How to best use two minutes left after the third passage

[steves]

Any suggestions on how to make the best use of two minutes remaining when I complete the third passage questions? This has happened on several PTs now. Two minutes is not enough time to get through the fourth passage, let alone any of the questions. I've thought to go back and review earlier work, but not sure how to make best use of the time there, esp. if I have to re-read the prior passage to revisit any I'm uncertain of. A couple times, I've changed correct answers to wrong by going back.

At least in LG, I can usually go do the last orientation question even without doing a diagram first!

[tommywallach]

Hey Steves,

Best (real) answer is don't only have 2 minutes left on the last passage. This is bad pacing on previous passages, so I would hardly want to tell you what to do in that situation: I want to tell you not to ever be in that situation!

Seriously though, there isn't much you can do. One thing (though again, I'm not REALLY recommending this) is that you can look for any SPECIFIC questions, particularly those that call out an individual word or line. The best would be something like "The author uses the word 'bacon' in line 7 to mean:"

Those questions are almost always answerable without referencing the whole passage, and you might be able to get 2 of 'em in 2 minutes, if you're having a good day.

-t

[steves]

Thanks, Tommy. Actually on the latest PT I took yesterday, I saw I was headed for that situation again, so I was able to rush through the 3rd passage in time to give me close to 5 minutes on the last one. Rushing resulted in several wrong answers for both passages--but more total right answers than if I had hit passage 4 at the 2 minute clock again.

The rushing strategy did not work so well for LR, where moving (too) fast resulted in zero net gain; I know we've been taught to rush on the early rather than later LR questions...

Steve

[tommywallach]

Hey Steve,

Well, the argument would be don't rush at all, but the arc for difficulty goes Easy-Medium-Easier-Hardest, so rushing right at the beginning or at about the halfway point MIGHT be best...though that's dangerous and general.

-t

[amber]

How long do you suggest per passage?

[tommywallach]

Overall it divides pretty evenly. It's not like LR, which has a difficulty gradient we know about, or LG, where you can make a decent prediction of difficulty from the presentation of the game. RC passages are presented randomly (in terms of difficulty), so you just want to spend about a quarter of your time on each passage.

-t