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When I started studying for the LSAT way back in Fall 2024, I was scoring in the 150s. My biggest problem was that I was passively reading. I would read the stimulus, vaguely understand what it was saying, and then go into the answer choices basically blind.

I wasn't stopping to think about which claims were actually supported, how the argument worked, o what I was trying to accomplish in the answer choices.

Getting into the 170s required me to completely change how I approached LR. Here are the things that made the biggest difference:

1. ACTIVE READING

This sounds obvious, but I mean actually active reading.

As I read, I started paying attention to how each sentence built on the one before it. I would ask myself:

\- Is this a fact or an opinion?

\- Why did the author give me this example?

\- How does this sentence connect to the previous one?

\- Is the author making an argument? If so, what's the conclusion?

\- Can I simplify this sentence in my head?

If something wasn't fully connecting, I stopped and simplified it rather than just continuing and hoping it would make sense by the end.

This alone made a huge difference. Dense LSAT stimuli become much less intimidating when you're actively breaking them into pieces rather than trying to absorb the paragraph all at once.

2. HAVE A GAMEPLAN FOR EVERY QUESTION 

This was probably the biggest change for me.

I stopped going into the answer choices without knowing what I was looking for.

If there was a conclusion, I highlighted it. Then, before looking at the ACs, I would explicitly state my goal.

For example, on a weaken question:

"Argue that even if there was an oil spill, that doesn't mean it was responsible for the fish mutations in Puget Sound."

Or on a paradox:

"Find a way to explain why cigarette smokers who switch to cigars inhale more nicotine than people who've only smoked cigars."

Give yourself a specific job before you look at the answers.

Otherwise, you're reading five plausible-sounding statements and asking yourself which one "feels right." That's exactly where the LSAT wants you.

This also connects to prephrasing. On harder questions, your prephrase probably won't literally be the correct answer. That's fine. The point is to spend 10–15 seconds thinking about what could accomplish your goal.

If your objective is:

"Argue that even though there was an oil spill in Puget Sound, it didn't cause the fish mutations."

You might prephrase:

"Maybe there was toxic algae in the water before the spill."

Then the actual answer might say:

"A chemical plant had been dumping waste into the Sound."

You didn't predict the answer. But your prephrase PRIMED you to recognize what the correct answer was doing: providing an alternate cause.

3. Stop just drilling question types. Drill FORMS OF LOGIC.

This might be a hot take, but I think question-type drilling is most useful when you're in the 150s and still learning what it means to weaken, strengthen, resolve a paradox, etc.

After that, it's MUCH more valuable to drill the specific forms of reasoning that appear over and over again.

In particular:

\- Causal reasoning

\- Conditional reasoning

\- Analogical reasoning

\- Quantitative reasoning

Once you get really comfortable identifying these, even difficult questions become much more manageable.

For example, suppose you immediately recognize that an argument relies on causal reasoning, and you're asked to weaken it.

Your job suddenly becomes way simpler. You're primarily looking for something that:

1. Suggests an alternate cause

OR

2. Makes the proposed cause look less likely

That's it.

Now instead of staring at five complicated answer choices, you have a specific purpose: Which answer does one of those things?

The same principle applies to other forms of reasoning. Master the major forms of logic, then drill how strengthening, weakening, assumptions, etc. work within each one.

There really aren't that many ways the LSAT can manipulate each form of reasoning. This is key!!!

I've found this especially helpful with students who have been stuck in the 150s or low 160s. Once they start recognizing the underlying logic instead of treating every stimulus as a completely new problem, LR becomes much less mysterious.

4. DON'T LET YOURSELF OFF THE HOOK

This one is huge.

Sometimes you're tired. Sometimes the stimulus is confusing. Sometimes you've been studying for two hours and realize your eyes are just glazing across the words. 

There's an enormous temptation to say:

"Whatever, I basically get it. Let me look at the answers."

RESIST THIS IMPULSE. EVERY TIME.

Go back to the beginning.

Actively read it again.

Ask yourself: Is this an opinion or a fact? How does this sentence connect to the others?

Find the conclusion.

Identify the form of logic.

State your specific purpose.

Prephrase.

Then go into the answer choices.

One of the best ways to train this is actually to work out loud with a study buddy, peer, or tutor. I do this a lot with my tutoring clients. When someone is forced to verbalize their reasoning—what the conclusion is, what kind of logic they're seeing, what their objective is, and why an answer accomplishes it—two things tend to happen:

1. They do much better.

2. They realize how often they had previously been relying on intuition, guesswork, or an incomplete understanding of the stimulus.

Ultimately, the LSAT is a hard test but it becomes a lot easier when you systematically apply the process I laid out.

The LSAT uses technical language, dense stimuli, and extremely well-designed trap answers. That's what makes it intimidating.

But if you:

Read actively → find the conclusion → identify the logic → state your purpose → prephrase → eliminate every AC that doesn't accomplish your purpose.

Then, the test starts feeling much less daunting.

If you found this helpful or have any questions, feel free to DM me! I'm also taking on a couple more LSAT tutoring students right now, so if you're interested, message me and we can work something out. I specialize in helping people scoring in the 150s and 160s, but I'm open to students at any level.

Since this post was very LR-focused, I'm also planning to make posts on:

\- How I went from around -15 to -0/-2 on RC

\- How I finally broke out of the low 170s after being stuck there for about 8 months

\- How to leverage your wrong answers journal most effectively 

Those were two very different problems, so I'll break down what actually changed for me in each.

My Journey From 150 to 177 pt. 1