Logic Games are Ruining My Score. About to Give Up Forum

[rubydandun]

Hi all,

I'm retaking from a cancel in 09 and LG have always been a horrific experience for me. I get around -3 per LR section and -3 per RC and when it comes to LG...

My mind just doesn't work that way.

I can't memorize/internalize the rules and this causes me to have to refer back constantly, makes it hard to connect inferences, and generally makes me really, really slow. I've gone through the LGB once and am going through it again now, and my plan is to:

Read the pertinent LGB section (e.g., linear balanced) - do every linear balanced game ever, with 2 copies for a later visit - and so on and so forth.

I'm hoping that with blunt repetition I can maybe, maybe get a decent score on game day. Any advice on NATURALLY BAD lg people? I'm so upset that the section people find easiest/gimme points will be my downfall

[bk1]

The best I can say for LG is practice practice practice.

[Veyron]

Give up. Find another career path.

[MrPapagiorgio]

The LG section is the hardest for most people in the beginning. But it is also the most learnable section. Keep at it. The LG Bible helped raised my score on retake from 156 to 169. If you say that you "can't memorize or internalize" the rules, you have not practiced as much as you need to.

[nshapkar]

When reviewing the examples in the bible try to understand the inferences that they point out, don't simply read over them. Take a couple of minutes to understand it. After a while you should see patterns repeating themselves. Also, I don't agree with some people saying memorize the rules. Do what you have to do, write them out, but as far as memorizing I don't do, especially on games where every rule is a conditional statement. Simply build the concrete ones into the diagram, and the other ones should kind of stick to memory around the 2nd or 3rd question in the game....that worked for me, after the second set I have looked back relatively quick at the rules and by that point they were ingrained, BUT I was working on the questions throughout the process. Hope this helps.

[OnlyLivingBoyinNY]

Hi all,

I'm retaking from a cancel in 09 and LG have always been a horrific experience for me. I get around -3 per LR section and -3 per RC and when it comes to LG...

My mind just doesn't work that way.

I can't memorize/internalize the rules and this causes me to have to refer back constantly, makes it hard to connect inferences, and generally makes me really, really slow. I've gone through the LGB once and am going through it again now, and my plan is to:

Read the pertinent LGB section (e.g., linear balanced) - do every linear balanced game ever, with 2 copies for a later visit - and so on and so forth.

I'm hoping that with blunt repetition I can maybe, maybe get a decent score on game day. Any advice on NATURALLY BAD lg people? I'm so upset that the section people find easiest/gimme points will be my downfall

I am borrowing this method from pithypike, but I would suggest Kaplan's Mastery book. You can use it to do a bunch of the same type of games in a row, thus enabling you to develop a rhythm and familiarity with each type of game.

[mac35352]

My only advice to you will be to stop saying you can't and you are not wired for it. It's useless when you know you need to it if you want to do well. You are obviously smart enough if you can do well in the other sections.
Practice practice practice

[Eugenie Danglars]

You said you reviewed the relevant sections in the bible. I suggest you work through the whole thing, cover to cover (don't get too wrapped up in categorizing games). Do their practice games then work through the explanation so it makes sense. Then do the game again. Also, don't time yourself. You don't need the added stress of time until you have the confidence that you can do it. Good luck!

I improved super dramatically on LG: something like -12 on my first test to near perfect on my last LSAT. If you want more specific help, PM me.

[SanDiegoJake]

Hey Ruby,

I've been teaching LSAT courses for 15 years (Princeton Review) and have seen this situation many times before. Don't give up. With your performance in the other sections of the test, it would be a shame to abandon your law school aspirations over these silly puzzles.

What you need is a method of attacking these games that makes sense for you. While I'm admittedly completely unfamiliar with other approaches to the games section, a few of your comments struck me as techniques that will never work. (Of course, that doesn't mean that those techniques are useless. In my experience, some techniques work for people who self report as "good" at games, while different techniques work for people who self report as "bad" at games.)

Namely, for you, the technique of "memorizing the rules" will never work. Instead, you need to think of these games as visual / spatial-relational puzzles. That is to say that you want to work these games with your eyes and your pencil as well as your brain. Rather than attempt to memorize the rules, symbolize them according to what they look like visually. For instance, if a rule says that X always arrives directly before Y, draw a box with XY inside it. Do this for all the clues, and then check every symbol for every question.

Additionally, when you say that "your brain doesn't work that way", my response to that would be to stop trying to train your mind to work that way. Instead, use your eyes and your pencil. For instance, when a question says, "If X arrives second, which one of the following could be true?", draw it out in your chart (Um, if you're not using a chart to answer questions, then that's your whole problem right there.) When I say "draw it out", what I mean is that you want to chart the possibilities of what could be true. Usually, there is some rule that limits the number of possibilities to 3 or fewer. Write them out instead of trying to keep it all in your head.

I have lots of advice/experience/time to help, so let me know if you'd like to hear more. Also, you may be interested in something I'll be debuting in the next few weeks. It's called "Game of the Week", and I'll be doing a different LSAT game each week in my online classroom. Attendance will be free to anybody. More on that to come in its own dedicated thread once details are finalized.

You can do this Ruby. The problem is not with your mind, but with your approach to the section as a whole.

[Kurst]

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 4#p3980688

[BrianGriffintheDog]

Maybe LGB method, which works great for most people, isn't well suited for you. Why don't you try using methods by different companies? I've taken kaplan prep course the first time I studied and used the bibles the second time I studied, I can say that they're somewhat similar but at the same time slightly different. I think you should just look for different methods. Don't give up just yet. Logic games are supposedly one area that is likely to bring greatest improvement and easiest place to bring up your score. Try blueprint, testmasters, kaplan, princeton review, even one of those less popular ones (lsat book for dummies). Try all kinds of shit.

If you can score that well on LR & RC, you shouldn't have any problem eventually grasping LGs.

Good luck

[rubydandun]

Thank you everyone for your fantastic advice. So do you suggest not doing any timing at all until I am fully comfortable with the inferences?

To elaborate on my problem:

I have trouble managing all the moving parts. I'll know that N can't go in slot 1, but when i draw up a hypothetical next to a local question, I'll forget that N can't go in 1. Small mistakes like this, and a general lack of attention to detail, really screws me. Hoping that I can really hone in on the technique and just do so many of these that getting the inferences becomes second nature.

It'd be a dream to get -4 or -5, would set me on the right path.

[Eugenie Danglars]

Thank you everyone for your fantastic advice. So do you suggest not doing any timing at all until I am fully comfortable with the inferences?

To elaborate on my problem:

I have trouble managing all the moving parts. I'll know that N can't go in slot 1, but when i draw up a hypothetical next to a local question, I'll forget that N can't go in 1. Small mistakes like this, and a general lack of attention to detail, really screws me. Hoping that I can really hone in on the technique and just do so many of these that getting the inferences becomes second nature.

It'd be a dream to get -4 or -5, would set me on the right path.

To disagree a little with some of the advice here, I think the methods are working ok for you, but you just need more practice. Don't time. Take your steps slowly and be very careful. You'll get more right and build your confidence. I used to have the same problem (Like choosing NMPOQ as an answer when the very first rule says "N is not first.") For me, it was getting nervous and jittery and rushing that led to these errors. Try doing them slowly and following all the steps you've learned carefully and see if it helps before you chuck out all you've learned to learn a new method (which, imo, could be very confusing).

For example, to use the scenario above, your main diagram would be like so:

___ ___ ___ ___ ___
-N

right?

So when you go to make a hypothetical next to a question, copy the exact same diagram. If you're not rushing you'll take the time to do this, and you'll see right there that N can't be in one.

Hope that makes sense