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All LSAT Reading Resources

6 Diagnostic Tests 179 Practice Tests Question of the Day Flashcards Learn by Concept

Want to review LSAT Reading but don’t feel like sitting for a whole test at the moment? Varsity Tutors has you covered with thousands of different LSAT Reading flashcards! Our LSAT Reading flashcards allow you to practice with as few or as many questions as you like. Get some studying in now with our numerous LSAT Reading flashcards.

LSAT scores form the most important part of law school applications, and this weight can make preparing to face the exam a nerve-wracking experience. Many students choose to focus their review on the Logical Reasoning and Analytical Reasoning sections of the exam, as these sections most directly test analytical abilities in ways that may not have been covered directly in previous coursework. The test’s logic games are typically understood by applying logic to careful diagramming, whereas one’s ability to understand the nuts and bolts of a few sentences of logical argumentation requires similar skill with logical deductions. In the midst of the methodical logic that is at the heart of these sections, the Reading Comprehension section of the LSAT may seem like a less-imposing outlier. Previous success on the reading sections of other standardized exams may give test-takers false confidence that leaves them unprepared on test day and with a lower score than they otherwise could have achieved through more balanced preparation. The LSAT’s Reading Comprehension section determines a quarter of your overall score, so focusing your studies exclusively on other sections can be a recipe for disaster. While sharpening your logical acumen, you should not neglect brushing up on your ability to work through longer prose passages while picking up on all of their subtle details. Whether you need LSAT tutoring in Atlanta, LSAT tutoring in Houston, or LSAT tutoring in San Francisco, working one-on-one with an expert may be just the boost your studies need.

What makes the LSAT’s Reading Comprehension section so demanding? For one, the length and number of passages it includes present most test-takers with a challenge. LSAT Reading Comprehension passages are typically around five hundred words long, and five passages appear on each test, two of which are shorter and analyzed together. The section only lasts for thirty-five minutes, however, presenting readers with a need to balance care with speed. In addition, LSAT Reading Comprehension passages are drawn from a wide range of topics in the humanities, physical sciences, natural sciences, and law. Passages are typically written in a dense style about complex topics, arranging more obstacles between test-takers and correct answers. Finally, LSAT Reading Comprehension questions are themselves quite idiosyncratic. Whereas most reading tests include questions that are directly answered in the passage, the LSAT’s Reading Comprehension section asks you to not only locate relevant information, but make complex and subtle deductions based on it. You may be asked to surmise the effect new evidence has on an author’s argument, or consider what must or might be true based on what has been stated. In addition, each LSAT Reading Comprehension section includes the analysis of a pair of passages, setting the stage for questions that ask you to compare and contrast aspects of each argument on this part of the test. Varsity Tutors also offers resources like free LSAT Reading Diagnostic Tests to help with your self-paced study, or you may want to consider an LSAT Reading tutor.

How can one best prepare for all of these challenges? Practice, practice, practice. Only by working through a good deal of practice material of appropriate difficulty can you get a clear picture of your own abilities and calibrate your reading speed so that you can get through all of the passages without missing crucial details. Varsity Tutors’ free LSAT Reading Comprehension Flashcards can help you do just this by helping you get a better idea of your own particular skill set. Our LSAT Reading Comprehension Flashcards are each drawn from the various types of passages and questions used on the LSAT. Each question comes with a detailed explanation of the reasoning used to arrive at the correct answer, and data about how long you took to answer each question is also included in the feedback you receive. Registering on our Learning Tools website allows you to save your results and track your progress. In addition to the LSAT Reading Flashcards and LSAT Reading tutoring, you may also want to consider taking some of our free LSAT Reading Practice Tests. By dedicating time to preparing yourself for the Reading Comprehension section as well as the other sections of the LSAT, you practice all of the skills you will need and be ready for whatever challenges your particular exam presents.

Flashcards: Strengthen or Weaken Argument in Science Passages

Adapted from The Extermination of the American Bison by William T. Hornaday (1889)

With the American people, and through them all others, familiarity with the buffalo has bred contempt. The incredible numbers in which the animals of this species formerly existed made their slaughter an easy matter, so much so that the hunters and frontiersmen who accomplished their destruction have handed down to us a contemptuous opinion of the size, character, and general presence of our bison. And how could it be otherwise than that a man who could find it in his heart to murder a majestic bull bison for a hide worth only a dollar should form a one-dollar estimate of the grandest ruminant that ever trod the earth? Men who butcher African elephants for the sake of their ivory also entertain a similar estimate of their victims.

By a combination of unfortunate circumstances, the American bison is destined to go down to posterity shorn of the honor which is his due, and appreciated at only half his worth. The hunters who slew him were from the very beginning so absorbed in the scramble for spoils that they had no time to measure or weigh him, nor even to notice the majesty of his personal appearance on his native heath. In captivity, he fails to develop as finely as in his wild state, and with the loss of his liberty, he becomes a tame-looking animal. He gets fat and short-bodied, and the lack of vigorous and constant exercise prevents the development of bone and muscle which made the prairie animal what he was.

From observations made upon buffaloes that have been reared in captivity, I am firmly convinced that confinement and semi-domestication are destined to effect striking changes in the form of Bison americanus. While this is to be expected to a certain extent with most large species, the changes promise to be most conspicuous in the buffalo. The most striking change is in the body between the hips and the shoulders. As before remarked, it becomes astonishingly short and rotund, and through liberal feeding and total lack of exercise, the muscles of the shoulders and hindquarters, especially the latter, are but feebly developed.

Both the live buffaloes in the National Museum collection of living animals are developing the same shortness of body and lack of muscle, and when they attain their full growth will but poorly resemble the splendid proportions of the wild specimens in the Museum mounted group, each of which has been mounted from a most careful and elaborate series of post-mortem measurements. It may fairly be considered, however, that the specimens taken by the Smithsonian expedition were in every way more perfect representatives of the species than have been usually taken in times past, for the simple reason that on account of the muscle they had developed in the numerous chases they had survived, and the total absence of the fat which once formed such a prominent feature of the animal, they were of finer form, more active habit, and keener intelligence than buffaloes possessed when they were so numerous. Out of the millions that once composed the great northern herd, those represented the survival of the fittest, and their existence at that time was chiefly due to the keenness of their senses and their splendid muscular powers in speed and endurance.

Under such conditions it is only natural that animals of the highest class should be developed. On the other hand, captivity reverses all these conditions, while yielding an equally abundant food supply.

Which of the following, if true, most undermines the author's thesis?

Bison who are active in captivity look more like wild bison than other captive bison.

Some animals closely related to bison grow larger when kept in captivity.

Not all captive bison developed the weak form described by the author.

Wild bison who are underfed do not develop the same muscle tone as those who are not underfed.

Bison who are idle in the wild look more like other wild bison than captive bison.

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Flashcards: Strengthen or Weaken Argument in Science Passages

Which of the following, if true, most undermines the author's thesis?

Your answer:

Bison who are active in captivity look more like wild bison than other captive bison.

Your answer:

Some animals closely related to bison grow larger when kept in captivity.

Your answer:

Not all captive bison developed the weak form described by the author.

Your answer:

Wild bison who are underfed do not develop the same muscle tone as those who are not underfed.

Correct answer:

Bison who are idle in the wild look more like other wild bison than captive bison.

Explanation:

The author's main explanation for why captive bison are smaller than normal and the bison in the Smithsonian collection are larger than normal hinges on the amount of exercise and activity animals living in both environments had. According to the author, wild bison living at the end of the bison hunts survived more chases and had more activity than was usual, meaning only the finest specimens survived, while captive bison were deprived of exercise and activity. Thus, if a wild bison that did not exercise and was not active looked more like other wild bison, some other factor besides exercise would have to be found to explain the difference in appearance between wild and captive bison.

Flashcards: Strengthen or Weaken Argument in Science Passages

Adapted from The Extermination of the American Bison by William T. Hornaday (1889)

Which of the following, if true, would most undermine the author's thesis?

A captive bison raised in the wild does not show any of the symptoms (small size, underdevelopment) described by the author.

Bison raised at another zoo grew up to be short and underdeveloped.

A professional elephant hunter was well-known for his moving, poetic descriptions of the power and stature of elephants.

Professional bison hunters would often measure especially large animals they had killed for record keeping purposes.

Immediately following the start of systematic bison hunting, unusually large and powerful individual bison died out, never to be seen again.

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Flashcards: Strengthen or Weaken Argument in Science Passages

Which of the following, if true, would most undermine the author's thesis?

Your answer:

A captive bison raised in the wild does not show any of the symptoms (small size, underdevelopment) described by the author.

Your answer:

Bison raised at another zoo grew up to be short and underdeveloped.

Your answer:

A professional elephant hunter was well-known for his moving, poetic descriptions of the power and stature of elephants.

Your answer:

Professional bison hunters would often measure especially large animals they had killed for record keeping purposes.

Correct answer:

Immediately following the start of systematic bison hunting, unusually large and powerful individual bison died out, never to be seen again.

Explanation:

The credited answer is the only one that addresses the author's central thesis—that the accounts and examples we have of bison are all in some way different from the norm of bison that existed in the wild—targeting his assumption that the mounted bison, being examples of the last, fittest survivors, are unusual in their size and fitness. If no unusually large bison had existed since the bison hunts first began, then it could not be possible that the last survivors of the bison hunts would be unusually large. Thus, the National Museum specimens he mentions could not be anomalous examples in the way he describes.

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