The Official September 2014 Study Group Forum

P.J.Fry · Post by **P.J.Fry** » Thu Jun 26, 2014 7:38 pm

Took the June 2007 as a cold diagnostic yesterday. Scored a -13 for 166 (untimed). Definitely went well over time limit on 3 of 4 sections, but very happy with this as a starting point nonetheless! I remember getting a 160 on my cold diagnostic seven years ago. I have no idea how I managed to actually improve during my absence from academia

Package from Amazon with PS Bibles, Manhattan trio, and lots of PTs arrived today. 3 months to get this dialed in. Time to get to work!

DivineJustice · Post by **DivineJustice** » Thu Jun 26, 2014 7:44 pm

Louis1127 wrote:Oh I'm glad you said that, DivineJustice! What were some LR things that really helped you make that solid gain?

Honestly, I just took a lot of the advice said here on TLS and just read a chapter, then drilled extensively right after. Most of my wrong answers were for things I haven't gotten to reviewing yet.

I'm thinking the plan is to do RC untimed (but keep track of how long I spend) until I can pick up some personal techniques to get a consistently low score. At least that's how I approached LG and I rarely go above -2 on LG nowadays.

Also, does anyone have the new Manhattan RC and have reviews about it? I had the edition from last year and I didn't learn from it at all (I was averaging -8 on RC before i took the December exam).

Calbears123 · Post by **Calbears123** » Thu Jun 26, 2014 10:37 pm

Scotty. wrote:Took the June 2007 as a cold diagnostic yesterday. Scored a -13 for 166 (untimed). Definitely went well over time limit on 3 of 4 sections, but very happy with this as a starting point nonetheless! I remember getting a 160 on my cold diagnostic seven years ago. I have no idea how I managed to actually improve during my absence from academia

Package from Amazon with PS Bibles, Manhattan trio, and lots of PTs arrived today. 3 months to get this dialed in. Time to get to work!

A -13 for a 166 is my nightmare

Louis1127 · Post by **Louis1127** » Thu Jun 26, 2014 11:10 pm

Calbears123 wrote:
Scotty. wrote:Took the June 2007 as a cold diagnostic yesterday. Scored a -13 for 166 (untimed). Definitely went well over time limit on 3 of 4 sections, but very happy with this as a starting point nonetheless! I remember getting a 160 on my cold diagnostic seven years ago. I have no idea how I managed to actually improve during my absence from academia

Package from Amazon with PS Bibles, Manhattan trio, and lots of PTs arrived today. 3 months to get this dialed in. Time to get to work!
A -13 for a 166 is my nightmare

Yea June 2007 curve is notoriously hard lol

hetookmetoamovie · Post by **hetookmetoamovie** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 12:51 am

Hi everyone!

Sorry - I'm joining late

I just signed up for the September LSAT! I'm about 10 years out of school, but after years of grinding out a living, I figured it's time to give my own dreams a shot. I signed up for the LSAT in June 2008, but due to some "life circumstances," ended up not showing up for the test (and forgetting to cancel). Unfortunately, I confirmed with LSAC that the "absent" is going to be on my record still if I do end up applying to law school this year...

Anyway, I just took PT53 and got:

LR1: -7 (I missed 5 in a row at the end -- It took me awhile to get into the groove/focus, I realized I was running out of time, and I think I panicked)
LG: -0 (with 5 extra minutes -- I was halfway through the last problem at 35:00)
[ok, to be totally honest, I took a 2 hour break here to watch USA v. Germany]
LR2: -1
RC: -3 (The passage about common law took me a long time to get through, so I had to rush through the one about mites, where I got all the questions wrong)

What I'm mainly concerned with is building up stamina/time-management skills and speed, especially in LG. I tried Game #4 again after reading the explanation of the game, and it still took me about 10 minutes just to execute

Hopefully, this will improve with practice? Also, I noticed that in the second LR section, when I didn't feel as pressured for time, I was much more conscientious about reading through and eliminating wrong answers, which I think facilitated a better showing. Preparing for a test is kind of novel for me being so far out of school, but it's depressing how hard it is for me to focus these days. I was EXHAUSTED after 2 sections.

Anyway, I have the LSAT Trainer, so I'm going to work through that, and then do a shitload of PTs until test day. We've got 3 months! Let's do this!!

vracovino · Post by **vracovino** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 1:11 am

Discouraging day for me. A couple questions for you guys:

For those of who you have just about "mastered" logic games, when did it click for you? How many months? I find myself being okay with accuracy ( I usually make a stupid mistake somewhere) but I'm drilling Advanced Linear and it takes me a good 3 minutes more (at least) to finish a game then it should. It's a bit concerning.

Reading Comprehension has become so frustrating, which seems so stupid to me because I consider reading such a strength of mine. It's so random and it just feels chaotic for me when I am working through the questions. I've read a whole bunch of tips but I haven't been able to put it comfortably all together. If I read for great and careful comprehension, I usually rush through the last passage. If I try and speed read the passages, I usually get tripped up on the questions. Any ideas for a middle ground approach?

mornincounselor · Post by **mornincounselor** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 10:03 am

Post removed.

DivineJustice · Post by **DivineJustice** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 10:53 am

vracovino wrote:Discouraging day for me. A couple questions for you guys:

For those of who you have just about "mastered" logic games, when did it click for you? How many months? I find myself being okay with accuracy ( I usually make a stupid mistake somewhere) but I'm drilling Advanced Linear and it takes me a good 3 minutes more (at least) to finish a game then it should. It's a bit concerning.

Reading Comprehension has become so frustrating, which seems so stupid to me because I consider reading such a strength of mine. It's so random and it just feels chaotic for me when I am working through the questions. I've read a whole bunch of tips but I haven't been able to put it comfortably all together. If I read for great and careful comprehension, I usually rush through the last passage. If I try and speed read the passages, I usually get tripped up on the questions. Any ideas for a middle ground approach?

For me, it took me about a month of solid drilling and re-drilling. I owe a lot to the LGB, but I also found personal techniques of my own to make me go faster. That's what gets me in a range between 0 and -2

Gray · Post by **Gray** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 12:01 pm

vracovino · Post by **vracovino** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 1:06 pm

mornincounselor wrote:
The individual games click for me after watching the 7sage video and being able to subsequently do it myself quickly and accurately. The category of game clicks for me when I'm doing a full timed test and a game of that type pops up with some unusual element (PT 53 the game with multiple "either before x or after y but not both" for example) and I'm still able to do it quickly and accurately.

I feel your pain on RC. Here's a couple things I've found useful in increasing speed without losing accuracy.

If "the bird, bergfytye, from the family obvfhsgueben-lkoe possesses some traits similar to the ancient fish pljgrgoro from the mesopholiac age," I wouldn't try sounding out the words and getting confused I'd just read it as, "this bird, b, from the o family shows similar traits to the ancient fish p, from the m age.

When I find an example I usually just ensure I know what the example is trying to show and I mark the area as an example and I don't try to actually understand the example until a question forces me to.

Interesting, I'll try to do implement that into my RC reading.

smccgrey wrote:
vracovino wrote: I find myself being okay with accuracy ( I usually make a stupid mistake somewhere) but I'm drilling Advanced Linear and it takes me a good 3 minutes more (at least) to finish a game then it should. It's a bit concerning.
First of all, some of those advanced linear games are soul suckingly terrible. Don't be worried. If you can finish the easier games in less than 5 mins, you can take your time with the harder ones. But I wouldn't rely entirely on this strategy.

One thing that helped me save time (on PTs) was learning when to stop and make an educated guess. To be clear, you shouldn't really guess on LG, but if you're really, really stuck, sometimes just picking the one that makes sense to you and moving on can work.

Frequently, one of the later questions in a game will make the answer click for you, or at least help you to eliminate incorrect choices. Go back at the end of the game and look at it again. Most of the time, when I look at it again, I realize that I'd been over thinking the question.

And if you don't have time to go back, it's fine. Think of all the questions you wouldn't have had time to answer correctly had you fought your way through it.

I feel you on just choosing the answer that feels right. More often that not you can see which variables are the most limiting and guess the answer based on that alone. And it is good to hear some of these are tough. I just hope more repetition will help me improve my speed.

At least we are still three months out! I just hope things start coming together in a way I can tangibly see.

flash21 · Post by **flash21** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 1:08 pm

mornincounselor wrote:I'm drilling the balanced basic linear games and I've come across the first question which has given me trouble.

PT 24, Game 2

7 characters into 7 numbered spaces.

"Lucy performs third only if Nancy performs fifth."

The way I visualize this rule would be: N5 -> L3 ; In actuality the rule should look like: L3 -> N5

Going to have to reread the LG bible section which talks about "only if"

Hey Counsellor ,

I had this same issue funny enough. Remember that "only" often introduces a necessary condition, as it does in this case. So, N5 would be the necessary condition in this case, while L3 is the sufficient (looks like L3--->N5). I went back and memorized some of the neceessary and sufficient indicators since I messed this rule up. I find that basic linear games have rules that are relatively unique just to that type of question. How are you finding them? I also found the unbalanced basic linear games a lot more challenging due to the rules that arise out of not having a balanced amount of variables to spots.

sashafierce · Post by **sashafierce** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 3:44 pm

Just completed NA Level 1 questions went 71/76, I did pick up a few patterns though, especially with the wrong answer choices. Looking forward to doing Level 2 this weekend.

Side note: I just downloaded the LSAT max app "law school 100" in the App Store. It's pretty good stuff. It's basically the US news ranking of the top 100 law schools with a little info on all the schools stuff like GPA range, LSAT range, class size, faculty count etc. It also tells u each school's US News ranking for the past 3 years.

WaltGrace83 · Post by **WaltGrace83** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 3:51 pm

This is a totally rudimentary lesson on grammar but I found it helpful.

http://www.manhattanlsat.com/forums/pos ... 47f#p25933

tommy wallach of MLSAT wrote: Hey Guys,

A quick note on "definite" versus "indefinite" articles.

A -- indefinite pronoun -- implies an indefinite example

Example: "I have a problem."
Meaning: This is not my only problem, but I still have it.

Example: "Sugar is an ingredient in this cake."
Meaning: Sugar is one of multiple ingredients in this cake.

THE -- definite pronoun -- implies a definite example

Example: "That's exactly the problem."
Meaning: There is one problem we are discussing, and that's it.

Example: "The ingredients in this cake are pears, sugar, and flour."
Meaning: The only ingredients in this cake are pears, sugar, and flour.

OUR QUESTION: "...the components of Pluto's atmosphere are nitrogen, carbon monoxide, and methane..."
Meaning: The only components are those listed.

You can hate it, but that's the way it works. : )

-t

ilawsxhool1 · Post by **ilawsxhool1** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 4:05 pm

Hello,

I have a really hard time with RC. I was wondering if I should purchase the Manhattan LSAT Reading Comprehension? Any thoughts? The ONLY reason I'm holding back is because I am unsure if it contains recent RC sections and I do not want to use them as practice and then not have practice tests. THANKS

longhorn65 · Post by **longhorn65** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 4:20 pm

Scotty. wrote:Took the June 2007 as a cold diagnostic yesterday. Scored a -13 for 166 (untimed). Definitely went well over time limit on 3 of 4 sections, but very happy with this as a starting point nonetheless! I remember getting a 160 on my cold diagnostic seven years ago. I have no idea how I managed to actually improve during my absence from academia

Package from Amazon with PS Bibles, Manhattan trio, and lots of PTs arrived today. 3 months to get this dialed in. Time to get to work!

I've been wondering if most take the Diagnostic timed or not. I took my diagnostic last night at 1am (not best choice) timed with SUITS on lol and got a 150. I was terribly dissapointed in myself but untimed would have been a whole different story because I missed alot due to NO attempt ....ran out of time

....still curious if most go timed or untime

mornincounselor · Post by **mornincounselor** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 4:33 pm

Post removed.

bound · Post by **bound** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 4:48 pm

mornincounselor wrote:
ilawsxhool1 wrote:Hello,

I have a really hard time with RC. I was wondering if I should purchase the Manhattan LSAT Reading Comprehension? Any thoughts? The ONLY reason I'm holding back is because I am unsure if it contains recent RC sections and I do not want to use them as practice and then not have practice tests. THANKS
I'm about 100 pages in and I've seen a couple partial passages from the 50s and one from the 60s. This also concerned me, but perhaps the new tests require a slightly different skill set which require one to look new at least some newer tests.

At the end of the day, this honestly doesn't matter. They make take a passage from a few of the PT's, but it shouldn't make a difference. It's the strategy that matters. FWIW I used Manhattan RC and loved it. I think I went -2 on the real deal last December.

hetookmetoamovie · Post by **hetookmetoamovie** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 5:28 pm

Sorry if this is a dumb/obvious question, but is the right answer to a question ever given in the form of its contrapositive?

ilawsxhool1 · Post by **ilawsxhool1** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 5:52 pm

hetookmetoamovie wrote:Sorry if this is a dumb/obvious question, but is the right answer to a question ever given in the form of its contrapositive?

Yes! I wouldn't say it happens a lot, but it happens. It's just another way they can disguise the right answer.

P.J.Fry · Post by **P.J.Fry** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 7:12 pm

luke65 wrote:
Scotty. wrote:Took the June 2007 as a cold diagnostic yesterday. Scored a -13 for 166 (untimed). Definitely went well over time limit on 3 of 4 sections, but very happy with this as a starting point nonetheless! I remember getting a 160 on my cold diagnostic seven years ago. I have no idea how I managed to actually improve during my absence from academia

Package from Amazon with PS Bibles, Manhattan trio, and lots of PTs arrived today. 3 months to get this dialed in. Time to get to work!
I've been wondering if most take the Diagnostic timed or not. I took my diagnostic last night at 1am (not best choice) timed with SUITS on lol and got a 150. I was terribly dissapointed in myself but untimed would have been a whole different story because I missed alot due to NO attempt ....ran out of time ....still curious if most go timed or untime

Personally, I don't plan to do anything timed until probably the start of August. When I say not timed, I'm still recording how long it takes me to do it, and hoping to see a steady decline in that, but I won't be cutting myself off after 35 minutes in a section. Speed will follow accuracy, but not the other way around.

Had I taken the diagnostic timed, it would have been in the high 150's likely as I went over by 9 mins on two sections, and 6 mins on another. I took my time to check and recheck a lot of answers as it was more important to me to know if I knew how to do it right, not fast. At least for now.

longhorn65 · Post by **longhorn65** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 9:17 pm

Scotty. wrote:
luke65 wrote:
Scotty. wrote:Took the June 2007 as a cold diagnostic yesterday. Scored a -13 for 166 (untimed). Definitely went well over time limit on 3 of 4 sections, but very happy with this as a starting point nonetheless! I remember getting a 160 on my cold diagnostic seven years ago. I have no idea how I managed to actually improve during my absence from academia

Package from Amazon with PS Bibles, Manhattan trio, and lots of PTs arrived today. 3 months to get this dialed in. Time to get to work!
I've been wondering if most take the Diagnostic timed or not. I took my diagnostic last night at 1am (not best choice) timed with SUITS on lol and got a 150. I was terribly dissapointed in myself but untimed would have been a whole different story because I missed alot due to NO attempt ....ran out of time ....still curious if most go timed or untime
Personally, I don't plan to do anything timed until probably the start of August. When I say not timed, I'm still recording how long it takes me to do it, and hoping to see a steady decline in that, but I won't be cutting myself off after 35 minutes in a section. Speed will follow accuracy, but not the other way around.

Had I taken the diagnostic timed, it would have been in the high 150's likely as I went over by 9 mins on two sections, and 6 mins on another. I took my time to check and recheck a lot of answers as it was more important to me to know if I knew how to do it right, not fast. At least for now.

Haha watching TV definitely did not help my score but to be honest im glad I took a timed one. It gave me a feel for the real test and how quick you really have to work. Next time I will probably time but give 40 min a section and work down from there. I was wondering how long do most people study. I'm considering the September test but leaning toward December that gives me 6 months to December and almost three for september. How many hours a day do most people average?

Clyde Frog · Post by **Clyde Frog** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 9:22 pm

hetookmetoamovie wrote:Hi everyone!

Sorry - I'm joining late I just signed up for the September LSAT! I'm about 10 years out of school, but after years of grinding out a living, I figured it's time to give my own dreams a shot. I signed up for the LSAT in June 2008, but due to some "life circumstances," ended up not showing up for the test (and forgetting to cancel). Unfortunately, I confirmed with LSAC that the "absent" is going to be on my record still if I do end up applying to law school this year...

Anyway, I just took PT53 and got:

LR1: -7 (I missed 5 in a row at the end -- It took me awhile to get into the groove/focus, I realized I was running out of time, and I think I panicked)
LG: -0 (with 5 extra minutes -- I was halfway through the last problem at 35:00)
[ok, to be totally honest, I took a 2 hour break here to watch USA v. Germany]
LR2: -1
RC: -3 (The passage about common law took me a long time to get through, so I had to rush through the one about mites, where I got all the questions wrong)

What I'm mainly concerned with is building up stamina/time-management skills and speed, especially in LG. I tried Game #4 again after reading the explanation of the game, and it still took me about 10 minutes just to execute Hopefully, this will improve with practice? Also, I noticed that in the second LR section, when I didn't feel as pressured for time, I was much more conscientious about reading through and eliminating wrong answers, which I think facilitated a better showing. Preparing for a test is kind of novel for me being so far out of school, but it's depressing how hard it is for me to focus these days. I was EXHAUSTED after 2 sections.

Anyway, I have the LSAT Trainer, so I'm going to work through that, and then do a shitload of PTs until test day. We've got 3 months! Let's do this!!

Pretty sure your lsat report only shows tests from past five years.

DivineJustice · Post by **DivineJustice** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 9:45 pm

Just took an RC section from Preptest 21 today. I did it untimed but still kept track of how long I was taking and I ended up finishing in 39 minutes. I went -6 which is still bad, but it's a still a sign of good hope that I can probably knock that down to -4 or less. (I have gone as low -3 when I prepped last time) I understand the older tests RC may be a bit easier, but I still think it's good practice.

NotASpecialSnowflake · Post by **NotASpecialSnowflake** » Fri Jun 27, 2014 11:11 pm

Checking in. I've taken the LSAT twice before, so this is my last chance.

My #s for my last one

167
Section 1 LG -1
Section 2 LR -3
EXP.
Section 3 RC -8 (This was when the girl next to me called the proctors over to talk with me about how I was "sharpening my pencil too loudly" The proctors apologized after the test and said she was out of line. I had a -6 RC on my diagnostic and was PTing at a -3)
Section 4 LR -6 (-6 was my diagnostic and I was PTing at a -3).

So yeah, pretty much explains why I have to take it again.