LSAT strategy Forum

[marryJLP92]

What do folks here feel about the following strategy (10 month duration) NB: i've tried and tested this with 1/3rd of what is shown below (i.e. 3m = 1m).

LG: 3 months
LR: 3 months (a few LG's can be exercised periodically during this time)

LG & LR: 1 month (sustaining prior performances when sections were specialized)

RC: 1 month. (mix of both LG & LR can be exercised during this time...say one weekend to keep fresh)

Combination of all three (2 practice tests/week) 1 month.


NB: 1 month left out for periodic breaks. Aggregate duration: 10 months.

[SunDevil14]

I do not think you need to take nearly as long focusing on a single section, one month overview of each subject should be sufficient. I think that specialized practice is fine when your are new to the material and working on your fundamentals. The bulk of your prep should be addressing specific weakness and then taking a practice test to measure progress followed by review and addressing persisting weakness.

Take a look at some of the posts regarding detailed study plans on this forum, no need to reinvent the wheel.

[Voyager]

Dude. I think that is a horrible plan.

You don't learn anything like that.

Is that how you learned to play sports? Just hit groundstrokes for 3 months to the exclusion of all else? Then dropped ground strokes to spend 3 months on volleying and overheads?

Each week you need to do practice in all sections.

[Voyager]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

[SunDevil14]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

I respectfully disagree, so long as he does not burn out and comes up with a better plan then out then 10 months are fine. (Easier said than done) I largely agree that each subject needs to be addressed within the same relative time frame. The exception is that a person with really poor initial diagnostic may benefit from focusing on the subjects one at a time in order to get a grasp of the fundamentals. Surely, 3 months of one section is way too long.

Furthermore, an initial diagnostic and goal would be helpful. Going from a 150 to a 160+ my require a much different plan than 145 to 170+
150 to 160 is reasonable in 3-4 month. 145 to 170 in 3-4 months may not be achievable given how much time a person studies each day coupled with personal aptitudes and abilities.

My 2 cents

[Voyager]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

I respectfully disagree, so long as he does not burn out and comes up with a better plan then out then 10 months are fine. (Easier said than done) I largely agree that each subject needs to be addressed within the same relative time frame. The exception is that a person with really poor initial diagnostic may benefit from focusing on the subjects one at a time in order to get a grasp of the fundamentals. Surely, 3 months of one section is way too long.

Furthermore, an initial diagnostic and goal would be helpful. Going from a 150 to a 160+ my require a much different plan than 145 to 170+
150 to 160 is reasonable in 3-4 month. 145 to 170 in 3-4 months may not be achievable given how much time a person studies each day coupled with personal aptitudes and abilities.

My 2 cents

I don't think I've encountered anyone who has studied for 10 months and done materially better for themselves. There are lots of posts on here of "I'm on my 4th attempt, please advise!"

It just means they wasted 8-9 of those 10 months with a poor study approach or quickly reached their max ability set by years of not taking academics seriously.

Better is to have a disciplined, rigorous 3-4 month program max.

If you can't learn the tactics in 3-4 months for this thing, you won't learn them in 10. And if the problem is larger than tactics/methods (as in, you didn't bother reading much your entire life or never learned how to study) it won't matter if you take 10 months or 10 years, your score is not going up much.

I get focusing 1 week on, say RC, but you can't just not do any drills on anything else... and certainly can't do that for 3 months. Even within that RC week I threw in practice sections on LR and LG regularly.

That's not how I have learned any activity. You need to practice the stuff you learned previously to keep it fresh. SunDevil, you and I agree on most of this actually, I think I just have a different take on how far investing time can get you. I think it stops paying returns much sooner than you do. Happy to read stories of people proving me wrong, though.

Hey OP: as Sundevil proposed, please go look up some of the study guides on here. They will steer you in the right direction. Here's the one I wrote 10 years ago (wow, yeah, it's been 10 years... wow)
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 16#p136016

[SunDevil14]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

I respectfully disagree, so long as he does not burn out and comes up with a better plan then out then 10 months are fine. (Easier said than done) I largely agree that each subject needs to be addressed within the same relative time frame. The exception is that a person with really poor initial diagnostic may benefit from focusing on the subjects one at a time in order to get a grasp of the fundamentals. Surely, 3 months of one section is way too long.

Furthermore, an initial diagnostic and goal would be helpful. Going from a 150 to a 160+ my require a much different plan than 145 to 170+
150 to 160 is reasonable in 3-4 month. 145 to 170 in 3-4 months may not be achievable given how much time a person studies each day coupled with personal aptitudes and abilities.

My 2 cents

I don't think I've encountered anyone who has studied for 10 months and done materially better for themselves. There are lots of posts on here of "I'm on my 4th attempt, please advise!"

It just means they wasted 8-9 of those 10 months with a poor study approach or quickly reached their max ability set by years of not taking academics seriously.

Better is to have a disciplined, rigorous 3-4 month program max.

If you can't learn the tactics in 3-4 months for this thing, you won't learn them in 10. And if the problem is larger than tactics/methods (as in, you didn't bother reading much your entire life or never learned how to study) it won't matter if you take 10 months or 10 years, your score is not going up much.

I get focusing 1 week on, say RC, but you can't just not do any drills on anything else... and certainly can't do that for 3 months. Even within that RC week I threw in practice sections on LR and LG regularly.

That's not how I have learned any activity. You need to practice the stuff you learned previously to keep it fresh. SunDevil, you and I agree on most of this actually, I think I just have a different take on how far investing time can get you. I think it stops paying returns much sooner than you do. Happy to read stories of people proving me wrong, though.

Hey OP: as Sundevil proposed, please go look up some of the study guides on here. They will steer you in the right direction. Here's the one I wrote 10 years ago (wow, yeah, it's been 10 years... wow)
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 16#p136016

Haha, you nailed it.

[SunDevil14]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

I respectfully disagree, so long as he does not burn out and comes up with a better plan then out then 10 months are fine. (Easier said than done) I largely agree that each subject needs to be addressed within the same relative time frame. The exception is that a person with really poor initial diagnostic may benefit from focusing on the subjects one at a time in order to get a grasp of the fundamentals. Surely, 3 months of one section is way too long.

Furthermore, an initial diagnostic and goal would be helpful. Going from a 150 to a 160+ my require a much different plan than 145 to 170+
150 to 160 is reasonable in 3-4 month. 145 to 170 in 3-4 months may not be achievable given how much time a person studies each day coupled with personal aptitudes and abilities.

My 2 cents

I don't think I've encountered anyone who has studied for 10 months and done materially better for themselves. There are lots of posts on here of "I'm on my 4th attempt, please advise!"

It just means they wasted 8-9 of those 10 months with a poor study approach or quickly reached their max ability set by years of not taking academics seriously.

Better is to have a disciplined, rigorous 3-4 month program max.

If you can't learn the tactics in 3-4 months for this thing, you won't learn them in 10. And if the problem is larger than tactics/methods (as in, you didn't bother reading much your entire life or never learned how to study) it won't matter if you take 10 months or 10 years, your score is not going up much.

I get focusing 1 week on, say RC, but you can't just not do any drills on anything else... and certainly can't do that for 3 months. Even within that RC week I threw in practice sections on LR and LG regularly.

That's not how I have learned any activity. You need to practice the stuff you learned previously to keep it fresh. SunDevil, you and I agree on most of this actually, I think I just have a different take on how far investing time can get you. I think it stops paying returns much sooner than you do. Happy to read stories of people proving me wrong, though.

Hey OP: as Sundevil proposed, please go look up some of the study guides on here. They will steer you in the right direction. Here's the one I wrote 10 years ago (wow, yeah, it's been 10 years... wow)
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 16#p136016

^Agree with basically everything above, which likely covers 90%+ of test takers. I just assume by default that people on here are striving for admissions at YHS CCN and a few others. In which case, one may see some benefit to grinding out diminishing returns once they start hitting the 170's.

[somedeadman]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

I respectfully disagree, so long as he does not burn out and comes up with a better plan then out then 10 months are fine. (Easier said than done) I largely agree that each subject needs to be addressed within the same relative time frame. The exception is that a person with really poor initial diagnostic may benefit from focusing on the subjects one at a time in order to get a grasp of the fundamentals. Surely, 3 months of one section is way too long.

Furthermore, an initial diagnostic and goal would be helpful. Going from a 150 to a 160+ my require a much different plan than 145 to 170+
150 to 160 is reasonable in 3-4 month. 145 to 170 in 3-4 months may not be achievable given how much time a person studies each day coupled with personal aptitudes and abilities.

My 2 cents

I don't think I've encountered anyone who has studied for 10 months and done materially better for themselves. There are lots of posts on here of "I'm on my 4th attempt, please advise!"

It just means they wasted 8-9 of those 10 months with a poor study approach or quickly reached their max ability set by years of not taking academics seriously.

Better is to have a disciplined, rigorous 3-4 month program max.

If you can't learn the tactics in 3-4 months for this thing, you won't learn them in 10. And if the problem is larger than tactics/methods (as in, you didn't bother reading much your entire life or never learned how to study) it won't matter if you take 10 months or 10 years, your score is not going up much.

I get focusing 1 week on, say RC, but you can't just not do any drills on anything else... and certainly can't do that for 3 months. Even within that RC week I threw in practice sections on LR and LG regularly.

That's not how I have learned any activity. You need to practice the stuff you learned previously to keep it fresh. SunDevil, you and I agree on most of this actually, I think I just have a different take on how far investing time can get you. I think it stops paying returns much sooner than you do. Happy to read stories of people proving me wrong, though.

Hey OP: as Sundevil proposed, please go look up some of the study guides on here. They will steer you in the right direction. Here's the one I wrote 10 years ago (wow, yeah, it's been 10 years... wow)
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 16#p136016

I typically agree with everything voyager says, but not in this case. It took me about 8 months of studying to reach a point where I finally plateaued (from 146 to 168-172 consistently).

I'm not saying this is the typical case, but I don't see anything wrong with a diligent prolonged study plan. Heck, a lot of people learn better just doing a few hours at a time versus grinding it out.

[SunDevil14]

And 10 months? Aim for 3. 4 max.

I respectfully disagree, so long as he does not burn out and comes up with a better plan then out then 10 months are fine. (Easier said than done) I largely agree that each subject needs to be addressed within the same relative time frame. The exception is that a person with really poor initial diagnostic may benefit from focusing on the subjects one at a time in order to get a grasp of the fundamentals. Surely, 3 months of one section is way too long.

Furthermore, an initial diagnostic and goal would be helpful. Going from a 150 to a 160+ my require a much different plan than 145 to 170+
150 to 160 is reasonable in 3-4 month. 145 to 170 in 3-4 months may not be achievable given how much time a person studies each day coupled with personal aptitudes and abilities.

My 2 cents

I don't think I've encountered anyone who has studied for 10 months and done materially better for themselves. There are lots of posts on here of "I'm on my 4th attempt, please advise!"

It just means they wasted 8-9 of those 10 months with a poor study approach or quickly reached their max ability set by years of not taking academics seriously.

Better is to have a disciplined, rigorous 3-4 month program max.

If you can't learn the tactics in 3-4 months for this thing, you won't learn them in 10. And if the problem is larger than tactics/methods (as in, you didn't bother reading much your entire life or never learned how to study) it won't matter if you take 10 months or 10 years, your score is not going up much.

I get focusing 1 week on, say RC, but you can't just not do any drills on anything else... and certainly can't do that for 3 months. Even within that RC week I threw in practice sections on LR and LG regularly.

That's not how I have learned any activity. You need to practice the stuff you learned previously to keep it fresh. SunDevil, you and I agree on most of this actually, I think I just have a different take on how far investing time can get you. I think it stops paying returns much sooner than you do. Happy to read stories of people proving me wrong, though.

Hey OP: as Sundevil proposed, please go look up some of the study guides on here. They will steer you in the right direction. Here's the one I wrote 10 years ago (wow, yeah, it's been 10 years... wow)
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 16#p136016

I typically agree with everything voyager says, but not in this case. It took me about 8 months of studying to reach a point where I finally plateaued (from 146 to 168-172 consistently).

I'm not saying this is the typical case, but I don't see anything wrong with a diligent prolonged study plan. Heck, a lot of people learn better just doing a few hours at a time versus grinding it out.

I was in a similar situation as you, with a tad higher on the diagnostic and the back end. Kind of where I was coming from in the posts above.