Ask Steve: eight questions about review
Students ask me the same handful of questions about review, year after year. Here are eight of them, with my answers.
How do I review the questions I got wrong?
“You want to drill down to exactly what you got wrong and why, so that you can avoid making the same mistakes again. So for example, in Logical Reasoning, did your mistake stem from the argument, the question stem, or the choices? If it was the argument, was it complex wording? Was it LSAC’s failure to include key indicator words for evidence and conclusion, or sufficient and necessary conditions? If it was in the question stem, were they using less common terminology or phrases? If your mistake stemmed from the answers, was it a tempting wrong answer or an unappealing right answer? I always recommend keeping some sort of error log or mistake journal to document your review, because when you’re doing it on your own, it’s too easy to look at the answer key and say, oh, I get it now, how could I have been so dumb? And then you end up making the same mistakes all over again. Articulate it and get the review process out of your own head. That can also be talking it out with a study buddy, a coach, a tutor, or even just your pet dog or cat or lizard. As long as you are talking out loud or writing and documenting something, you will go a lot deeper.”
What is the Socratic Review Method, in one breath?
“We want to drill down to the root cause of what you’re getting wrong and why. You keep asking why you got a question wrong until you can drill down to the root cause, so that you can avoid making the same mistake again. And keep a wrong answer journal or a mistake log to document your errors, to reveal common patterns in the errors of your thought process.”
I’ve taken it twice, my best is a 150, and I know I need to review differently. What does that mean?
“What has your review process looked like up to this point? A lot of students will just look at the answer key and say to themselves, oh, I was down to A and C, I chose A, but it’s C, I get it now, makes sense. And then they move on. But they’re not really getting down to the root cause of why they chose the wrong answer. What was off about your process? It’s not about the particular question in front of you. It’s about the process, step by step, that led you down the wrong path. And you want to figure out what you could do differently next time around to change the outcome.”
My timed section was eight off. When I went back untimed, it was three off. What does that tell me?
“The untimed score to me isn’t really that helpful, because a large part of what makes the LSAT hard is the time constraint. For most students, I’ll have them do one practice test a week as test day approaches. If you’re studying for the LSAT full-time, two practice tests a week, along with detailed review of those practice tests. Maybe not more than that, because we don’t want you to burn out, and we also want you to have sufficient time to review your mistakes in depth. Not only the questions that you got wrong, but also the ones that you got right but had difficulty with. Maybe you guessed and got lucky, but it just as easily could have gone the other way.”
I get the easy questions right and miss the hard ones at the end. How do I fix that?
“When you’re getting harder questions wrong, it’s because they have more difficult methods of reasoning. The arguments are more complex. So you’ve got to engage in deeper review like anybody else. Look into exactly which tricks and traps you’re falling for using the Socratic Review Method, which is basically just root cause analysis. When you get a question wrong, we’re asking why. Was it a complex argument or passage? Was it a confusingly worded question stem? Was it a tempting wrong answer in the choices? Was it an unappealing right answer? If we can drill down to the root cause, you’re not going to make the same mistake again. But you’ve got to slow down, do fewer questions, and review those fewer questions in more depth.”
I’m running out of fresh questions. What now?
“If you were to redo the sections and questions you’ve done before, would you get perfect 180s on them? Probably not. There’s probably still something you’d get wrong again, and maybe you’d even choose the exact same wrong answer choice again, which means you haven’t yet learned the lesson from those questions. So why not redo those first? That’s where your analysis should go. That’s where your in-depth review should go.”
When I’m down to two, I usually see why I was wrong right away. What does that mean?
“There are probably cases where you’re guessing between two and you’re getting it right, and you’re just not thinking about those cases. So I would recommend that you review every single question where you’re down to two and you guess. You might have gotten lucky or you might not. Whenever you’re down to two and you’re not totally sure, that is a question you should flag for later in-depth analysis and review. Every question that you are unsure of, or you get wrong, is an opportunity to learn something new. If you’re only getting questions right, you are not doing enough difficult questions.”
My test is tomorrow and I’m still struggling with timing in Reading Comprehension. Any suggestions?
“I’m not going to give you last-minute strategy changes, because there could be an adjustment period where there’s actually a temporary drop. This is the time to be winding it down. Settle down, go get a massage, take a hot bath, go for a walk in the park. I want you to go into the LSAT tomorrow feeling cool, calm, collected, ready to crush it.”
And for the day before, I’m specific about what off means:
“I would just have a me day. Watch Legally Blonde 2 and just do whatever you like for relaxing. Get a massage, take a hot bath, binge Netflix, whatever. Just really take it easy. De-stress. No LSAT.”
If you’ve read this far, you’ve heard every one of these answers before, said to one student in a session. The answers don’t change. Only the person asking does.
