Some personal experience and tips for Lare 1-4

[Xiaoxue Huang]

I passed exams in a year and at the first try. Because I have got a lot of help from my friends and this group, I would like to share some of the experience and tips before I forget them,  Hope this will make your preparation a little bit easier. 

Ps: If you are very picky about the grammar, please forgive me. I don't have enough time to double check my sentences before I post. 

General Tip

1. Group 1&4 and 2&3 together, if you want to take two at each time. I took 1 and 2 separately, then 3&4 together, very bad idea. 1&4 and 2&3 each has a lot of overlaps, but 3 and 4 are very different.

 

2. How did I start?

    For each exam, I started with a test, I use PPI, some people recommended Lareprep. I finished the test, scored them without figuring out why my answer was wrong. It is too early for that, my goal was to understand what kind of the challenges I was going to face and what is my weakest part. PPI divided test into sections, so you will have an idea which part you need to focus on. And then, I read the book on the Clarb's list, looked through the part I masterd very fast and took notes on the part I am not good at. Then one or two weeks before the exam, I started to study the terms and retake the test. This time I only did 10 questions each time, scored them, then read the explanation very carefully to make  sure I understand the knowledges behind each choice and know how to cut the wrong choices at the first spot. 

3. Even with the tricky questions, CLARB's goal is to test your capability to handle your work, the working documents and drawings from your company are very good study materials.

4. I am a visual learner, and non native, some of the terms are very hard for me to understand through reading. If you have enough field experience, please skip this one. If you don't, try to search YouTube videos, there are a lot of very short videos with very handy construction experiences.

Section 1

I started my career as project manager on the developer side, so section 1 is the simplest to me. I finished PPI to get an idea of the exam, I did a good job on the project management part, and made a lot of mistakes in construction contracts. Then I went through the Project Management for Design Professionals / Ramroth very quickly. Read Construction Contracts, 3rd Edition / Hinze very thoroughly, took notes and remembered the legal terms. 

Those are good books, but the most helpful material i use is my project bid package. I was working on the bidding phase of my project at that time, I found that the first two chapters of my documents used a lot of terms and forms I read in Hinze's book, so I decided to read those chapters page by page, especially the one I didn't edit. Turns out it covers about 70% of the exam questions. 

Section 2

After I finished PPI, I realized those geographic terms are big challenge to me. So I read Site Analysis: A Contextual Approach to Sustainable Land Planning and Site Design / LaGro page by page and finished chapters related site analysis of Site Planning and Design Handbook, 2nd Edition / Russ. Started The Living Landscape - An Ecological Approach to Landscape Planning / Steiner but didn't finish it. It is a good book, but I just don't have enough time.

I request a day off before the exam, and took soil report for stormwater management facility and leach field home and reread them. I know very little about leach field before I work on that project, so I want to know more about it. The leach field report covered 3 questions in my exam, so I think I made a good decision.

Section 3

I think section 3 is the hardest. It is very different from the 1 and 2. The only way to solve so many design questions in 3.5 hours is to familiar with the way LARE thinking. There are two topics you need to study for section 3, knowledge and design. I used Landscape Architectural Graphic Standards - Student Version / Hopper, Time-Saver Standards for Landscape Architects, 2nd Edition / Harris and Dines and Site Planning and Design Handbook, 2nd Edition / Russ to study knowledge part and focused on Time Saver because I prepared 3 and 4 together, I think Graphic Standard and Sustainable Sites Handbook / Calkins is better choice according to my friend's experience. The graphic standard is a very good reference book, especially those topic specific chapters. To prepare design part, I did 7 Vignettes, spent a lot efforts on the first 3 to understand how LARE score the design and what are the differences between my design and LARE scoring system.  There are some criteria disappeared from the new test, like the dimensions of those setbacks, but the basic logic of having them still hide in the exam. You have to be very familiar with the concerns associated with the certain type of design elements to solve the problem very quickly. 

Section 4

PS:This sharing is longer than I thought, I am tired this part won't be as clear as the last three, sorry, I will fix it later

I figured out the bolts and joints were my weakest part. So I watched a lot of youtube videos. But there is only one question about the selection of bolts in my exam.

lighting: I drafted a lighting plan before, but still a lot to learn, youtube helped me again. 

Irrigation: I knew almost nothing about it. Rain birds posted a couple of very simple videos to give you general idea about it. I watched spray system and dripline videos and read the chapter in Time saver and Graphic Standards. I think that's enough to handle the related questions. Questions regarding the lighting and irrigation is very basic. 

I used. Besides the book I mentioned I also read Site Engineering for Landscape Architects, 6th Edition / Strom, Nathan and Woland chapters related to grading and stormwater management 

Read Hinze's book again if you have time, 4 &1 has a lot of overlaps.

Thanks for reading. Hope my sharing could make your preparation a little bit easier.

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Sorry I didn't know the post is not editable. Feel free to let me know if you have any confusions or questions. 

[NH]

Hi Xiaoxue
Thank you very much for all these advices and explanations. Very helpful .

[QL]

Thank you so much for sharing.Your advice that having 1 and 4 together is really helpful. I already went through the HINZE`s book, and I want to start to read books for section 4. Do you have recommendation on where to start section 4 reading? Thank you.

[Xiaoxue Huang]

It really depends on your level of experience. I recommend find a test like lareprep, test yourself and figure out where is your weakness. I started with something I knew but needs some reading and practice to really master it. Because I don't want to start with something I knew nothing, it will make me frustrated at the beginning. It's only January now, you have a plenty of time to study something deeply.

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Just realized one thing, Group 2&3 is the strategy most of the people could handle, because problem finding - inventory and analysis is linked to problem solving very tightly. For 1&4, if you didn’t have enough project management experience and construction design experience, don’t group them together. Because you have to study a lot of new stuffs for each section, even if there is more than 20%(my rough estimate may not correct) overlap, the rest 160% still takes a lot of time to prepare.

[l. gerlach]

Hi Xiaoxue - What vignettes did you use for section 3? You mentioned 7, thanks!

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Hi, I used LARE Review section C by Joshua L Roland and a book from PPI same name by Glenn Acomb. The second one is very good summary of the rule LARE tested in Problem solving questions. There are some problems in the first one , sometimes the way they try to solve the problems brings more problems, but it still a good book to help you understand the basic logics LARE want you to keep in mind. Those are just the books I use. A lot of people recommended LARE prep.

[Leah YK]

Hello, I am preparing for the section 2. I have failed already once. 

I am reading the Site planning and design handbook now but there are a lot of information in this book. Did you only study certain chapters for Section 2?

Thanks for you tips.

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Hi, the book I finished for the section 2 is Site Analysis and the chapter 1&2 of the design handbook and chapters in living landscape related to site inventory and analysis. I do think the way I used to prepare the section 2 is a overkill. Follow the exam content CLARB put in the orientation guide, according to my experience, CLARB did very good job to make sure that the test covers almost everything in that list.

[AS]

Hi Xiaoxue,

What is the PPI book you refer to for section 1? Thanks for sharing your experience!

[Xiaoxue Huang]

I used this one. But it only covers project management and construction contracts https://www.amazon.com/LARE-Review-Section-Sample-Exam/dp/1591261449
I answered all the maintenance and preoccupation questions per my working experience, see Ray Freeman’s comments in this group regarding these two specific topics.

[Kelly Ridenhour]

Thank you very much for this, it is helpful! How recently did you take the exam?

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Hi, Kelly,

I took them all in 2017, section 1 in April, section 2 in August, and section 3&4 in the last December. 

[Jennifer Jung]

Thank you for sharing! :)

[pe...@whitesycamore.com]

Hi, any specific chapters from the LAGS and TSS books you would recommend to focus for Sec. 3?  I've already passed 1 &2, but that was many years ago..  Thanks.

[Ray Freeman]

Rowland's books are terrible and should be avoided. The Acomb book is quite good for section 3 graphic problems.

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Thanks for the correction. I did find a lot of mistakes when I use Acomb's tips and rules to check Rowland's book. 

[GSw]

What is the Adobe book? Thank you for the help.

[Xiaoxue Huang]

Hi, it is LARE Review section C (PPI) by Glenn Acomb.

[XH]

Hi, congrats and thanks for sharing the helpful experience! Do you have any LARE Review sections (1,&2,&3) with other materials still available and want to sell? 

Thank you! 

[DH]

Thanks, 

I have all the PPI books,( I suppose I really should open them up and see what's there that can be of help. I did not for Sec1) 

 I was not sure what the 'Acomb book' was until you made the comment following Ray's reply.

Thanks for sharing your experiences and advice.