Missing LR questions with no real identifiable pattern. Forum

[TheThriller]

So, I haven't posted on here a lot but I read most of the threads. Anyways, here is my issue:

I am at the point in my prep where I am taking PTs 3 times a week and light drilling on my off days. I do not believe I am experiencing burnout and am actually pretty excited to wake up every morning and drill/take a PT because I want to see myself improve.

However, my LR is really holding me back and dropping my overall PT scores. I usually am -2 through -4 on RC and -0 or -1 on LG per PT and/or timed drill section. However my LR is usually -6+ per section timed while being -2 through -4 without time restraints. What this amounts to on PTs is -12 sum total for my LR sections, knocking me out of the 170s.

I can honestly say that I am super frustrated that I haven't seen any improvement within the last 3 weeks in my LR. I have read the LR bible early on in my prep (march). There seems to be no pattern in the questions I am missing (in other words, it's not like I suck at JUST weaken or flaw or assumption questions, there seems to be an even distribution of suckyness). I always thought that in my just drilling and taking PTs the questions would just click and I would be able to easily distinguish what LSAC wanted as the right and wrong answers (this is how I approached the ACT and SAT).

Does anyone have any insight on possible ways to combat this and lower my amount of missed questions?

These may help in your (expert) assessment:

I do not prephrase, it has never made much sense to me
I was scoring better on older (20s, 30s) LR then on these newer (PT 40s,50+)

[jbates14]

I had the same issue when I originally started doing full LR sections. I found that my problem was that I was too concerned with the time constraint. I was rushing and simply not paying enough attention to detail. Recently, I somewhat slowed down my pace and it seemed like doing RC sections made it easier for me to pace myself efficiently. Also, reviewing after each section caused me to see an improvement far greater than waiting till after a complete PT or a couple LR sections. I think that some people on this site over-emphasize the importance of doing it in accordance to how it will be on the actual test. If you are taking the June test, you have plenty of time to complete PTs in full test conditions. If you are trying to achieve over a 170 then a complete review of each question that you got wrong or struggled on would be more beneficial immediately after the section instead of waiting till you've gone through multiple sections. I found that the older tests were slightly easier so it is not strange that you did better on older PTs.

Just a side note, there are some question types where a prephrase could save you a lot of time so that you can spend more time on difficult questions. I am currently experimenting on prephrasing questions during my review of completed sections to see if I could potentially improve on the prephasing enough to be able to complete sections in much shorter periods so that I could review harder ones.

[jigglebottom]

I feel you man..Im currently busting balls trying to get my LR score up. Heres something that I looked into this morning from another thread. I mean.. we all know the basics, and even advanced tips.. sometimes we just need a new emphasis!


McDidd says:

My gains in LR came from the following (or at least what I can verbally pinpoint)
-- Reading the question first. - A lot of prep companies are against this, except Velocity. When I started doing this, my reading of the stimulus was more directed and focused. I was able to pre-phrase my answers in many more cases and therefore, my accuracy increased non-trivially because I wasn't falling for the catchy trap answers.

--Don't spend time staring at answer choices you know are wrong - I usually can eliminate 2 or 3 answer choices within the first 10-15 seconds of reviewing the different choices. If you have a gut feeling its wrong, get rid of it and don't fret time. With the remaining answer choices, you should be able to understand exactly why one of them is right. If you can, pick it and move on. If you can't then you should stop and go back and look at the ones you originally eliminated for a few seconds. But, I have found that 9 times out of ten, your intiial gut instinct about the choices is correct and in the long run, this saves you a large amount of time.

--Language strength - Each type of question generally has a corresponding language strength that you would expect to see in the stimulus. Must be true questions, for instance, have strong language in the stimulus and the correct answer choices are usually less strong. Sufficient Assumption questions, on the other hand, are the exact opposite. Learn these different patterns and use them to your advantage.

--10 in 10 and if possible, 15 in 15.. This, in my opinion is vital. If you can finish the first 15 questions in 15 minutes with perfect accuracy, you are setting yourself up for perfect LR sections over and over again.

--Less Diagramming (THIS IS ENTIRELY A PERSONAL PREFERENCE AND DEFINITELY DOESN'T APPLY TO EVERYONE) - My LR scores increased when I stopped thinking of the question stems in such a rigid, scientific manner. This is probably the exact opposite of what many people try to do, but I don't think well like this. Unless the question stimulus is highly conditional in nature, I DO NOT diagram. I feel I have more success thinking through it logically in my head rather than trying to figure out and waste time representing it visually. This is probably not the case for most people though, so I would not consider this good advice. But maybe, it could help someone.

and... that's all I can think of atm.

[Tiago Splitter]

--10 in 10 and if possible, 15 in 15.. This, in my opinion is vital. If you can finish the first 15 questions in 15 minutes with perfect accuracy, you are setting yourself up for perfect LR sections over and over again.

I'd normally point to this too but six or more wrong per section is a lot.

For each one you miss, go back and drill 10-15 of that type.

[naillsat]

for most of th LR sets i did timed, i could finish first 15 in 15 minutes with 0 or 1 missing. but tend to miss 2 or 3 from #20. Most of them are due to carelessness, more like due to my fatigued brain. meh....

[shifty_eyed]

If you haven't already done so, review the Superprep test explanations carefully. Also, going back and rereading the LR Bible might help. I go back and reread the highlights/summary at the end of the relevant section sometimes when reviewing a PT question and find it helps. Finally, I do prephrase and this has increased my speed.

Drilling by question type may help increase your speed/accuracy/prephrasing ability even if you don't always consistently miss certain question types.

[humbugger]

...
I do not prephrase, it has never made much sense to me...

Dude, that's a problem.

Certain question types, especially the easier assumption/flaw questions, are 100% easier if you can prephrase. You can save a lot of time by knocking these questions out of the way quickly.

Also, I agree with jigglebottom that diagramming is a waste of time except on the strict formal logic questions.

[TheThriller]

Just an update:

I tried the method of reading the question stem first and then reading the argument. I found that this FORCED me to prephrase. I scored -2 and -3 on my timed sections today.

Thanks for that advice, I know others warn against it but it worked for me on this PT (41). I will see if the trend carries over to my #50+ PTs.

Thanks for all the help! Any more tips would be awesome.

[naillsat]

Just an update:

I tried the method of reading the question stem first and then reading the argument. I found that this FORCED me to prephrase. I scored -2 and -3 on my timed sections today.

Thanks for that advice, I know others warn against it but it worked for me on this PT (41). I will see if the trend carries over to my #50+ PTs.

Thanks for all the help! Any more tips would be awesome.

The consensus is the LR sections in PT 40+ are generally easier.