Law School News and LSAT Strategy

There are many ways to study for the LSAT effectively.  You can study on your own with prep books or online LSAT courses, take a prep class,  or hire a private LSAT tutor.  However, regardless of which option you choose, you should almost certainly be taking the below five steps to best prepare for the LSAT:

1. Take a timed, full-length practice test

• This is the best way to get a sense of your starting point.
• Your score does NOT matter, the point is to really assess yourself.
• This is the best way to see your strengths and weaknesses.
  • Can you set up a logic game effectively?
  • Is time going to be an issue?
  • How well do you understand what the logical reasoning questions are asking?
• If you work with a tutor, a timed practice test serves as the basis of developing an effective study plan. 

There are many ways to have a great experience with an LSAT tutor. The key is to decide what role you want the tutor to play in your LSAT preparation.  One sure-fire way to have a bad experience is to develop a certain set of expectations, not communicate those expectations to your tutor, and then become frustrated as the sessions come and go and you aren’t getting what you expected from the relationship.

The LSAT’s Writing Sample is the last section of the intellectual marathon.  After a day spent navigating Analytical Reasoning, Logical Reasoning, and Reading Comprehension, many LSAT takers experience waning motivation.

Since the beginning of your education, you have had to read passages and then answer questions about them.  In that respect, the LSAT’s Reading Comprehension’s format will be familiar.

The LSAT’s Logical Reasoning is all about arguments and the test taker’s ability to evaluate them.  You’ll be given a short passage and a question stem.  It’s your job to select the right answer from five possibilities.

Law school students and lawyers make, evaluate, deconstruct, and refute arguments.  The LSAT’s Logical Reasoning is your introduction to this usage of critical thinking skills.  With time and practice, you will learn to identify and understand arguments, evidence, and conclusions.

Specifically, you will have questions about inferences which logically follow a passage:

By the time someone contemplates the LSAT, he or she has probably already had experience with standardized tests and entrance exams.  And yet, an encounter with the LSAT's Analytical Reasoning is unlike any other.