June 2009 LSAT – Logic Game Tips
If you took the June 2009 LSAT, or if you’re reading the blogs, you have no doubt be thinking about one particular feisty logic game. Since it’s bad form to talk about LSAT question specifics, let’s keep this extremely general.
From what my sources tell me about the especially tricky game, what made it particularly difficult was the number of issues at play. Basically, the LSAT took elements of various game types and threw them together. The diagram, therefore, provided few people the big break-through inferences they hoped for. This is common of more complex 3-D ordered numbering games. The takeaway is to prepare to be unprepared. Strict executors, as usual, are punished. LSAT logic games mastery is all about flexibility.
The other big issue that people reported was that there was not enough room on one game to write out all the diagrams. That’s a tough one! It goes to show you that you must practice with real LSAT questions — and without scratch paper. Practice writing small!
In a class I taught last night, I was very impressed with how the students showed how a generally “clunkier” strategy (spelling out scenarios to eliminate on a “must be true” question) actually worked extremely well for a certain question – it actually worked faster than a more “elegant” solution of following the inference chain. This sort of refusal to accept orthodoxy is ideal. The key to working on this is to re-play games in different ways. See if you can do it faster a different way. Don’t become a logic game dinosaur.
Try out this game to flex your muscles: //www.manhattanprep.com/lsat/lsat-logic-game-9.cfm and take a look at our LSAT Logic Game Strategy Guide to see some other tips: www.manhattanprep.com/lsat/lsat-books.cfm