Tips for Breaking 170 | LSAT Demon Daily, Ep. 840

Main ideas & lessons

• Score improvement is “maintainable” once skills are learned

  • The hosts emphasize that LSAT improvement functions more like learning stable skills than training for a temporary peak.
  • After mastering the needed skills, you can keep performing well with only minimal ongoing practice.

• Going from ~160 to ~170 requires more than quick tips

  • Improving from the high 160s to the low/high 170s typically involves identifying and fixing the specific error types that separate those bands.

• A common high-score bottleneck: confusing assumption question types

  • The main suggested skill gap is between:
    • Necessary Assumption
    • Sufficient Assumption
  • Students often:
    • Get easier assumption questions right, but
    • miss the harder ones due to conflating these concepts.
  • Fixing this can move someone from the high 160s into the low 170s—but going further requires cleaning up other mistakes too.

• Another potential issue: misreading/inference on Reading Comprehension

  • The hosts suggest that a high scorer might be:
    • mis-answering RC questions that require extracting what the passage actually says, while
    • incorrectly assuming they should “get into the author’s head” or speculate.
  • Example mistake described: treating “Which choice can be inferred?” questions as permission to speculate beyond the passage.

• Use a study buddy for deeper review gains

  • Creating a study buddy relationship is recommended because:
    • Explaining questions helps the student notice what they missed on the first run.
    • Reviewing wrong answers becomes more precise when you can identify why they’re wrong (not just that they’re wrong).

• Explanation-based learning mechanism

  • As described, explaining can reveal:
    • multiple reasons an incorrect answer is wrong,
    • including a “big” decisive reason the student failed to notice during the initial attempt.

Methodology / “instruction-like” guidance

• To move from high 160s to high 170s:

  • Identify whether you are conflating Necessary vs. Sufficient Assumption questions.
  • If yes:
    • Drill and practice until the difference is consistent, especially on harder assumption questions.
  • Also track and correct other categories of mistakes, since fixing only one issue may cap you around the low 170s.

• For Reading Comprehension:

  • Ensure you answer questions based on what the passage supports, not what you want to infer emotionally or hypothetically.
  • Practice interpreting question stems accurately (e.g., inference vs. author intent vs. direct support).

• For review effectiveness:

  • Form a study buddy partnership.
  • When reviewing:
    • Explain the correct answer and the wrong answers.
    • Look for and verbalize the decisive reason wrong answers fail (not just minor flaws).
  • Use the explanations to update your mental model so future attempts are more confident and accurate.

Speaker/source list

• Nathan Fox (co-founder of LSAT Demon; host)
• Ben Olsen (co-founder of LSAT Demon; host)
• Chad (email sender / longtime listener; the question source)
• H Mason and Dan L M AO (name aliases/readouts from the email content; source is Chad’s email formatting)
• YouTube video / LSAT Demon Daily podcast (context/source of the episode)
• Music (non-speaking background)