LSAT vs GRE Analytical Sections
So much for making progress, yesterday I hit my first rules based section, what would have been called the Analytical section in the GRE. I remember when taking practice tests for the GRE some fifteen years ago, this was the section that worried me the most. The problem is that there are only a few little text sections, each with five or more questions trailing after it. If you get hung up on a section, a lot of time can go by. That's exactly what happened to me yesterday, I spend half of the 35 minutes allotted on the first section (6 questions), and when I finally looked at my watch, I almost gave up on the spot. In the end, I forced myself to keep moving, and I did get all of the questions I answered correct, but, I only answered 13, for a score of 13 out of 24. I also went over by a couple minutes, because I failed to notice the time running down, so I didn't guess any of the remaining questions, which is like throwing out 25% of your score, since there's no penalty for being wrong.
On the bright side, I'm pretty sure I know what went wrong. These questions are pretty simplistic, starting with a set of rules that exclude some possibilities, than adding an additional condition for each question. Drawing a diagram is acceptable, and unless you write extremely rapidly, I would suggest using some form of shorthand notation to express the rules in a table. Here's where (I think) the trick comes in. You really need to diagram every question from scratch, starting with the basic rules, and adding new condition before even looking at the answers. I ended up trying to work each section with a single diagram, crossing out new conditions and making such a mess of the whole thing that I ended up just trying to do it in my head. Big mistake, especially if you've seen the inside of my head.
The funny thing is I still remember taking the GRE, and like the LSAT, they had an additional section stuck in there just for trial purposes. I completely blew one of the Analytical sections, brain locked up, and had to guess essentially all of the answers, but in the end, I got a 740 for the Analytical score. Either the section they dropped was the one I blew, or I'm a hell of a guesser.
I should also mention that in an attempt to simulate something more like test conditions, I took the section in a coffee shop, rather in a nice quiet library. Since I didn't bring any scrap paper, I tried working the problems on a brown napkin, which isn't ideal. Still, my time management failure was pretty unforgivable. Not finishing the section is one thing, not having time to guess the remaining questions is another. I suppose on an official test sheet, you can always guess the remaining blanks even once you've gone onto another section, or would they consider that cheating?
On the bright side, I'm pretty sure I know what went wrong. These questions are pretty simplistic, starting with a set of rules that exclude some possibilities, than adding an additional condition for each question. Drawing a diagram is acceptable, and unless you write extremely rapidly, I would suggest using some form of shorthand notation to express the rules in a table. Here's where (I think) the trick comes in. You really need to diagram every question from scratch, starting with the basic rules, and adding new condition before even looking at the answers. I ended up trying to work each section with a single diagram, crossing out new conditions and making such a mess of the whole thing that I ended up just trying to do it in my head. Big mistake, especially if you've seen the inside of my head.
The funny thing is I still remember taking the GRE, and like the LSAT, they had an additional section stuck in there just for trial purposes. I completely blew one of the Analytical sections, brain locked up, and had to guess essentially all of the answers, but in the end, I got a 740 for the Analytical score. Either the section they dropped was the one I blew, or I'm a hell of a guesser.
I should also mention that in an attempt to simulate something more like test conditions, I took the section in a coffee shop, rather in a nice quiet library. Since I didn't bring any scrap paper, I tried working the problems on a brown napkin, which isn't ideal. Still, my time management failure was pretty unforgivable. Not finishing the section is one thing, not having time to guess the remaining questions is another. I suppose on an official test sheet, you can always guess the remaining blanks even once you've gone onto another section, or would they consider that cheating?
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