Preparing for Your LSAT Journey
The LSAT is a singularly challenging test. It is unlike any test you have likely ever taken — a test designed so that you cannot rely on previous information, almost entirely dedicated to your ability to reason precisely and under intense time pressure. No wonder the LSAT is so competitive!
Because the LSAT is a challenge, whether you are just starting out or in the middle of the test, it makes sense to have a strategy for studying that does justice to the particularities of the LSAT. So lets think about some of the best things to do, wherever you are:
1) SCHEDULE THE TEST
Look, life gets in the way, and a $200 test isn’t something we’re all aching to get money out for. But it’s essential to know when you are taking the test. Not only will the rest of your testing schedule work backwards from there, but keep in mind that having a firm deadline will improve your ability to focus on preparing for that day.
2) START EARLY
While it is impossible to know any hard facts for sure, many LSAT prep sites recommend at least 200+ hours of study and preparation. And, to my mind, this can’t be far off. Consider that taking a practice test alone is around a 3 hour commitment. Assuming you spend that reviewing the test, you see that each test will take at least six hours of focused work.
And that’s not even getting into one of the most important parts of LSAT prep — taking as many prep tests as you can. Taking two practice tests a week for two-three months has historically been a requirement to perform at your best on the LSAT.
Assuming 14 weeks at 2 tests each, every test taking 6 hours of prep, the bare minimum recommended is already 168 hours of preparation. And this doesn’t include any additional practice, detailed study and review, etc.
Going back to (1) then, you should ideally have three to four months to prepare for the LSAT, especially if….
3) START WITH REASONING
….you aren’t a mathematician, physicist, or philosopher.
Given that the law is meant to be an objective, rational, argument-focused space, filled with conditions, it’s unsurprising that the LSAT itself is just the same. Equally unsurprisingly, the majors that tend to start at the best place in LSAT preparation have intensive training in logic.
In most cases, therefore, you will need a firm grasp of the fundamentals of conditionals, inferences, and argumentation. From this, you can start to develop a powerful test-taking strategy. Before this, questions might feel very hit or miss.
We recommend The LSAT Trainer as one way to practice specific skills. But equally useful is looking at the official explanations for answers, noting how the LSAC itself thinks about the questions.
Just as when you learned algebra or a new language, you needed to learn the basic rules and grammar to get started, make sure you begin with things like necessary and sufficient conditions and conditionals: the essentials for any LSAT student.
