Did you know that you can attend the first session of any of our online or in-person courses absolutely free? We’re not kidding. Select your test to sign up now.

“It’s confusing sufficient with necessary” is probably one of the phrases that LSAT students use most frequently. But what does that really mean? If you’re just starting out your LSAT prep, this conditional logic can be a bit confusing. So, here’s a basic lesson.

Let’s start with an example: Read more

As an LSAT teacher you end up explaining a lot of LSAT questions.  We’ve actually designed our forums to focus on providing an easily searched bank of explanations to any LSAT problem – //www.manhattanprep.com/lsat/forums .  (We figured we’d save a few trees by not printing an entire book of them, plus then all those studying on their own have a place to go.)   I will say, however, that I’m always a bit cautious when I find a student asking for the explanations for an entire test.  I always wonder – and sometimes ask – whether the student has reviewed the work on his own first.  The best students first review the test themselves.  A couple of tips on reviewing your work:

1. Mark which answers you can easily eliminate and which ones are tempting.

2. Note any problem that you find difficult, find yourself guessing on, or that you find takes too long.

3. When you review your work, review all the questions you answered incorrectly, and all those you noted above (see #2).

4. For the questions you review, ask yourself the following:
– Do I understand the question (this includes the stem and the stimulus, passage, scenario, etc.)?
– Why is the correct answer right?
– Why is each wrong answer wrong?
– How could I have approached this question differently?  Is there a more efficient manner?  Is there a more intuitive approach? Read more

A lot of folks struggle with timing on the LSAT.  Clearly, if the test were un-timed, we’d all find it a lot easier.  Since we have only 35 minutes per section, if you’re having trouble finishing on time, it’s important to address your pacing.

There are several reasons folks struggle with pacing:

1. Not enough full practice under time conditions. If you’re just starting out, your mind is probably not used to the pace at which it needs to work.  I know that I generally equate a good read with a slow read — but that simply doesn’t work for the LSAT.  You probably can speed up considerably by just telling yourself to speed up!  From now on, every problem you try should be done with a stopwatch.  Also make sure you’re throwing in full practice tests along the way.  Don’t wait until you’re done learning all your strategies to work on your speed.

2. Ineffective strategies. Some ways of tackling problems would work just fine if the LSAT were untimed but breakdown under time pressure.   For example, in logic games, writing out all the possible scenarios doesn’t work for the vast majority of games.  In reading comprehension, you simply do not have enough time to do a full re-read.   In logical reasoning, you can’t wait until you’ve read the question to start thinking critically about an argument you’ve already read — you need to be reading critically from the outset.

This problem turns up more frequently with folks who are not using a book to study with, though even those who are in a course can fall prey to this problem if they don’t do timed practice, which often forces them to realize that they must indeed use the strategies they’re learning about. Read more

From various questions I’ve received, I’ve created this flowchart to help folks organize their thoughts (and laugh):

Take with a grain of salt, but not too much