This is the most important point we can make about acing the LSAT. More important than any little tricks and tips, more important than what you have for breakfast the morning of the test, and more important than how much your mom loves you. You must practice a lot for at least three weeks before the test. This means that you must take constant practice exams, and even take each one two or three times. Get your hands on at least 20 former LSATs, and take every single section multiply until you've figured out the patterns. Yes, this is a lot of work, but it's cheap and easy.
Some people lack the self-discipline to just sit and practice, so here's our advice:
* Before you invest in prep books or classes, you should determine your starting score (hey, maybe you'll get a 180, you never know). So download a free sample LSAT and see how you do. (You'll need Adobe Acrobat too.)
* As you take the test, CROSS OUT the answers that you know are wrong as you go along, and try not to skip around too much (it makes it tougher for you to know which questions you answered and which ones you didn't). However, if you get stuck on a particular question, put a huge circle around it and move on.
* Treat your first sample test like the real thing: stick to the time limits, take it in one straight afternoon, and keep the distractions to a minimum.
* After you've taken the practice test, go carefully through every question, and see which ones you got right and which ones you got wrong. Try to find a pattern in your wrong answers. For instance, did you do OK on the games, but you couldn't get to the last 2 sections? Did you miss a lot of reading comprehension questions about the tone of the passage? Did you have problems in the arguments section identifying a parallel line of reasoning?
* Now all you have to do is take more LSATs. By far, the best book to get is the Official LSAT Preptests, which are real LSATs from recent years. There are tons of ways to get copies of previous tests, but the best way is to either get them from the LSAT website or from your local bookstore. Whatever you do, try to get at least 15 practice LSATs in your hands.
* For the first week, don't bother timing yourself. Just take the time you need to finish every question. After all, it does you no good to stay in the time limit if you can't even get the questions right.
* Once you've gotten more comfortable with the questions, start trying to stay under the time limit.
* If you got a particularly bad score on the games section (as most people do their first time), then don't cry; it's the easiest section to improve on, because it's all about familiarity. Just stick to our advice: draw lots of pictures and figure out the rules in advance.
* Early in your practice, feel free to do a section and to immediately check your answers afterward. But as the test date nears, try to do an entire test or two without looking at the answers in between.
* As we said, you have to get your hands on as many tests as possible. It may cost you a few bucks ($100 and over), but it's well worth it. When you're a lawyer, you'll make $100 for picking your nose. You can get the books on the LSAT website. Also, check out amazon.com.
on 9/20/2009
This information is good and dandy to explain the basics of the lsat. I did a ton of research online and I squandered more than $1000 paying Kaplan but my LSAT score remained the same. In the end, only two things worked to jack up my LSAT score one was the PowerScore Logic Games Bible and the second was lsatscientist statistical strategies. Good luck.
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Comments
robinhood26 said
on 9/20/2009 This information is good and dandy to explain the basics of the lsat. I did a ton of research online and I squandered more than $1000 paying Kaplan but my LSAT score remained the same. In the end, only two things worked to jack up my LSAT score one was the PowerScore Logic Games Bible and the second was lsatscientist statistical strategies. Good luck.