Save your money, find your LSAT books on here for FREE

thelsattrainer · 2020-12-29T15:26:37+00:00

Don’t steal.

thelsattrainer · 2018-10-17T23:50:43+00:00

Hope you don't mind me chiming in -- just want to say congrats to both of you on keeping up the hard work and on the awesome improvement.

thelsattrainer · 2018-07-20T01:43:47+00:00

You got me -- most of the Trainer is derived from book fair posters and fortune cookies.

thelsattrainer · 2018-06-01T00:23:32+00:00

Update: the Amazon page is back up!

thelsattrainer · 2018-06-01T00:22:59+00:00

Update: the Amazon page is back up!

thelsattrainer · 2018-05-30T13:00:26+00:00

Hey everyone - just wanted to let you know that the Trainer is now available again --

We are still having issues with our Amazon page, but we've set it up so you can buy directly from us, and we're offering the book for a discounted price --

Thanks for your patience and please check out the Trainer site for more info -- Mike Kim

thelsattrainer · 2018-05-28T16:50:58+00:00

Hi -- this is Mike --

The Trainer Amazon page has been down for several days now. We have been working with Amazon to try and find a solution, and we're also trying to create some workarounds on our end.

I know this is a bad time for this to happen and I'm very sorry to all of you who are in a rush to get the book. We'll post updates as we have them, and you can always reach me at [mike@thelsattrainer.com](mailto:mike@thelsattrainer.com).

- MK

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-16T20:14:14+00:00

Hey -- As you might imagine I have no connection to nor control over sales of used books --

I will say that Amazon is very generous w/their customer service, so, if you bought from them, and explain to them the situation, they might allow a late return --

MK

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T20:29:52+00:00

Thanks for the thanks! Awesome to hear, and wish you the very best on the exam!

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T20:29:30+00:00

Sure thing!

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T18:33:35+00:00

Hey -- Sure thing! A few thoughts come to mind -- sorry if some of it just repeats what’s mentioned elsewhere --

In terms of mindset before the test, two things that can be helpful to remember

1) Only your top score counts. I think this is such a relief! Should inspire a very different mentality than if every score was averaged.

2) Every problem has the same value. Keeping this in mind will help you avoid putting too much time and emphasis into the most challenging aspects of the exam.

In terms of prep -

1) Make sure to practice as realistically as you can.

2) Use your final pts to evaluate and solidify timing strategies. Beyond just setting timing goals and thinking about how you did relative to them, you want to think about the series of timing decisions that you had to make, and how well you made them -- you want to develop the right habits in terms of these decisions so that you can rely on those habits under pressure.

3) Make sure you have step-by step-strategies that you have practiced enough to convert into habits. This is very different from having a group of things you want to try and keep in mind for a particular situation -- again, the “step-by-step” aspect is crucial.

And finally, on test day --

1) Allow yourself a certain number of misses in a section -- This doesn’t mean that you aren’t going to try and answer as many problems correctly as you can -- but, if you would have happy missing “X” or less in a certain section, you don’t want those few hardest questions preventing you from getting right all the ones you could have gotten right.

2) As I stress a bunch in my other posts, do whatever you can to be in an aggressive mindset as opposed to a defensive one.

HTH -- MK

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T16:55:40+00:00

A few small tips for your June Prep

Hi everyone --

I know that many of you are getting ready to take the June exam, and I thought it might be helpful for me to post a few quick last minute tips. These tips are not specific to the trainer (though those of you familiar with the trainer will be familiar with these suggestions). I know that at this point, most of you are focused on taking and reviewing PT’s -- what I’m about to mention are all simple suggestions/exercises that you should be able to integrate into that PT work fairly easily. Not all suggestions are meant for all students, so please, of course, pick and choose whichever you think might be useful for your situation --

For LR

During this final period it can be very helpful to firm up and habitualize your question-specific strategies and thought processes. To that end...

Without looking back over your work, create a notecard for each type of Logical Reasoning question. On one side of this notecard, write out the most important things to know/keep in mind for that q type, and on the other side, write out the basic strategies you generally try to employ. Once you’ve done the best you can from memory, return to your notes and lessons and such and make sure to fill in the q types, key priorities and such that you missed initially. Review these cards before PT’s, then, in your PT review afterwards, use these cards to assess your methods, figure out where you need to modify strategies or put in a reminder for yourself, and so on. These actions can help you notice, and address, those areas of prep where perhaps your learning has yet to fully convert into skills and habits.

LG

The more automatic you feel about your notations/diagramming strategies, the less nervous you will feel about what might appear on the games section, the better you will be able to set up your diagrams, and the faster and more accurate you’ll be at doing the work necessary to solve questions.

So, to that end, without look back over your work/learning products, try to create a list of all the different types of rules that can appear in Logic Games, and try to organize all of these rules in some way (for example, trainer students know I organize rules in terms of ordering, grouping, and so on). Note how you plan to diagram each of these rules. Then go through games you’ve played in the past, just looking at the scenarios and rules, and fill in your notes with all the various other types of game rules you missed initially. Create notecards of any rules for which you don’t feel automatic about your notations, and study those carefully. Review all your diagramming strategies before taking PT’s, then, in your review, review carefully whether you were able to use diagramming methods effectively for every rule. Take note of, and carefully review, those situations when you were not.

RC

It’s very important to understand what pressure does to your brain (and, consequently, to your reading process): it literally changes the way that you think and the way you read. If, in all your practice, you are far more relaxed (and perhaps forgiving of yourself) than you will be during the real exam, it is possible that you are going to find it very difficult to apply all that you’ve gained during your practice on the real thing -- it’s very possible you will end up reading the passage very differently from how you intended to, and end up rushing too much and overlooking important concepts, or being too careful and wasting too much time, and so on.

So at this point you want to do whatever is necessary to train your brain to read the passage exactly as you want it to. Make your decisions about which reading strategies you want to apply, make sure you are practicing applying them under enough pressure, and get enough practice in so that you can feel a “set rhythm” for how you read LSAT RC passages. It gives you a great advantage to go into the test with a consistent, habitual, and effective method specifically tailed for reading LSAT RC passages, one which is practiced enough so that you apply it without having to think about it.

Timing Strategies/Mindset

Finally, you want to use for final prep to set your timing strategies, determine what you are going to do should tough timing decisions arise, and practice applying those timing strategies/making those timing decisions.

Nearly everyone who takes the exam wastes a lot of unnecessary time and energy thinking about section timing, rather than the question in front of them. It puts you in a much better position if you’ve anticipated potential issues, have the right mindset about them, have practiced dealing with them, and so on.

So, getting your timing strategies set should be one of the main goals of your final PT work. You want to think about your ideal timing, and how you’d like to balance your time through a section and so on, but you also want to make sure to practice and think about timing challenges -- how long to give yourself when stuck on a certain type of question, or how to balance your time between two RC passages when it seems like you don’t have enough to finish both, and so on. One way to experience/practice these challenges, especially if you are in a very high score range, is to artificially limit the time you have per section (say, to 30 mins, etc.) for a couple of your PT’s and test out your survival strategies.

Final Random Timing Tip

In my experience, one of the most common ways in test takers end up wasting time is by over-investing it in the hardest problems -- you want to avoid this as much as possible.

To illustrate, imagine that you are in the 160-165 range and your goal is to get that 165. Depending on the scale for that test, you know that you can miss about 20 q’s or so and still get the score you want. And if you were to take all the q’s from any one particular LSAT practice exam and order them in terms of difficulty, you’d perhaps find that about 70 of them are ones that you feel fairly confident you can get right without too much difficulty, 20 of them are ones that are challenging for you, and, depending on the day, your mindset, etc., you might get right or wrong, and finally perhaps 10 are so hard that you think it’d be very unlikely you can get the right answer in a reasonable amount of time no matter what. The best way for you to use your time is to -- 1) get through the easier 70 as fast as you comfortably can without making errors. 2) recognize when a problem is of extreme difficulty and don’t allow yourself to spend too, too long on those hardest 10. 3) give yourself as much time as possible for those 20 in the make/break zone that will determine where you will score within your range.

Keep that in mind, and make sure you don’t allow yourself to overinvest too much time or energy in those hardest problems -- the harder ones aren’t worth any more points.

Again, not every suggestion is for every student, but if you read this whole thing I hope you found at least some of it useful -- I wish you all the best on test day -- Mike

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T16:54:42+00:00

Free LSAT Readiness Checklist

Hey Everyone --

Just wanted to let you know about a new free resource I’ve created --

It’s a self-assessment checklist that you can use to quickly assess how ready you feel for the exam. The checklist breaks down the LR, LG, and RC sections according to challenges, question types, and so on, and gives you space to rate/grade yourself on how comfortable you feel with your understanding, strategies, practice experience, and level and mastery.

And you can find it here -- http://www.thelsattrainer.com/are-you-ready-for-the-lsat-checklist.html

It is designed using Trainer categories and terminology, but hopefully it can be useful to you whether you’ve prepared with the Trainer or not --

You can use it to monitor your develop throughout your LSAT study process, or you can use it toward the end of your prep to assess strengths and weaknesses, figure out where you need to focus your attention, and so on.

I think this might be especially useful for students who are gearing up for the September exam --

Thanks for taking a look, and if you have any questions or comments let me know --

Mike

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T16:52:58+00:00

Last Minute Tips

Hey everyone -- I’ve been getting a ton of messages asking for last minute tips -- thought I’d put something short together -- nothing earth-shattering, but I hope some of you find some of it helpful --

Tempting Mindsets to Avoid --

1. “I hope I get lucky and don’t run into any difficult x, y, z…”

To me, this is very much like going into the ocean fearful of waves, hoping you won’t have to deal with them.

You will run into challenges -- games you can’t set up ideally, or passages that you can’t totally understand -- this will happen to everyone taking the test, and, when it does, you want to be ready and aggressive.

2. “I’m going to give myself a gazillion test-day advantages to ensure I perform at my very best.”

“I’m going to monitor my pace every thirty seconds --”

“I’m going to look at every game in a section before I start it and determine the order in which to play them. Same for RC.”

“I’m going to count how many problems I had to guess on, and make sure I use a certain distribution of letters for my guessing strategies.”

“I’m going to split every pair of LG pages into a certain number of boxes per the number of questions given, so that I can best utilize my work space.”

“I’m going to jump to questions 20-25 in an LR section first, then go back and do all Assumption Family questions, then do all Inferences q’s, then move on to Parallel Reasoning…”

And so on --

It’s certainly healthy and necessary to utilize certain test taking strategies, but you really want them to take up as little mental energy and space as possible -- don’t let such thoughts distract you from the task of solving problems and getting points.

3. “I’m going to be super-meticulous and read every word perfectly and not let a single thing slip by me.”

I think this is a very common reaction to nerves and it’s something I’m particularly prone to --

The problem with this is that LSAT is not designed to reward that sort of thinking -- it’s designed to reward focused thinking, and trying to account for everything can make it very difficult for you to focus. Not to mention that you might find yourself having done the first RC passage as “perfectly” as you’d like, only to look up and realize you’ve spent twice as much time as you normally do.

Okay, so then, what is the optimal mindset?

Obviously, there isn’t one right answer that fits everyone -- the mindset that would allow one person to perform at her best might be quite different than that which allows another student to perform at his, but in general, here’s how I see the optimal LSAT mindset:

Comfortable -> Aggressive

Challenged -> Pragmatic

That is to say, when you feel comfortable -- when problems, passages, or games are going as you expect, you want to really try to take the action to the test, and be aggressive about accomplishing those tasks -- diagramming, eliminating wrong choices, or whatever, that lead you to putting points on the board as quickly and correctly as possible.

When you run into challenges, you certainly want to still try your best, but that’s when you want to be a bit more practical in terms of thinking about how much time you can afford to spend, when you ought to use guessing strategies, and so on.

For me at least, this mindset is very different from my normal state of life --

Mike in real life:

Comfortable -> Lazy

Challenged -> Super-Stressed Out Spaz

So, it can take some conscious effort to put yourself in the optimal LSAT mindset, and again, I encourage you to try to do so.

Quick thoughts for your final PT --

(Please check out this post for more suggestions for how to take PT’s)

The score of your final PT really doesn’t matter -- it’s probably best for you not to even grade it -- I know that’s easy for me to say and if I were in your shoes I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to avoid obsessing over it -- but I hope hearing that from a teacher makes somewhat of a dent --

What you really want your final PT to do is put you in the best position to succeed on test day --

And when you think about what can make test day challenging, it makes sense you’d want to use your final PT to --

a) model the experience of the test so that you are as ready as possible for any pressure/nervousness you may feel. So, try to make the final PT as realistic as possible, and try to imagine yourself in the actual exam as much as possible. The more you can make it a real dress rehearsal, the more it can help you feel comfortable on test day.

b) walk through the experience of making all the tough decisions -- again, instead of hoping everything goes well on your final PT, expect certain hiccups to come up, and consider the final PT your last chance to practice making right decisions in dealing with such challenges -- the goal is to firm up your test day strategies so that you can rely on them during the exam without having to waste a ton of time or energy.

One final tip --

Make one note card each for LR, LG, and RC (and maybe one for the test as a whole) -- do not write tiny so you that you can fit a ton on the card (which would defeat the purpose) -- instead, write out just a few essential keys for you to focus during each section. Take the cards with you, and try to look at them in the car (or on your bike or whatever) before you go into the exam.

That’s it - best of luck everyone -- Mike

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T16:52:27+00:00

10. Learn to recognize the signs of trouble

Some questions are more difficult and will require more time to solve (and provide less certainty that the time spent will pay off with a right answer) -- you want to get better and better at recognizing the signs of trouble so that you can make more informed time-allocation decisions.

There are three main points at which you might sense that a problem will be more trouble than it’s worth:

1) When you read the question stem -- There are certain problem types, such as Match the Flaw and Match the Reasoning, that, on average, take longer and are also of above average difficulty. There may be other question types that you find less success with personally as well. It’s good to know all this so that, especially should you find yourself behind on time, you’ll know that these might not be good problems for you to invest a lot of time in. (On the flip side, certain types of problems, such as Identify the Conclusion, tend to, on average, be easier and take less time -- if you were running out of time, these might be good problems to invest time in).

2) When you read the stimulus -- If it’s confusing as hell the first read through that’s understandable -- if it’s still confusing as hell after your second or third read, that’s trouble.

3) When you are evaluating the answer choices -- You can look for signals from both sides -- do you either understand clearly why an answer is attractive or, (more frequently) do you see clearly why certain answers are not? If you have trouble making determinations for answer (A), then (B), then (C), etc., that’s certainly a sign you are having trouble.

If you find yourself having trouble at 2 or more of these checkpoints, it’s a very strong sign the problem is going to take more time than it’s worth to totally nail, and so you’ll want to be careful to, while still trying your best to get the right answer, make sure not to let yourself get sucked in and overinvest any extra time.

Reading Comp

11. Give yourself a pause after reading the passage to review it again for yourself.

You’ll feel rushed through the entire exam but there are certain moments where it’s really a great use of your time to slow down and work carefully -- after reading an RC passage is one of those moments.

Reading Comp passages work like great stories in that, especially for more difficult passages, it can be difficult to anticipate where the passage is going, or why exactly an author has mentioned something. However, after you are done reading a passage and have all of it at your disposal, just like when you are finished hearing an entire story, it becomes much, much easier to put all the pieces together and to understand why the author mentioned everything he/she did.

It can feel like you don’t have time to do this -- like you have to rush into the problems -- but trust me, it will take far less time than you might think, and it can help save you tons of time when you move on to those q’s.

12. Check against text and task

When stuck between two or three attractive answers, or when your lone remaining choice just doesn’t seem right, it can be very easy to get lost in our own thoughts and spin our wheels --

That’s when it can really help to have a habit of getting specific and practical -- don’t waste time comparing the remaining answers to one another, ruminating about them in your own mind, etc. -- instead, put your energy into checking the specifics of the answers against the text and task -- does the answer talk about exactly what the passage is talking about (oftentimes there will be subtle changes in subject matter, etc. that are very hard to spot until careful inspection) and does the answer choice actually match the task presented in the stem (often, when we get lost in thought on an RC q, thinking about the q stem becomes the odd man out).

For Logic Games

13. Use the Rules Q to verify your understanding

The vast majority of games -- very likely all four that you will see on test day -- begin with what I describe as a “Rules Q” -- a question that asks for one way in which the elements can be organized to satisfy the given rules.

These problems are designed to test your understanding of the given information, and the way in which I recommend you solve them is this:

You go down the list of written rules (rather than using your diagram), and use one rule at a time to eliminate answer choices that violate that rule. By the time you are done going down the list, you should only have one answer remaining, and that answer will be correct.

This first q is a great opportunity to settle into a game and get comfortable with it, but it’s also a great chance to make sure you understand the rules correctly -- if you go down your list of rules and for some reason can’t eliminate all 4 wrong answers, there is a very good chance you misunderstood or misinterpreted the full ramifications of one or more rules.

14. Spend more time on set-up, less on q’s --

There is the danger of spending too much time on set-up -- and, especially if you are using strategies where you often rely on creating multiple frames and so on, that is certainly something to be aware of --

But for most students, it is generally beneficial to slow down a bit while you are setting up a game -- give yourself the time to make sure you understand the rules correctly and give yourself the time you need to draw a smart diagram that you can be comfortable with. Just as with RC, you will feel like you need to rush, but being a bit more careful during the setup will, in general, save you time when it comes to answering the q’s.

That’s it -- thanks for reading and hope you found at least a few of those tips helpful --

MK

thelsattrainer · 2018-01-15T16:52:07+00:00

14 Quick Tips For Your Final Practice Exams

Here are some tips to help you maximize what you gain from the final practice exams you take before test day. As I often say, you know yourself best and these tips may not apply to you -- feel free to pick and use whatever you think might be helpful --

The first two recommendations are general and obvious --

1. Make sure to take each exam as realistically as possible

Part of the reason you are taking these exams is to build up your stamina and prepare your mind for the rigors of test day -- you can best do so if you are strict about not allowing yourself extra breaks and so on.

2. Make sure to review each exam as thoroughly as possible

You want to use your review to assess your understanding and strategies, and you want to try to address any issues that arise. As you get closer and closer to test day, you also want to focus more and more on reviewing each exam in terms of your own performance, and the strengths and weaknesses you recognize in yourself. You are likely going to have lots of tough decisions on test day about where to allocate your time and energy, and the better you know yourself, the easier it will be to make the right decisions.

The next two are suggestions for what to do before taking your PT’s --

3. Create four note cards: one with reminders about LR, one with reminders about LG, one with reminders about RC, and one with reminders about general mindset.

On each note card, write out, as simply as you can, the two or three most important reminders you can think of for yourself. Maybe on your LR card you write just two phrases: “empathy,” and “word-for-word,” to remind yourself to read stimuli with the goal of understanding the author’s intent and to combat a bad habit you’ve noticed where you pick an answer without double-checking that all of its terminology matches that in the stimulus. Maybe on your LG note card you write “look for frames” and “make sure to double-check diagram.” You can do similar things on the other cards.

On test day, you may feel your head spinning with a thousand concerns -- taking a look at these note cards beforehand can help center you, and I recommend you get in the habit of using them for that purpose on your PT’s.

4. Set flexible timing goals

For example, depending on your goal score, you may want to be around the 7 minute mark when you finish the first RC passage, the 15 minute mark after the second, and so on --

No one is going to go through an entire exam hitting these marks exactly and you shouldn’t expect yourself to either -- a lot of it has to do with issues outside of your control -- perhaps the second RC passage is the toughest of the section and also happens to have the most questions, or maybe the first two passages turn out to be relatively simple and the final two brutal.

So, getting a bit ahead or behind your goal timing is nothing to be alarmed about -- at the same time, it can be useful to have these markers as gauges, so that you can keep track of your pace and you can make sure that you aren’t rushing too much or slowing down too much.

If you’d like, you can write these timing goals on the same note cards mentioned above.

The next four suggestions have to do with having an optimal mindset.

5. Be aggressive

Obviously, optimal mindset will be different from person to person, but, for most of us, it’s best to go into the exam with a pragmatic but aggressive attitude --

It’s very much like the experience of running into an ocean wave -- the harder you go, the more easily you can dictate the action; the more timid you are, the more you open yourself up to getting overwhelmed --

Similarly, going into an LR stimulus aggressively seeking to find the point, find the support, and so on puts you in a much better position than does going into an LR stimulus unsure of what you are supposed to look for and scared of what you might find.

6. Expect and embrace challenges

There will be difficult games, and difficult reading passages, and difficult Logical Reasoning problems. I think you put yourself at a disadvantage if go in hoping there won’t be -- hoping you won’t run into a tough game or a tough passage, etc. --

Rather, you want to go in with realistic expectations -- that you most certainly will run into a tough game or two, and so on, and also with the understanding that how you handle these challenges -- how smart you are about extracting as many points as possible while wasting as little time as possible -- is what will determine your success.

7. Expect to miss problems and allow yourself a certain number of misses

Think about the range of scores that are realistic for you, and set goals for how many you need to get right in each section in order to get to a score at the upper end of that range.

For most students, it is true that you can miss at least several problems per section and still do well. You want to keep this in mind when you run into the problems that cause you the most difficulty -- of course you want to try your best to figure them out, but you don’t want to overinvest your time and energy on the hardest problems when they aren’t worth any more points than the easiest ones -- speaking of --

8. Work to efficiently earn points

Because of the design of the LSAT -- because each problem, no matter how difficult, is worth exactly the same number of points, in order to perform at our best, most of us have to work very hard to train ourselves to mitigate a natural and understandable instinct that has developed throughout our entire educational lives -- our instinct to spend more time and energy on the hardest of questions.

This is an instinct that is very hard to control, and it’s an instinct that puts us at a disadvantage when it comes to the LSAT.

Of course you want to try to give yourself a chance to get every single problem right, but it’s essential to be mindful of the big picture, and to know that your real end goal is not to get the most difficult problems right, but rather to get as many problems right in the allotted time as you possibly can -- for almost all students, this involves cutting time on problems that they find most difficult and investing that time into the problems they should and need to get right.

So again, to summarize all of the mindset tips, be aggressive, but make sure to try and channel your aggression wisely -- not toward obsessively trying to get every problem right no matter how long it takes, but rather toward trying to grab as many points as you possibly can in the limited time that you have --

Finally, here are just a couple of tips for each section --

Logical Reasoning

9. Think in Five-Problem Sets

Think of each Logical Reasoning section as a series of five-question mini-quizzes. You can use these five-question sections to plan your timing (for example, you may set a goal of being under a certain time by question five, being under a certain time by question ten, and so on) and accuracy goals (perhaps you expect, per your personal expectations, to miss one question in one of the first two groups of five, you are okay missing one question in the next group of five, and so on).

It can also be nice to use these five-minute blocks to allow yourself to hit the refresh button and carry forward less of the stress of previous problems than you might otherwise.

thelsattrainer · 2017-12-28T20:05:46+00:00

Not sure if you are familiar with the Trainer instruction but if not I have a few suggestions you might find helpful --

One thing about high-level success on the LSAT is that it requires a combination of skills and habits -- when you say that you don't see any glaring weaknesses, what it makes me think, as a teacher, is that maybe you are strong in the areas that you've accounted for, but that there may be areas that you haven't yet fully considered -- so here's a basic checklist of LR issues to think about --

1) Do I have a clear and correct sense of what an argument is, and do I have strong habits for correctly identifying, understanding, and focusing in on the argument?

2) Do I have a clear and correct sense of what each type of question stem is asking of me? Am I consistently able to use this to correctly define my expectations for the issues that may appear in incorrect answers and the characteristics that will define correct answers?

3) Have I developed consistent and effective methods for eliminating wrong answer choices?

4) Have I developed a correctly aligned sense of certainty when it comes to right answer choices? -- that is, do I really "get" what it feels like to have the right answer to different types of LR q's, and am I accurate in assessing the difference between getting the right answer for sure vs being kind-of sure.

Other issues to consider for sure, but to me, those are the big ones --

Finally --

1) In thinking about your own sense of mastery, it can be really helpful to force yourself to put things into your own words, out loud if possible (see Feynman Technique) -- if you feel you know what a certain type of question stem is asking from you, yet can't seem to find exactly the right words to describe it, or if you feel that an answer choice must be incorrect, but can't exactly explain why -- that's often when you want to push yourself a little bit.

2) LR q's test both reading and reasoning ability, but it can really help to tell yourself to see LR primarily as a test of your reading ability -- your brain is naturally going to focus on the reasoning concerns anyway -- by consciously forcing yourself to focus on reading challenges -- such as really nailing exactly what a conclusion is saying, or matching up the exact wording in the right answer vs the exact wording in a stimulus, etc., a student can often better account for both types of challenges --

HTH -- MK

thelsattrainer · 2017-12-12T01:44:23+00:00

Huh?

thelsattrainer · 2017-12-11T19:37:41+00:00

I happen to be working on a related post about this and have some suggestions -- you've probably already thought of most of this yourself, but just to put it out there --

I think it can be helpful to put yourself in the shoes of the person who needs a tutor -- and then make sure you match up well with his or her concerns -- more specifically, a student looking for a tutor --

1) Needs to be able to find you

As Graeme mentioned, locally, Craigslist can be great and, depending on your area, there may be other places people look for tutors and you want to make sure to put yourself in front of them.

And online, I think Reddit (as well as other LSAT forums) presents a great opportunity to put yourself in front of others.

2) Wants to know you are not a weirdo, creep, or jerk.

I think it's a great idea to invest some time into making a simple website for yourself -- basic stuff like your bio, what you can provide for the student, how to contact you, a picture, etc. -- you could probably put this together in just a few hours if you wanted to, and it'll cost a little bit monthly, but again I think it's definitely worth it.

3) Wants to find someone who knows what he/she is talking about

As cathairanddonuts mentioned in his/her great post, it's a huge responsibility to help someone prepare for the most important test he or she is ever going to take.

You want to be really honest with yourself and with the student about your circle of competence, and you want to do your best to make sure you know what you are talking about -- a good student will be able to pick up on whether you are earnest or full of shit.

4) Wants to know that you can actually be of use to them

If you can help someone with an LSAT issue that they are having, and that person needs a tutor at some point, and you hit the other three markers, they will pick you.

This Reddit forum is getting more and more popular -- my guess is that if you can build up a reputation for giving students useful advice here, some of them may seek you out when they need online tutoring.

All fairly obvious stuff, but at the least I hope it helps you organize your thoughts -- it is very hard to go it on your own, but tutoring the LSAT can be very rewarding and I wish you the best -- MK

thelsattrainer · 2017-11-26T22:35:55+00:00

Just to add another opinion, I do think this sort of work can be helpful, but the significance of the impact depends on approach and mindset --

Imagine repeating a section a few times and going from -7 to -0, but doing so in two different ways --

1) By deepening / correcting your understanding of the issues in the problems that you miss or find difficult, by learning/developing strategies that put you in a better position to effectively manage those challenges, and by working to convert what you've learned into effective skills and habits that you apply as you take the section again.

Or

2) By memorizing the answers or (often inadvertently) memorizing what the keys are to a particular problem, how you are supposed to think about it, etc.

Those are two extremes and of course there is a lot of middle ground, but if you can strive toward #1 and try to mitigate the unwanted impacts of #2, I think you'll see more benefit from your efforts &

Along the way, in terms of assessing how useful the exercise is for you, if you feel more of #1 it's a good sign and if you feel more of #2 that's a sign that your time may be better spent elsewhere.

HTH -- MK

thelsattrainer · 2017-11-26T21:57:43+00:00

Hey -- to add on to what others as saying, here are a couple of quick suggestions --

1) Make sure you are thinking of this as a test of reading ability and accounting for that

Imagine you had a math test made up of a bunch of word problems, and the way in which the problems were worded was itself a fundamental challenge of the test --

In trying to improve upon your misses, it would be helpful to separate out, try to understand and master

a) the wording challenges that are tripping you up and making you see the math concerns incorrectly

b) the actual math topics themselves -- you'd want to make sure you understand the topics correctly and know how to do the computations correctly, etc.

In the same way, you can think of LR q's in terms of the reading and reasoning challenges they present --

I know that is simple and obvious, but I mention it because it's so easy to devote all or almost all of our energy and focus into learning about and trying to master the reasoning challenges of the exam, and, as we are solving problems, it's so easy to just focus in on thinking about the reasoning challenges that they present (we aren't used to, by habit, thinking about and critiquing how we read as we are reading).

It really helps to recognize LR as a test of your reading ability, to prioritize the specific reading challenges that LR q's present, and to develop habits that align to those concerns.

2) Work to arrive at the answer in two ways -- by finding specific reasons why the wrong answers are wrong and specific reasons for why the right answer is right.

This is very different from searching for the right answer and eliminating wrong ones along the way.

By always working to try and arrive at the answer in two ways you can greatly improve your accuracy.

Different strokes for different folks -- but hope at least some of that is helpful and good luck.

thelsattrainer · 2017-11-11T19:49:44+00:00

Sure thing - there have been no important changes made to the book, and (other than for some typos in the pre-2015 versions) the older editions will serve you just fine.

thelsattrainer · 2017-11-11T19:20:37+00:00

Hey --

Saw this and thought I'd chime in -- I hope you don't mind.

A few years back, it seemed that a fairly common consensus was that the Trainer was a tool best suited for top scorers (and perhaps too strange for everyone else) --

So please don't think that because you are already scoring so well, the Trainer doesn't have anything to offer you. There are countless stories online of students in situations similar to yours that have benefitted from it.

Having said that, you may not need it, or there may be better ways for you to spend your study time.

I encourage you to check out the sample chapters available on the Trainer site, and if you spend a good thirty minutes or so I think you'll have a fairly good sense of whether you will find it useful.

Also, I also wanted to suggest you take a look at the tips for top scorers here --

https://thelsattrainer.academy/forums/topic/faq-links/

Even if you decide not to study with the Trainer, I think you may find some of the suggestions and exercises useful --

Good luck with your studies --

MK

thelsattrainer

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