June 2011 Study Group Forum

[Eichörnchen]

Sorry bout the drop Gev, it happens unfortunately. At least you know it was an off night cause your level is much higher. Just make sure you relax and don't dwell on it.

And yea, don't forget your picture. At least we won't have inky thumbs

[Neidermeyer519]

PT 54

Reading Comp: 23/27 (-4)
Logic Reasoning 1 : 24/26 (-2)
Logic Games : 22/23 (-1)
Logic Reasoning 2 : 23/25 (-2)

Raw Score: 92
Scaled Score 171

This was my first time breaking into the 170's. Pretty excited about it, especially since ky first LSAT was a 152.

[pkpop]

Is it just me or are these tests harder than the ones in the 30s? Maybe I am just not doing well after taking a break for the weekend. I am in the chat room if anyone wants to join me.

IMO there is something a *bit* different about the newest tests. I couldn't tell you what exactly it is, but honestly this is EXACTLY why I suggested the group do a few of the newer tests now and review the material rather than waiting until mid-late may to hit that PT50s "wall" and start to panic a couple weeks before the test. I had the same experience when I was going into December. I cruised through some of the 40s tests, but when I started taking a few of late 50s just weeks before the LSAT, I started scoring lower and really did not know what to put my finger on. Averages scores slightly lower across the whole test, even on LG sections I would get -3 or -4 wrong. This in turn caused less confidence and more prep when, at that point in time, I needed more confidence and less prep.

Just think, it's better to have the slight drop now, find out what happened, and correct it moving forward with a couple months to go.

Just my $0.02.

[99.9luft]

Pt 41: -7
Pt 57: -13

Fml, so pissed. More details to come after tomorrow's review and a less angry mood.

[Eichörnchen]

Weird so apparently all of us have seen a drop these past few days and are pissed. Must be something in the water 'round these parts haha

edit: except for Neidermeyer apparently. Jerk.

[geverett]

take pt 57. then we will talk

[Neidermeyer519]

Weird so apparently all of us have seen a drop these past few days and are pissed. Must be something in the water 'round these parts haha

edit: except for Neidermeyer apparently. Jerk.

Haha, don't worry, I expect a drop to occur at anytime. Most likely it will be test day :/ lol

[Neidermeyer519]

take pt 57. then we will talk

Will do. I'll probably take it next week, and after your report, I expect my soul to be shattered. :/

[Eichörnchen]

Weird so apparently all of us have seen a drop these past few days and are pissed. Must be something in the water 'round these parts haha

edit: except for Neidermeyer apparently. Jerk.

Haha, don't worry, I expect a drop to occur at anytime. Most likely it will be test day :/ lol

Haha noooooo! I hope not for your sake.

[geverett]

i am kicking myself as i review some of these. some really silly answers here.

[Neidermeyer519]

Weird so apparently all of us have seen a drop these past few days and are pissed. Must be something in the water 'round these parts haha

edit: except for Neidermeyer apparently. Jerk.

Haha, don't worry, I expect a drop to occur at anytime. Most likely it will be test day :/ lol

Haha noooooo! I hope not for your sake.

Haha thanks that makes two of us. What range are you PT'ing in?

[Eichörnchen]

Hmm I think it's been 160, 162, 163, 171, 168, 165. The biggest hurdle for me is LG- they are pretty much the only difference between that 171 and 165. Just depends how absolutely horribly I do on them.

[geverett]

Going over yesterday's epic fail. The wording on the newer stuff is definitely of a different sort then from other PT's I have encountered. They probably made one of their chief LR writers take early retirement b/c his material was starting to become old hat. I know that's an unwarranted assumption, but still . . .

[geverett]

PT 57 Section 2 #24. I have been trying to wrap my head around it for a while. There are glimmers of it revealing it's secrets, but I have yet to understand it fully.

[Eichörnchen]

Going over yesterday's epic fail. The wording on the newer stuff is definitely of a different sort then from other PT's I have encountered. They probably made one of their chief LR writers take early retirement b/c his material was starting to become old hat. I know that's an unwarranted assumption, but still . . .

Yikes I fear the new tests! I haven't done any yet. Maybe I should revamp my PT schedule and add some new ones soon.

[geverett]

I will have my vengeance.

[jim-green]

I will have my vengeance.

Did u do PT56? I think it is the easiest of the 62 PTs. What do u think?

[geverett]

Have not done it. I am reviewing PT 57 heavily. It is my nemesis. Also mis-diagramming rules is my achilles' heel.

[mickeyD]

June will be my first time taking the LSAT, and obviously I hope it is my last. But just in case a retake is necessary, how many PTs should I leave untouched for a potential October testing? I've currently taken 10, but haven't taken any of the 15 newest tests. If I save 5, will 10 of the newest PTs be enough from now until June? I also have SuperPrep C left to do and a couple others that I've avoided doing the questions for, so more like 13, with the last 3 being from various years.

Anyways, gonna do lots of drilling this week in Must Be True LR questions, taking SuperPrep C this Saturday. Games are my weak point and people say that the SuperPrep series has some tough sets of games.

March 3, SuperPrep A: 171 (-4 LG)
March 9, SuperPrep B: 175 (-3 LG)
March 16, SuperPrep C: ____

My problem is that since I know the average game should be in less than 8:45 (i train to finish under 7:30), when I look at the clock and see that I'm not on pace, I freak out. But are some games designed to take longer than others? Like do you guys think that on a given test, you would expect one hard grouping game to take 9-11 minutes, and a basic linear game to take 5-7 minutes?

[coldshoulder]

June will be my first time taking the LSAT, and obviously I hope it is my last. But just in case a retake is necessary, how many PTs should I leave untouched for a potential October testing? I've currently taken 10, but haven't taken any of the 15 newest tests. If I save 5, will 10 of the newest PTs be enough from now until June? I also have SuperPrep C left to do and a couple others that I've avoided doing the questions for, so more like 13, with the last 3 being from various years.

Anyways, gonna do lots of drilling this week in Must Be True LR questions, taking SuperPrep C this Saturday. Games are my weak point and people say that the SuperPrep series has some tough sets of games.

March 3, SuperPrep A: 171 (-4 LG)
March 9, SuperPrep B: 175 (-3 LG)
March 16, SuperPrep C: ____

My problem is that since I know the average game should be in less than 8:45 (i train to finish under 7:30), when I look at the clock and see that I'm not on pace, I freak out. But are some games designed to take longer than others? Like do you guys think that on a given test, you would expect one hard grouping game to take 9-11 minutes, and a basic linear game to take 5-7 minutes?

Damn, with those scores why would you save any tests for October? Seriously though, use the most recent ones for your June test, plan to take the LSAT once and kick its ass. If you need to retake, you can use the same tests over again, no big deal.
As far as timing on LG, your second point is correct. I'll budget myself 5-7 minutes for the first two games, that way I have more time for the more likely to be difficult third and fourth games.

Also, as you may have seen, the Superprep LG are generally deemed more difficult than the rest of the tests. If those are the only questions you're missing now...enjoy 180 in June.

[Eichörnchen]

Firstly, this +1:

Damn, with those scores why would you save any tests for October?

And I'm so jealous of this:

As far as timing on LG, your second point is correct. I'll budget myself 5-7 minutes for the first two games, that way I have more time for the more likely to be difficult third and fourth games.

[geverett]

RC is still a weakness.

[Hunterrhoid]

PT 57 Section 2 #24. I have been trying to wrap my head around it for a while. There are glimmers of it revealing it's secrets, but I have yet to understand it fully.

The necessary assumption question asks you to bridge the gap in the reasoning of the stim, right? Where is the gap?

Paragraph Structure:
1st premise: sometimes readers believe a poem expresses contradictory ideas, even if the poem is great.
Conclusion: It's wrong to think the meaning of the poem is what the author intends to communicate.
2nd premise: Great poems aren't intended to express contradictory ideas.

The gap is that readers believing something about a poem is equated to the 'meaning' of the poem. How do they get from one to the other? Why is the author of the stim so sure that the definition of 'meaning' as: 'the author's intent in writing poetry' is wrong?

He assumes that meaning can't be totally divorced from the readers' beliefs.

All that being said, I would never go through all that bullshit to answer this question. The speed answer here is that ACs A-D are flawed:

A - This one is flawed twice, but you should kill it as soon as you see 'usually'. The stim says 'sometimes' and is very tentative about certainty in regards to readers. This is a necessary assumption question so levels of certainty should match.

The choice is also flawed because it talks about conflict between readers, where the stim speaks about a single reader perceiving the poem as conflicted within itself.

B - This isn't an unstated assumption in the argument so much as a paraphrase of the last sentence. By being a paraphrase, it certainly doesn't bridge any gap (you can know this about it even if you aren't able to identify the gap in the stim!)

C - Readers' assessments of the author's intent are never given in the argument, and the argument actually divides readers' beliefs from author's intent in the 2nd statement (the conclusion). Furthermore, this whole assumption could be false and it would have no effect on the argument. Basically, all readers in the world can do whatever they want (as long as at least one reader sees 2 contradictory ideas in at least one great poem, ever), and this whole argument stays consistent.

Also, this AC is, I think, written in an entangling way to snag you. Strategy: see that it's all about readers (who are only a small part of this argument) mark it for deletion, and reconsider if you don't find anything else. Check it one more time before you move on.

D - 'Every'? Get rid of it. The stim is only absolute about the 3rd statement and that statement is about author's intent. The reader doesn't need to discern every idea in the poem for this argument. They need to "sometimes" discern a minimum of two (2) ideas that contradict.

E - This bridges the gap. Even if you haven't identified the gap, and don't know what's going on here, you can match the key words 'believe' and 'meaning' to the 1st and 2nd statements, and you'll see that they help glue the concepts together.

What's important here is that even if you can't find the gap in the argument, you can still eliminate 4 ACs, and quickly.

[Ginj]

Finished PT 54...

167.

LR left me with -10.

*sigh*

So very sad. Haven't gone over it yet. As always, I'm likely to find that I almost picked the correct answer and then decided against it.

Sad for meeeeeeeeee.

[zanzbar]

I guess I am the odd man since I was one of the few who saw a major improvment on PT 57. Last night during review I realized I had marked 1 wrong I actually got right so I actually got a raw of 80 with scaled of 163 so we will all just mark this test as a fluke. Don't worry about the test guys yall will go back to scoring in the high 160s while I return to being stuck back in the high 150s.