« Findlawless.com and Economic Illiteracy | Main | Wait a second--it's OK as an S&M term, but not appropriate for Comp Sci? »

All Old Generals Fight the Last War

Dear Wormwood,

Since I've worn myself out today studying for this year's exams, I want to give exam advice. Unfortunately, I know nothing about how to take a 1L exam, since I've not really taken one yet. (Yes, there's Legal Methods, but I'm not sure it's typical.) So, dear Wormwood, I figured I'd write a little about what I found useful preparation for the LSATs, and what makes good pre-law reading.

All of this, of course, is just my opinion, and your mileage may vary.

LSATs
I only took the LSAT once, because I started applying late in the game: one of my best friends challenged me to apply to law school with her in September, and I didn't start prep-work until late that month. (She then backed out on me, and is spending the next year with her boyfriend in South America. You can keep comments on who had better judgment to herself.) I can only recommend the following:

The Obvious
Get sleep the night before, eat well, and don't stress about it any more than you have to in order to do well. This is probably more valuable advice than anything below--but it's also something anyone could tell you.

Study Aids
Everyone will have their preferred study aids, but I only used two. The first was a used copy of Barron's How to Prepare for the LSAT from my aforementioned study partner. It was pretty good, but pretty simplistic. After reading a few of the pointers, I found that I was only really interested in the stuff I kept getting wrong.

For this reason, probably 80% of my studying was done with Kaplan's LSAT 180. Basically, it's a compilation of real brainteasers. When I started feeling OK with these questions, the standard practice tests held much less fear. Of course, you may not need either prep-book: some people say you don't. I think they probably helped me, but again, your mileage may vary.

Logical Reasoning
I didn't do all my LSAT prep in the books above, though. One of them recommended an exercise that I think really helped me with the logical reasoning: read the newspaper. Specifically, read the opinion pages of at least one newspaper a day, and pick apart the articles.

Logical reasoning questions on the LSAT tend to deal with logical inconsistencies, assumptions, and fallacies. Op-eds, from authors on both sides of the aisle, are peppered with these by their very nature: deadlines, word-limits, and partisan appeal keep Maureen Dowd or George F. Will from fully fleshing out their arguments. I found that reading an op-ed page every day and underlining anything that was an assumption, leap of logic, or outright contradiction made the habits I was 'learning' for the LSAT a little more second-nature. Especially if I agreed with the article, it was a worthwhile exercise: I'd spot my own assumptions, and those pop up more than I would have expected on an LSAT.

Applications
For me to give you advice on law school applications would be insulting: I only applied to three places, and got rejected outright by one and waitlisted by the other. I also committed possibly the most chronic mistake: I waited until the last minute to apply. Let me tell you, near as I can tell, the earlier the better.

Likewise, find a bulletin board that lots of JD2B applicants are on, and chat to them. The one at the University of Chicago is pretty good. You may not learn anything you need to know, but it's good to have co-sufferers as you're waiting for applications to come back.

Anyway, that's all I can think of for now. Hope all of you studying up for that test I was so nervous about last year get everything you wish. A few months from now, I'll post my recommended reading list for your summer. God knows that after I spent so much time wondering about what to read last summer, I owe that to you, dear Wormwood.

TrackBack

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference All Old Generals Fight the Last War:

» Letters to Wormwood from Blawg Wisdom
Anthony at Three Years of Hell to Become the Devil is now entering his second year of law school at Columbia, but since beginning his three years he's been writing a series of commentaries and tips for getting through law... [Read More]

» Letters to Wormwood from Blawg Wisdom
Anthony at Three Years of Hell to Become the Devil is now entering his second year of law school at Columbia. He offers an extensive series of commentaries and tips for getting through law school, all of which he's kindly... [Read More]

Comments

All I can say is LEEWS and Planet Law School.

Post a comment

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)

NOTICE TO SPAMMERS, COMMENT ROBOTS, TRACKBACK SPAMMERS AND OTHER NON-HUMAN VISITORS: No comment or trackback left via a robot is ever welcome at Three Years of Hell. Your interference imposes significant costs upon me and my legitimate users. The owner, user or affiliate who advertises using non-human visitors and leaves a comment or trackback on this site therefore agrees to the following: (a) they will pay fifty cents (US$0.50) to Anthony Rickey (hereinafter, the "Host") for every spam trackback or comment processed through any blogs hosted on threeyearsofhell.com, morgrave.com or housevirgo.com, irrespective of whether that comment or trackback is actually posted on the publicly-accessible site, such fees to cover Host's costs of hosting and bandwidth, time in tending to your comment or trackback and costs of enforcement; (b) if such comment or trackback is published on the publicly-accessible site, an additional fee of one dollar (US$1.00) per day per URL included in the comment or trackback for every day the comment or trackback remains publicly available, such fee to represent the value of publicity and search-engine placement advantages.

Giving The Devil His Due

And like that... he is gone (8)
Bateleur wrote: I tip my hat to you - not only for ... [more]

Law Firm Technology (5)
Len Cleavelin wrote: I find it extremely difficult to be... [more]

Post Exam Rant (9)
Tony the Pony wrote: Humbug. Allowing computers already... [more]

Symbols, Shame, and A Number of Reasons that Billy Idol is Wrong (11)
Adam wrote: Well, here's a spin on the theory o... [more]

I've Always Wanted to Say This: What Do You Want? (14)
gcr wrote: a nice cozy victorian in west phill... [more]

Choose Stylesheet

What I'm Reading

cover
D.C. Noir

My city. But darker.
cover
A Clockwork Orange

About time I read this...


Shopping

Projects I've Been Involved With

A Round-the-World Travel Blog: Devil May Care (A new round-the-world travel blog, co-written with my wife)
Parents for Inclusive Education (From my Clinic)

Syndicated from other sites

The Columbia Continuum
Other Blogs by CLS students