LSAT Prep Time - Beating Your Head Against the Wall Forum

[irJong]

How early is too early to start LSAT prep? I'm a little over a month away from starting college and I'm already toying with the idea of getting a head start on the LSATs but I wonder if doing so this early on might be a waste of time and money and if such preparation is best reserved for the second half of college.

[cinefile 17]

It wouldn't hurt to take a practice test to see where you might be. If you get a 160+ on the practice test start studying your junior year. If you get lower than that you could start looking over stuff the summer of your sophomore year. You really should not start studying any earlier than the summer after your sophomore year (this is more than enough time to improve all that you can possibly improve before the actual test). For now, focus on getting As in your classes, college might be harder than you think. But kudos to you for recognizing the importance of the LSAT.

[pkpop]

To be honest, I think the best prep you can do right now is focus on UG high GPA. If you want to "prep", take relevant classes which promote LSAT type skills. Start to worry about the actual test in a couple years unless for whatever reason you want to take it as a sophomore.

[takehold]

Everybody here will tell you it's too early to actually study or prepare. Particularly for your freshman year, it's okay to think about law school every now and again. However, just focus on getting the most out of your first year at college. If you're really seriously concerned about law school admissions at this stage, the most you can really do is aim for the highest GPA you can. Likewise, if you want to do some unofficial prep of sorts, you can look into taking classes on logic.

[eberryhill7]

Don't start with official prep until at least your junior year. If you start this early you will both get burnt out and run out of study material.

There are a few things that you can do at this point to help you with the LSAT.
-Read everything that you can find. Reading dense artiles (The Economist, Scientific American, Smithsonian Magazine, etc), as well as your school material, will do you a ton of good in the Reading Comprehension section as well as the others to a lesser extent.
-Take some classes that make you either argue or think analytically. Philosophy classes always help as do formal logic classes.
-Just argue with everyone. If there is a debate club at your school then join it, that'll help you mind think logically and analytically.

Forming your mind to work this way will both help you on the lsat and then law school when you get there. Also, make sure that you enjoy college. Don't get preoccupied with law school at this point.

[cinefile 17]

-Just argue with everyone. If there is a debate club at your school then join it, that'll help you mind think logically and analytically.

Not in social settings though b.c. that shit gets annoying. You'll be deemed socially awkward and have no friends

[irJong]

Heh, alright then thanks for the advice everyone. If I graduate in 3 years, should I push studying ahead to sophomore year?

[Barbie]

I found that taking formal logic courses ended up being extremely helpful for the LSAT. maybe enroll in a few...

[arewhyaen]

Its good that you know law school is the path that you want to choose upon the completion of undergrad. You already have a leg up on the competition. Keep your GPA up, take challenging courses and join a pre-law fraternity or society. You'll always be exposed to the LSAT someway or another by doing that, not to mention discounts up the whazoo with LSAT courses.

Also, what I did was frontload the amount of classes I took Freshman through Sophomore year. I had AP credit, took summer courses and had 18-23 credits per semester. Now as I study for the LSAT, I have a 9 unit semester with pretty non-challenging courses. This allows me to be fully diverged in the world of the LSAT. You could also graduate a year early and spend 6 months living life post-UG, and another 6 months prepping for the lsat.