@AugDawn75 – I put a lot of time in, of course, and used Becker materials which were perfect for my style of learning. When I studied it the first time through I made sure I understood why everything was the way it was and never moved on until I could think independently about the subject in general (it takes time and sometimes you need to stop studying for a couple hours to clear your mind, but its a great way to train yourself and you get better and more efficient at learning like that the more you do it), that way I could think my way through the majority of questions without getting caught up in trying to remember the small details (there is almost always a general rule that Tim tells you about – i generally only tried to grasp those concepts) and also so I could pick it up easier when review started (everything from earlier lectures gets fuzzy when you reach the later ones). It wasn't every little thing that I made sure I knew, but anything covered in even somewhat detail in Becker. I never read the detail that wasn't highlighted in Becker as I felt it was minute details that might have 1 question on the exam and not really affect my score. Any excpetion to the GR i made sure i read it once or twice but didnt stress over them big time, what I remembered I remembered – usually the fact pattern will hint to an exception so you can trigger your memory if you know the main concepts very well. I did each MC once (or more for trickier subjects) and the sims once before review and usually scored around 70-75%. Then for review I would take about 3-4 days before each one and do each MC one more time (I re read the highlighted parts in becker before I woudl re do the MCs).
Also, sometimes I had a gut feeling about a very specific subject matter so i would study it a lot and every time i had a very hard sim on it that i was prepared for, so i really lucked out in that sense.
Obviously I had all summer off before I started work, and I wanted to make sure I was able to enjoy my life in a new city (Chicago!), so I had to sacrafice the summer. I still got to travel for a couple weeks and studied about 8-10 focused hours a day, 6 days a week (so liek a busy season) for the summer. I would say in the end I studied around 100 hours per section, which I know some people who studied more and some less.
Thats what worked for me, I know everyone is different though and its all a matter of putting in the time. I was lucky and I coudl afford to treat it like a job… I have crazy respect for people with families, careers, and so much else going on outside of the exam. Best of luck to you and anyone else studying for this, its totally worth the effort!
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