Brad McIlquham is Knewton’s Director of Academics. He is really into surveys, but then again, who isn’t?
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The February 2010 LSAT was this past weekend (at least for those who managed to avoid the massive snow cancellations). Just like we did in September and December, we polled our hearty Knewton students to get their feedback on the exam.
Most students who responded were from our full-length LSAT prep course, but a handful were from the first run of our 2-week Total Access program — their study program was abbreviated and largely self-directed, so we were interested to hear their feedback as well.
All told, the majority of respondents (70%) found the Logic Games section to be the most challenging. This majority wasn’t as overwhelming as it was in December — when over 80% agreed that AR was the toughest — but it still dwarfed the next runner-up. Only about 30% found Logical Reasoning to be the most difficult, while close to no respondents thought RC was the hardest.
Full results after the jump:
Overview
- 77% of students felt most prepared for the Logical Reasoning section. Only 12% felt best prepared for RC, and 11% for Games.
Timing
- The majority of students finished each section completely or only had a few questions remaining (80% in RC, 90% in LR, and 50% in Games).
- Again, the Games section created the biggest time crunch; about 50% of students said that timing was a major issue.
- About 20% of students reported that timing was not a problem at all in the RC and LR sections.
The Sections
- From the responses we received, it sounds like the Games section was especially challenging; 25% of students said it was as difficult as they anticipated, but over 50% said it was even harder than they thought it would be. For 63%, though, the Knewton strategies made things easier on this section; 25% reported that the strategies they had learned were essential.
- LR was a different story; nearly 40% of respondents said the section was more manageable than they expected, and 50% said it met their expectations. For many (37%), the Parallel Reasoning questions were the most difficult. Over 70% of students said the Knewton strategies were essential here.
- Almost 100% of respondents said the RC section was as difficult as they expected. No surprises there.
Conclusions
- The Games section was the major hurdle of the day, but students felt confident overall; over 85% reported that they were better off after preparing with the Knewton course, and the rest said they felt generally ready for what they saw on the exam.
To all you February 2010 LSAT test-takers: congratulations! We’ll keep our fingers crossed for you over the next three weeks…
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I thought the Games section on the FEB LSAT required several strategies that may not hae been well developed in the Knewton classes. First the games were almost all local rules questions. Second the games all required a significant amount of formal logic and deductions. While the Knewton classes did overview this it did not concentrate on it specifically. As evidenced by the poll numbers most felt that timing was an issue. Clearly this is a result of the LSAT’s move towards local rules games and significant deduction requirements in both LR and the games section. It would seem prudent to tweak the Knewton course given the DEC and FEB exams. And I don’t just mean cover them in class. Knewton should develop a series of strategies and methods to deal specifically with the LSAT’s move towards formal logic deduction and timing.
Hey Adam,
Interesting point, and thanks for writing in. It’s true that we generally spend more time on global questions than local ones — if only because there are more types of global questions you’re likely to encounter. Local questions only take one of a few forms (must be true, could be true, or must be false); global questions take more time to teach because there are so many varieties (complete and accurate list, acceptability, minimum/maximum, etc).
That said, we definitely hear you. Formal logic is at the heart of the Logic Games section — that’s why we start covering it in lesson one — and we could spend more time drilling students on how to use it effectively on local questions. We’re always looking for ways to tweak and improve the course, so one thing we’re planning to do is add more homework that is exclusively focused on making formal logic deductions quickly.
As far as your observation about the trend in recent tests, it’s something we’re looking into. The LSAT usually uses a 50-50 split between global and local questions, but as Kristen has emphasized this seems to have shifted slightly on recent tests. Once the Feb. LSAT is officially released, we’ll take a closer look.
Thanks again for the feedback.