Some Self-Assessment Tips Forum

[The LSAT Trainer]

Hi everyone --

Here's a rough draft of an article that will be going up on my website in a few days. I figure some of you -- especially retakers doing some self-evaluation and some planning for the coming months -- would appreciate seeing it a bit early -- as a secondary benefit, I'd love some help with proofreading the thing -- so, if you notice any errors or typos, please pm me -- I hope you find at least some of these suggestions useful -- Mike


Time to Check Yourself

So...you are fairly far along in your LSAT prep, and looking for ways to evaluate your strengths and weaknesses and gauge your preparedness for the big day. Here are some supplementary assessment exercises that you can perform in order to clarify your understanding. Some of these suggestions can also be incorporated into other aspects of your study process.


1. The Surprise Test

Imagine yourself walking out of the exam on test day, knowing that you did not perform as well as you had hoped you would. Imagine all the things that could have gone wrong for you—you misunderstood a Logic Games rule or got completely flummoxed by a Reading Comp passage or ran out of time on a Logical Reasoning section, for example (the more possibilities you can think of better)—and imagine how surprised you would be if indeed these were the issues that prevented you from getting your goal score.

I know it’s unpleasant to think about the above, but picturing your greatest fears, and thinking about how surprised you might be for them to come true, is a great way to honestly and accurately expose holes in your skill set. The things you are most afraid of, and the things you would be least surprised to see come up to haunt you, are likely the things you need to work on most.

If, for every issue you can think up, you’d be completely surprised if it caused you any trouble, chances are you are ready—because of this, the surprise test is also a great gauge to use near the very end of your preparation process as well.


2. The Notecard Test

This applies specifically to Logical Reasoning, and should be done after you’ve had a chance to learn about and get experience with all of the various types of questions.

Without looking back through your notes, books, or past work, create a notecard for each of the Logical Reasoning question types. On one side of the notecard, write down your general strategy for that question type, and on the other side, write down a few important things to remember when dealing with that type of question. Don’t cheat by writing small—the purpose of using a notecard is to force you to prioritize and only write out the things that are most important.

Not every LSAT question is going to work out the same way (otherwise the test would be too easy) but in order to perform at your best you should have a clear plan, and set of expectations, for each of the question types. If you have trouble coming up with all of the question types, don’t know what to write out for the strategies for a question type, or can’t prioritize the key things to remember about a question type, it’s a sign that perhaps you haven’t yet put yourself in the best place to succeed.

These notecards can also be very valuable when recycled through other aspects of your prep. You can review them before drill sets, and then, during your review process, if you realize you should alter your strategies a bit, or that there is some other important key to note about that question type, you can alter the notecard to reflect your growing and changing understanding.


3. The One-Pager

Again, without looking back through your work, write out a one page document for Logic Games and for Reading Comprehension (you can also choose to do this instead of the notecard test for Logical Reasoning if you’d like).

For Logic Games, try to write out all the different ways games can be set up, think about all the different types of rules that you can be given and how you might diagram them, and write out question types and keys to solving them.

For Reading Comprehension, try to write out what’s most important to think about during your read, and write out your general reading strategies. List the different types of questions that are most common, and your typical plan of attack for these questions.

Just as with the notecards for Logical Reasoning, these one-pagers can help you see what you may not be thinking about enough or missing — for example, if you totally forget to write out something that can commonly appear in Logic Games, it may be a sign you aren’t fully prepared for that issue — and they can help you track your weaknesses. Finally, they can serve as a summary of your changing and growing understanding of the exam.


4. The Quick Scan Test

This is another exercise that is more relevant toward the end of your prep.

Gather a bunch of Logic Games, Reading Comprehension, or Logical Reasoning sections that you’ve already completed.

For Logic Games, quickly, without actually playing the games, read just the scenario and the rules, to make sure you can easily picture each game and to make sure you would be completely comfortable understanding and notating each rule. Take note of the games / rules that cause you trouble, come back to them and review. If you can do this well, it’ll give you a lot of confidence going into test day.

For Reading Comprehension, try to do a similar quick scan of the passage, not really worrying about understanding it completely but, rather, just seeing how easy, or difficult, it is for you to recognize the reasoning structure of the passage. If this is very hard for you, it’s a sign that perhaps you haven’t habitualized effective reading practices as well as you can.

Finally, for Logical Reasoning, do a quick scan of every question stem (in the order in which it appears in the section) and test your ability to correctly categorize the question and, based off of that, your ability to plan your attack—again, take note of question stems that you don’t quite understand or can’t categorize, and take note of question stems that don’t inspire in you a plan of attack, and review them afterwards.

I’m sure there are other quick scan exercises that can be helpful (and if you have any ideas please email me!) but the above represent some effective ways to gather together the collected wisdom of past work and to assess how far you have come.


5. The Essential Skills Test

Finally, here is a list of the general skills that I feel are essential to performing at your best on the LSAT. This is a very broad list (and a very subjective one—you should absolutely feel free to make your own if you’d prefer), but if you feel confident that you have each of these skills, chances are you ready for test day. And, if anything on this list causes you some concern, hopefully that helps you better allocate your remaining prep time.

For Logical Reasoning
Do I have a clear sense of what each question type is asking of from me?
Do I have consistent and efficient approaches for each of the question types?
Do I have a clear understanding of what information is most important in a stimulus and why?
Do I utilize consistent and effective methods for eliminating incorrect answer choices?
Do I utilize effective methods for confirming the correct answer?

For Logic Games
Am I able to understand and visualize any and all game scenarios?
Do I understand the different types of rules and the ability to diagram them?
Am I consistently able to recognize and prioritize the most important rule or rules?
Do I know when to create multiple diagrams, and do I have the ability to do so accurately?
Do I have consistent and effective methods for approaching each of the different question types?
Can I recognize when I’ve made a mistake or missed a key inference, and do I have the skills to recover?
Do I have secondary methods for questions, and do I know when to reach for them?

For Reading Comprehension
Do I have a clear understanding of my main priorities during the read?
Do I utilize a reading strategy that helps me focus on the right things?
Is my reading strategy habitual enough so that I don’t have to think about it and can just concentrate on the passage?
Am I typically able to clearly understand the structure of a passage before moving on to the questions?
Am I familiar with the different types of Reading Comprehension questions, and do I have effective strategies for all of them?
Do I have effective strategies for eliminating wrong choices and confirming the right ones?

[LaurieWright]

Thanks, those are some great tips! A lot of helpful info, so I'm going to print it out to keep it handy.

I've been a paralegal for a few years, and recently also one of the bloggers for http://www.BestLegalAssistant.com, and have decided to take the plunge and go to law school

LSAT prep is proving more nerve-wracking than I expected!