160s as well, and the only thing that finally got my score up was more and more practice. I just kept taking PTs and drilled individual sections on the review days. Eventually you'll become so used to the types of questions the LSAT asks it will be like second nature.

Good luck!
NYC2012 - I know this is really delayed based on your initial response, but I just came across your post. Congratulations! Like you, I’m stuck in the 161-163 range. After a 148 diagnostic score and 10+ months of studying, I am more than ready to break into the high 160s and 170s.

I am registered for the December LSAT, which is in four weeks. Any thoughts on how I can crack this? I understand the concepts well. For timed single sections, I am nearly perfect in LR and LG (RC is my weakness and I only can complete 3 passages, so I usually score 20 raw score). Unfortunately, when I do full PTs, I don’t perform at the same level and leave a lot of points on the table. Any thoughts on practice? I NEED to close this gap!

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Experiment626

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by Experiment626 » Sat Nov 04, 2017 6:29 pm

hiscottie wrote:
NYC2012 wrote:I was stuck in the low 160s as well, and the only thing that finally got my score up was more and more practice. I just kept taking PTs and drilled individual sections on the review days. Eventually you'll become so used to the types of questions the LSAT asks it will be like second nature.

Good luck!
NYC2012 - I know this is really delayed based on your initial response, but I just came across your post. Congratulations! Like you, I’m stuck in the 161-163 range. After a 148 diagnostic score and 10+ months of studying, I am more than ready to break into the high 160s and 170s.

I am registered for the December LSAT, which is in four weeks. Any thoughts on how I can crack this? I understand the concepts well. For timed single sections, I am nearly perfect in LR and LG (RC is my weakness and I only can complete 3 passages, so I usually score 20 raw score). Unfortunately, when I do full PTs, I don’t perform at the same level and leave a lot of points on the table. Any thoughts on practice? I NEED to close this gap!
Why are you necroing a thread from 5 years ago... You could have just made your own thread asking for help or asked in the December study group...

altee

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by altee » Tue Nov 14, 2017 6:18 pm

hiscottie wrote:
NYC2012 wrote:I was stuck in the low 160s as well, and the only thing that finally got my score up was more and more practice. I just kept taking PTs and drilled individual sections on the review days. Eventually you'll become so used to the types of questions the LSAT asks it will be like second nature.

Good luck!
NYC2012 - I know this is really delayed based on your initial response, but I just came across your post. Congratulations! Like you, I’m stuck in the 161-163 range. After a 148 diagnostic score and 10+ months of studying, I am more than ready to break into the high 160s and 170s.

I am registered for the December LSAT, which is in four weeks. Any thoughts on how I can crack this? I understand the concepts well. For timed single sections, I am nearly perfect in LR and LG (RC is my weakness and I only can complete 3 passages, so I usually score 20 raw score). Unfortunately, when I do full PTs, I don’t perform at the same level and leave a lot of points on the table. Any thoughts on practice? I NEED to close this gap!
Bringing up an old thread aside, I'm in your boat too except my problem is LR. I usually go -2 or -3 on RC. The biggest trick to RC is managing time without sacrificing your understanding of the reasoning structure and main point of the passage. I usually spend no more than 2:30 on a passage and go on to the questions. The way I initially practiced this was dividing the section into four mini timed sections in which I would keep track (using the lap feature on my phones timer) of the time I took to read the passage and to answer each questions. I struggled at first but I realized a lot of my struggle came from thinking about something else while reading the passage and realizing I didn't remember anything I just read.

The way I combated this was to move my lips (silently) along while I read the passage and to honestly give a crap about the content. Really forcing yourself to find the material interesting and to actually read the words to understand the purpose of the passage benefits in two ways: (1) You naturally begin to understand how the passage is structured, what it is about, and why the author wrote it. (2) When you approach the questions, you spend less time looking through the text when it isn't warranted like main point questions. When it is warranted, you will begin to remember the context in which specific parts are mentioned so you dont have to read much beyond what the question cites.

As you practice more and more and more, you'll begin to see patterns in reasoning structure because, to be honest, there are really only a few basic fundamental ways to provide information in text depending on the authors viewpoint in my experience. For instance, i've found a common structure is (Background on common thing) - (But that's wrong) - (Why my thing is right) - (Possible limitations/more support). For more practice beyond sections, read a LOT more in your daily life. Read varying persuasive or informative information about unfamiliar topics and try to understand what the author is talking about and how they made their point. Just my two cents.

hiscottie

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Re: Stuck at 163! Help!

Post by hiscottie » Sat Nov 18, 2017 10:09 pm

altee wrote:
hiscottie wrote:
NYC2012 wrote:I was stuck in the low 160s as well, and the only thing that finally got my score up was more and more practice. I just kept taking PTs and drilled individual sections on the review days. Eventually you'll become so used to the types of questions the LSAT asks it will be like second nature.

Good luck!
NYC2012 - I know this is really delayed based on your initial response, but I just came across your post. Congratulations! Like you, I’m stuck in the 161-163 range. After a 148 diagnostic score and 10+ months of studying, I am more than ready to break into the high 160s and 170s.

I am registered for the December LSAT, which is in four weeks. Any thoughts on how I can crack this? I understand the concepts well. For timed single sections, I am nearly perfect in LR and LG (RC is my weakness and I only can complete 3 passages, so I usually score 20 raw score). Unfortunately, when I do full PTs, I don’t perform at the same level and leave a lot of points on the table. Any thoughts on practice? I NEED to close this gap!
Bringing up an old thread aside, I'm in your boat too except my problem is LR. I usually go -2 or -3 on RC. The biggest trick to RC is managing time without sacrificing your understanding of the reasoning structure and main point of the passage. I usually spend no more than 2:30 on a passage and go on to the questions. The way I initially practiced this was dividing the section into four mini timed sections in which I would keep track (using the lap feature on my phones timer) of the time I took to read the passage and to answer each questions. I struggled at first but I realized a lot of my struggle came from thinking about something else while reading the passage and realizing I didn't remember anything I just read.

The way I combated this was to move my lips (silently) along while I read the passage and to honestly give a crap about the content. Really forcing yourself to find the material interesting and to actually read the words to understand the purpose of the passage benefits in two ways: (1) You naturally begin to understand how the passage is structured, what it is about, and why the author wrote it. (2) When you approach the questions, you spend less time looking through the text when it isn't warranted like main point questions. When it is warranted, you will begin to remember the context in which specific parts are mentioned so you dont have to read much beyond what the question cites.

As you practice more and more and more, you'll begin to see patterns in reasoning structure because, to be honest, there are really only a few basic fundamental ways to provide information in text depending on the authors viewpoint in my experience. For instance, i've found a common structure is (Background on common thing) - (But that's wrong) - (Why my thing is right) - (Possible limitations/more support). For more practice beyond sections, read a LOT more in your daily life. Read varying persuasive or informative information about unfamiliar topics and try to understand what the author is talking about and how they made their point. Just my two cents.
Thank you so much for the response, altee! I am almost opposite of you. Typically, I receive -2 to -3 in LR, but -7 to -10 in RC because I am only able to complete 3 passages. And, of the passages I can complete, I miss -4, so I am losing a huge chunk to guessing due to time constraints. It’s frustrating because I am quick and with minimal errors in other sections.

I am working with your strategy now, so I’ll be sure to keep you updated! I am scoring 166-168, which is a good increase from the low 160s, but RC is still my challenge. I think it’s time for me to focus in on it! Lol.

Also, for all in regards to necroing, I don’t often comment in forums, so I wasn’t aware that this was a thing.

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