<p>I am going to be a junior this next year at Marian College. I am going to apply to law school. When do I have to take the LSAT? When do I apply to schools? And when would you recommend to start studying? Please help!</p>
<p>Also what are the actual parts of the LSAT? And would they be similiar to any parts of the ACT?</p>
<p>danesporty, this site should help: </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.lsac.org/LSAC.asp?url=lsac/about-the-lsat.asp[/url]”>http://www.lsac.org/LSAC.asp?url=lsac/about-the-lsat.asp</a></p>
<p>As far as the actual parts of the LSAT, there are 5, each of which has a 35 minute time limit. When you take the LSAT you’ll take the first 3 parts back to back with no time in between, then a 10-20 minute break, followed by the last two parts and the writing sample.</p>
<p>The LSAT has:</p>
<ul>
<li>1 logic games section</li>
<li>1 reading comprehension section</li>
<li>2 logical reasoning sections</li>
<li>1 experimental section, which could be any of the three types. The experimental section is not graded; they use these sections to test how LSAT takers will score on sections that they’ll put on future tests.</li>
</ul>
<p>The logic games section has 4 separate games. For each of the four, they’ll give you a set of conditions which applies to about 5-7 questions. The games are logical puzzles that test your ability to visualize and draw conclusions from convoluted information. They can be extremely difficult at first, but they can become much easier with practice - games are the most “learnable” of the three sections. Time constraints tend to be most aggravating for this section.</p>
<p>The reading comp section is similar to what you had on the SATs but the material is much more dense and difficult to read. A reading comp section has 4 passages, with (i think) 5-8 questions per passage.</p>
<p>The logical reasoning section consists of roughly 25 questions that test your ability to read and validate an argument. Typical questions will ask you to identify the conclusion, an underlying assumption, or an inherent flaw in a short argumentative statement, but you’ll see great variety in the type of questions asked in this section.</p>
<p>And at the end of it all, just when you think you’re done, you have the writing sample. It takes 30 minutes and is not graded, but rather photocopied and sent along with your scores for law schools to evaluate your ability to write a cohesive argument with proper writing mechanics (grammar, spelling, etc.). If you can write fairly well, don’t bother studying for this part: it’s not worth the time.</p>
<p>In answer to your question about when to take the LSAT, if you’re an entering junior right now I would suggest February if you want to apply EA or ED to any schools, and June if you don’t. My reasoning behind that is that if you take it in Feb. and absolutely bomb it and want to take it again, you can do it in June and still have time to get your app.'s in in Sept. or Oct. for EA and/or ED. However, if you’re just applying regular admission straight down the board you should take it in June and if you bomb then you can still retake it in Oct.</p>