Sources of passages

[nickek]

Through my practice I am coming across many interesting passages. Unfortunately, the preptests only provide references to a small portion of the works. For further unrelated reading, where could I find comprehensive bibliographical information of these tests?

[tommywallach]

Hey Nick,

I'm confused. Why would you want such a thing? For what it's worth, I don't believe LSAC releases the sources of their passages, but there's no particular advantage to having it in terms of studying, given that these passages aren't about pre-existing knowledge, but ability to answer questions about a given set of information. Are you just curious in a general life sense?

-t

[nickek]

"For further unrelated reading"

I do hope that these passages are presenting real information, and not just make believe stuff.

[tommywallach]

Aha!

Well, you're my kind of student! It's great that you're getting interested in the subjects brought up by the LSAT. Sad to say, I have no sense of what the sources of the material are. My guess is they come from a very wide range of publications looked over by LSAC, which are then manipulated in various ways to help them write questions (so they might not want to say the original sources). But you could do a search for some of the phrasings and see if anything pops up outside of LSAT land! : )

-t

[romano.eric901]

Since reading selections are drawn from many different disciplines and sources, you should not be discouraged if you encounter material with which you are not familiar. It is important to remember that questions are to be answered exclusively on the basis of the information provided in the selection. There is no particular knowledge that you are expected to bring to the test, and you should not make inferences based on any prior knowledge of a subject that you may have. You may, however, wish to defer working on a set of questions and essays that seem particularly difficult or unfamiliar until after you have dealt with sets you find easier.

Strategies. One question that often arises in connection with Reading Comprehension has to do with the most effective and efficient order in which to read the selections and questions. Possible approaches include
- reading the selection very closely and then answering the questions;
- reading the questions first, reading the selection closely, and then returning to the questions; or
- skimming the selection and questions very quickly, then rereading the selection closely and answering the questions.

Test takers are different, and the best strategy for one might not be the best strategy for another. In preparing for the test, therefore, you might want to experiment with the different strategies and decide what works most effectively for you.