LSAT: How A Prepared Student Handles Test Day

You wake up in the morning feeling refreshed but nervous. You had a good eight hours of sleep since you weren't up late cramming for the big day. You know there's nothing else to study since you've been studying and practicing for the past four to six weeks for several hours a day.

You take a nice leisurely shower and throw on sweat pants and a t-shirt thinking that if you're going to sit in a desk for three and half hours you might as well be comfortable.

With a few snacks in hand you're out the door. You arrive at the test center for check-in at least 15 minutes early with all your gear: admission ticket, valid photo ID, a watch and plenty of No. 2 pencils.

After a quick bathroom break you're ready for the big test. The test administrator goes through his usual spiel and passes out the exam and you start breathing erratically thinking about how your LSAT score has more weight than your GPA.

You set your watch, the administrator says go and you know there's no turning back now. You start to panic wondering which section you'll get first.

You turn the page and your first section is Reading Comprehension. You relax a bit. You're pretty good at this section since you've been doing a lot of timed practice. You read through your passages and answer the questions that follow. You're budgeting your time and you know that you have about eight and half minutes to read one passage and answer the set of five to eight questions.

The administer calls time and you set your pencil down. After a short break you're on to the next section. Oh no, it's logic games. You get dizzy with fear but remind yourself that you've gone over every type of logic game and you've got a system. Read, draw a diagram and answer questions. You know you have about eight and a half minutes per game.

It's nearing call time and you're not through with the section. You know that you're not penalized for wrong answers so you start bubbling in an answer for any questions you skipped.

After another break you're onto the next section, another Reading Comprehension. Piece of cake since you're already warmed up.

Your next section is Logical Reasoning. You know you have about 75 seconds to answer each of the 24 to 26 questions. You're working fast but you gained some time by not reading the directions. No need to do that since you've taken so many practice tests you can recite the directions by heart.

Now you're onto your last section. Wait, another Reading Comprehension? That makes three sections total which means that one of the sections is the non-scored experimental section. You know there's no way to figure out which one it is so you treat the section as if it would be scored.

Okay, you're nearing the finish line. You've had your last break, executed a few stretches and you're ready for your last section. You know exactly what it will be: the writing sample. You know the writing sample is a non-scored section but you also know that a copy of your essay will be sent to law schools along with your scores. You write a well-structured and coherent essay and you're finally done.

You head home after being at the test center for four to five hours and you start second-guessing yourself. Did I do the best I can? Did I answer all the questions even if I had to guess? Did I completely screw up the logic games? Should I cancel my test score?

You calm down, reminding yourself that you spent so much time preparing for the test. You felt comfortable with all the sections and test questions and you didn't have any emergency situations that distracted you from the test. Everything's going to be fine and now your only problem is how to get through a three-week wait to see how well you scored.

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