Final Countdown to the February LSAT: 4 Last Minute LSAT Tips
With less than 48 hours remaining before the February LSAT, we have some helpful advice on what can (and cannot) be done at this late stage in the game, as well as some mantras for test day.
Get your mind right. It can be rather tempting to start down some last minute LSAT rabbit holes. This close to test day, it is helpful to adopt somewhat of a “what’s done is done” attitude. For example, there are likely some game types that you simply are not going to get any better at between now and Saturday – and that is OK! So long as you’ve been consistently hitting or exceeding your target score on your latest timed practice tests without a mastery of those game types, you should see similar results on the real thing. Accept that you’re not going to get that 180, and start to focus on all of the success that you ARE going to have on test day as opposed to worrying yourself in to a frenzy over those sections of the test that have continually thrown you off after months of hard work.
Get off the sauce. This may seem painfully obvious, but steer clear of the alcohol or any other mood/behavior altering substances for the next few days. Start (or continue) exercising (exercise is linked to neural growth ya know).
Admit it: the LSAT is damn hard! Unless you’re scoring well-below the national average of 151, chances are that if you think a question on the exam is difficult, just about everyone else in the nation does too! Yes, there will be some super geniuses out there who won’t, but if we stick to thinking about rest of the mere mortal population, admitting that this thing is difficult can go a long way in easing your tensions. If it’s a tough question, lots of people will get it wrong; the question is whether you’ll get it wrong and waste a lot of time on it. Don’t get stuck on the mud on a question you were never going to get right, and cost yourself precious time that you could have been using to nail the questions that come easier to you.
Warm yourself up on test day. Since your brain is a muscle (and since it is unlikely to be accustomed to working hard on a Saturday morning), be sure to give it a proper warm up before you sit down to tackle the first section of the LSAT. I would advise arriving at your testing location at least 40 minutes early. Before you enter your testing center, do an easy-ish game that you’ve successfully completed several times before. This method of warming up is exponentially better than using section 1 on the real thing!
Good luck on Saturday – and be sure to remember what you can and cannot bring in with you to your testing center.