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I've been studying on and off since january and I hit a point recently where I was consistently scoring about 172 on some of the PT's. And then, in the last week and a half its like a switch turned off and I can get anything right. Im missing over 15 questions each time plus I can't get any of the games right… is it a good idea to postpone to september? I wanted to be ready for it in June and now I am having doubts… Especially since I haven't even been taking 5 section tests yet.

And is it me or are the games from PT's 30-40 a lot harder than the more recent ones? If you have some advice, please share it with me!

Yeah some of the games are harder.. there are more wildcard games like circular mapping games and one weird one about airplanes flying to and from a series of airports, a game that went wayy beyond the typical grouping game.

Which of the PT's were you getting 172's on? The more recent ones or the older ones? You have the potential man for a great score in June -- just trust yourself, don't cheat yourself in review, and try and master 2 out of the three sections. Month and a half is plenty of time IMO. I'm in a similar boat amigo -- I've been in the high 160's for the past 5 tests and can't seem to consistently break 170.

You know what you're capable of, and you know how much effort you can squeeze out during this month and a half. Don't listen to other people's advice as much as your own. I just decided to give my 2 cents as a means of encouragement because I think a lot of capable high scorers second guess themselves around this time in the study process. It's also about the hours and not so much the time frame. I have literally all of May off, so I know I can do LSAT stuff for 8 hours every day and it will be the equivalent of having, say, 2 more months left. Good luck!

Take a couple days off and try to think of anything besides the LSAT. You might be a little burned out.

dardardelight wrote:Yeah some of the games are harder.. there are more wildcard games like circular mapping games and one weird one about airplanes flying to and from a series of airports, a game that went wayy beyond the typical grouping game.

Which of the PT's were you getting 172's on? The more recent ones or the older ones? You have the potential man for a great score in June -- just trust yourself, don't cheat yourself in review, and try and master 2 out of the three sections. Month and a half is plenty of time IMO. I'm in a similar boat amigo -- I've been in the high 160's for the past 5 tests and can't seem to consistently break 170.

You know what you're capable of, and you know how much effort you can squeeze out during this month and a half. Don't listen to other people's advice as much as your own. I just decided to give my 2 cents as a means of encouragement because I think a lot of capable high scorers second guess themselves around this time in the study process. It's also about the hours and not so much the time frame. I have literally all of May off, so I know I can do LSAT stuff for 8 hours every day and it will be the equivalent of having, say, 2 more months left. Good luck!

Man, thanks for all the advice! I've been making 172's on the older ones, and then today was just really rough.. I ended up not even finishing the test because I was so frustrated after an LG section.. But I'm gonna keep at it and just keep my sights set on June.. You do the same man, and I'm sure it'll be all good. Good luck to you!

deep thorough review is key.

Taking lots of timed PTs is pointless if you're mainly doing it for practice and to test your current score range over and over frequently without also putting a lot of time into trying to change/improve your habits and skills between PTs. The deeper and better review you do and learn from your performance by carefully evaluating it in detail, the faster you figure out your exact weaknesses and can start doing specific things to fix them.

Basically, deep quality review of PT performance along with directed review/drilling focused on weaknesses/mistakes/issues determined from performance is where all the magic happens to find weaknesses, improve your performance skills and score. Spending at least two to three times as much time reviewing as it did to take the PT timed is important to get the most benefit from having taken a practice test for improvement purposes. You have to examine all of your decision making processes and habits in detail to figure out what's working and what isn't so that you can make fine tuning adjustments. Careful review of your step by step thought and decision making processes/reactions/habits/quality and depth of analysis you did/etc. is a time consuming process that requires a lot of self awareness and self evaluation far beyond just looking at the logic behind the CR and attractive trap answers. Evaluating and understanding logically why the CR is correct and the one you picked is wrong is just the simple tip of the iceberg starting point of review.

Make an error log and be as detailed as possible in all the mistakes you made in the processes you applied to solving questions on PTs, ways you could have done things better, time wasting things you did, etc. That is the roadmap for more review/drilling to shore up weaknesses and modify/improve processes before making another attempt at a timed PT, otherwise you'd just be wasting another PT if take another a day or two later.

Focus on getting better at applying reliable question solving/analysis step by step processes, and practicing them in perfect form via drilling more than just prioritizing practicing speed/timing. The more consistently you apply the processes, steps of analysis, etc. properly, the better and more consistent your scores will be. Then you can better isolate your remaining specific process/logic knowledge/understanding weaknesses/mistakes that are getting in the way of higher score range to put attention on.

The DL;DR version: do lots of deep thorough review, learn from your mistakes from every timed PT, do some drilling and review to work on those weaknesses before taking another PT. Lather rinse repeat with super deep thorough review.

yeslekkkk wrote:Take a couple days off and try to think of anything besides the LSAT. You might be a little burned out.

This. Take a few days off, then come back to it.

Certainly heed the above-mentioned advice! I know exactly how you feel because I was experiencing the same feelings a few days ago. If you feel overwhelmed and frustrated, then taking additional PTs and scoring well will not do much to ameliorate your problems. As Jeffort said, spend twice or three times the amount of time on reviewing your mistakes and ascertaining your weaknesses. If you're not reviewing in a similar style to this approach, advocated by Dave Hall in his 5th FAQ answer http://www.velocitylsat.com/frequently-asked-questions, then you're not doing it right.

I'm sure when you review your mistakes, a great deal of the time your smacking your forehead and cursing at the fact that you got some certain question wrong - everything in hindsight is 20-20. Dave's approach and that of many other's allows you to take away hindsight from the equation and improve real-time perception.

I know the LSAC has a certain date for you to reschedule or withdraw your registration, but if it is financially feasible, continue with your studies until the last day or couple of days and don't withdraw. The reason is that with the approaching test date pressure and months of preparation, something inside of you may just click and fall into place. You may finish your sections in time or finish with greater time, greater accuracy, etc. Granted you wont have the steady report of PT's demonstrating your ability to score in your intended goal range, but if you're feeling ready and confident, I would advise to stick with it. But obviously, if nothing changes or your tests, even at the last minute are not indicative of your desired score, then withdraw and reschedule.

Also, to mitigate the stress of the entire process, the best coping mechanism I've found is to think about it less. Sounds implausible? I'll explain. Stress is partly a perception issue - also concerning your own abilities and resources to cope with the issue. If you perceive the stress as overwhelming, well, it certainly will be as such. Now part of it is believing that you can indeed overcome this stress. But getting to the point, the way you mitigate the stress is by reducing the amount you think about it. Strategize and determine the necessary course of action to allow the achievement of your goal - research, contemplate, etc. Once you've completed this phase, pursue the outlined strategy and stop thinking about the stress. You do yourself no favors by constantly thinking about the fact that you wont make it, you're only drilling your subconscious with negative thoughts. Now, I'm not saying be a blind optimist and just hope for the best - certainly make any changes you see fit to your strategy. BUT, aside from those changes, all you can do is follow your program and give it your all. When your test day comes, you can make your final decision on how to continue. But by following this practice, your giving yourself a better shot at achieving your goal rather than constantly thinking about the crippling considerations of the stress.

Hope this is helpful to you and everyone out there! I wish you all the best!