LSAT

Note: The following is Stephanie's* (a real Velocity LSAT student) story of her LSAT-Flex experience on Monday, June 15, 2020, as told to Dave Hall.

There is justifiable tension among prospective law students---ugh. Strike that. I took a break from writing a law school paper to talk about the LSAT for a minute, and IT SHOWS. I’ve never read a more law-school-papery first clause of a sentence than that one. I’m sorry. Now where were we? 

What is the Digital LSAT?

So glad you asked. As it happens, that's exactly what I wanted to talk about. The digital LSAT is the same same same as the paper-and-pencil LSAT, except on tablets instead of in paper booklets. LSAC will provide the tablets to test takers at the test center. The content, structure, and questions will all be the same as the current LSAT.

But the tablets might be cool. They're supposed to have a timer with a five-minute warning, and they'll let you highlight and flag questions to come back to (within the section you're working on).

This week, I want to talk about soundness. So that's what I'm going to do. YOU'RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME, WORLD.

K. Got that out of my system. Let's do this:

Soundness, as a principle, is the simultaneous measure of two distinct aspects of a deductive argument: its coherence and its validity.  OK.  So what’re coherence and validity?  We’re glad you asked!

Remember our tow-chain from two weeks ago?  Let’s get that image back in our minds to continue.  Got it?  Excellent.

So, you’ve heard somewhere that the LSAT is a test that demands that you successfully weigh evidence against claims. OK, sure. But what does that mean? 

First, let’s establish some ground rules: 

I’ll keep it short. I’ve been meaning to create a timeline to help you visualize how your LSAT prep should go. This week, after the end of the semester and before I start my summer job, seemed like the right time.

So I did. It’s above.

Over the next few weeks, we’re going to continue our look at each piece of the law school application. We’re going to work chronologically—that is, we’ll take each item in the order that you should (in a perfect world, one in which you can maybe go back in time and fix your mistakes) be working on it. I’ve chosen to use a Q+A format, to make you feel like we’re in this together. It will be fun. I promise absolutely do not promise that.

So, as part of our occasional LSAT prep series on Logical Reasoning question types, today we’re going to take a look at Point-of-Disagreement (+ Point of Agreement) questions.

First, note that these questions can only be associated with multi-party arguments, in which two distinct arguments are juxtaposed by the test writers. The arguers’ names will inevitably demonstrate a richness of ethnic diversity (which, given how opposed they are to each other’s ideas, demands an answer as to how the LSAT’s authors view the possibility for global harmony.). But I digress…

A few weeks ago, we discussed whether you ought to spend a little time assessing Reading Comprehension passage difficulty. That discussion also applies, in pretty much exactly the same way, to LSAT Games. You should assess difficulty! You shouldn’t spend much time doing it, though! And you should definitely not try comparing games in a section to each other.

I recently uploaded a new video to the site (it’s also on YouTube; right here), in which I explain the theoretical basis for smart LSAT prep. I thought you might also enjoy reading it, so I’ve written up what is basically a transcript.

What I want to do here is start by getting you ready in a big-picture, First Principle kind of way for the manner in which we’re going to move you from a place of unfamiliarity, discomfort (and perhaps also fear) to a place of confidence, assurance, and readiness.