Discrepancy doing LG in test conditions

[AV994]

Hi! I'm having an issue with doing logic games outside of testing conditions, in which I usually do well with doing single games or a 35-minute section. However, when taking practice tests, I will do badly on questions, but there is no consistent pattern on types that I am getting wrong.

Are there "checks" I can perform to test better - like reading the rules one more time? Or are there other factors I should look at to diagnose this problem?

I do not have the same discrepancy with LR and RC, and have also been focusing on LG a lot so am trying to clear this up before the March test. Happy to answer more questions to help diagnose the problem. Thank you!!

[ohthatpatrick]

There's a good chance that you just care more and thus worry more when you're taking a practice test.

Stress is known to compromise our performance.

That's why high stress occupations like military, police, professional athletes, etc. involve such profuse levels of repetition. The people in these professions know that if they don't OVERpractice, i.e. if they don't achieve a staggering level of automaticity, then the panic of the real situation will degrade their decision making and execution skills.

Since you only have so much time to practice, you might have to fight this battle from the other side, by de-stressing yourself when you're taking practice sections. Part of that could come from a discipline of practicing some mindfulness breathing for 10-20 mins a day. Part of that could be more psychological, where you may need to get in touch with what anxieties or fears you have about a "poor performance" so that you can help yourself be at peace with the possibility of a poor performance, thereby removing a layer of stress.

If there's any disconnect between the modernity of the games you're doing in studying vs. the modernity of the games you're doing on practice tests, that could also be a factor.

The more modern an LSAT you're taking, the harder / trickier it might be on the whole.

If it's not stress and it's not different eras of LSAT tests, it could just be the fatigue factor of doing 4 or 5 sections in one sitting.

Perhaps you're fine with Games on a fresh tank of gas, but when you're coming at them partially depleted, it's too draining. All you can do there is be better at getting rest/exercise/food going into a practice test .... as well as getting better at all of LSAT so that everything involves somewhat less brain power than before.

If I were you, though, I'd be concerned with your process of deriving answers, if you're getting questions wrong. To me, there's no reason to get anything WRONG in Games (other than maybe one careless error per section). We can test out every single answer if need to in order to be sure we're getting the answer right.

We should only really be concerned that we'll run out of time to get every answer right, not that we'll make incorrect "guesses" along the way.

So if you feel like some of your answers are guesses, you probably are trying to do much stuff in your head and you need to concentrate on writing your thoughts out ... writing ENTIRE scenarios to verify that something you think is possible is really possible.

Hope this helps.

[iosm100]

wow great information totally love it buddy.