Drowning..first week over need major help

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skillfullhello

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Hi Folks,

i had my first week and its been a terrible experience. Im not sure i belong here in medical school, i am truly overwhelmed with the amount of material and how little time we have to study it. On mondays we have lectures 8-5 with some team based learning. Teusdays we have different lab and science skills sessions. Wednesdays are more lectures. Thursdays is science and skills labs again with more tbl. Friday is more lectures.

Friday we also have a lecture in the morning 8-11 and then we have a quiz over what we did the entire week ( including material from that mornings lecture)
Im pretty much at school 8-5, and i have no time when i get home to even get through what happened that day let alone to prep for the next day. Im not even sure i can figure it out like everyone says.

i have been dejected and very scared about this week, and i feel as through i won't make it. I don't even know where to begin or what to do.
 
Everybody is a little different. I know people that study everyday, while others just cram on the weekends. I find that studying a little bit everyday is what works best for me. You can go to class from 8 am - 5 pm, take a break from 5 - 7 pm to gym/dinner, then study from 7 - whatever time you want before going to sleep. Make it a consistent habit and you will find yourself feeling less behind. It also takes a while to adjust to the volume of med school material. When I first started, I felt like you. I thought I was drowning. However, with time, you do adapt and get better at studying and handling even LARGER amount of information. Just do the best you can now and don't give up! Like Dori from Finding Nemo would say, just keep swimming!!!
 
It's normal to feel this way. But don't be defeatist. Many have gone before you. This does not require high intelligence, just some time to develop a study system that works for you. It's tough because you need to be flexible and open minded about how to study, but at the same time you can't be switching up everything day to day and week to week.
Can you tell us how you've been approaching everything so far? Detail what you do in class and at home.
Are lectures mandatory? Are they recorded?
The biggest lesson I learned and wish I learned earlier: don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. You will not learn everything in the first or second pass. If you try to get something down cold before moving on you will get stuck and not move on to exposure yourself to the next topic in time. You need to be moving through things at a steady pace accepting that you'll need to revisit down the line. But trying to learn everything 100% in sequential order as it is presented is a fools errand because you knowledge will be lopsided and you will be constantly frustrated.

Unlike ugrad and high school, don't try to build from details to big picture. In med school, you need to go from big picture to details gradually fleshing it out over time. Before you memorize the krebs cycle you need to be understand the most basic things about it, each of these one word or sentence answers. What is the point of it it? Where does it take place? What happens before and after it? Then you get more details and memorize it during a dedicated few hours. By placing details in meaningful context you will remember it better and be a smarter student because you will understand things better.

Similarly in m2 with disease. Take something like pneumonia. You should first look for a one line definition (an inflammatory process of the lung parenchyma, usually caused by infection)
Then etiology (bacterial viral fungal) prevalence (is this common or uncommon) pathophysiology, diagnosis, treatment, prognosis. If you know even the basics about each for common diseases you're doing good and it gives you a place to put in details (eg hcap vs community acquired, etc).

Finally you need a review system of the information. I highly recommend anki. Once you find a way to make it work for you, which takes time, it is an efficient way to study first pass (making cards is a way to anticipate what test questions may be asked, therefore very active reading) and later on (you can do cards every day as review and never have to look at the primary source again, the system is such that you will focus on your weaknesses)

Gl
 
skillfullhello said:
i feel as through i won't make it.
Click to expand...
we-re-all-gonna-make-it-brah-t-shirt_design.png

It's pretty much the same for everybody. It's going take some time to adjust to the pressure when drinking from the fire hose that is medical school.
 
Thanks for taking the time to give me advice


Can you tell us how you've been approaching everything so far? Detail what you do in class and at home.

Are lectures mandatory? Are they recorded?


So after Mondays 7 hours of lecture I went home and I started to watch the recorded lectures of that day. I usually do this to go over slides that I wasn’t sure about or when the prof just speeds through something, or I don’t quite understand what was said. I have been printing the notes out and using a pen to take notes.


This will be changing because I already have binders full of notes and I know I cannot take my notes with me everywhere in the future to reference them. So I will be getting a surface pro 3 or a Lenovo yoga w a stylus .


In undergrad I used to just pay close attention to the slides in class (and make sure that I understood what was said in lecture ) hence I would go back and watch the lecture video to find key slides I was having trouble with. With the amount of volume we are given each day, this idea doesn’t seem practical at all.


Our class lectures are recorded and they say attendance is mandatory. Our class is the first one to have the new curriculum (old class was 8-12 lecture and that was it with one day of clinic).


I agree with your points about not trying to perfect everything before moving on, which is what I have been trying to do I guess. I feel that my mind is still in this mcat style of studying trying to make sure I realllly understand every concept of everything, and when I have 7 hours of lecture to do in one night and then have to prep the next day, I don’t even know if that’s possible.


I have heard about Anki and I want to use to make cards for lecture slides that have detail that I would need to know? Probably not for everything however?


So my new plan of attack is this:


Watch najeeb videos, Kaplan step 1 videos for next weeks topics and take notes (this gives me a first exposure)


Skim the lecture notes before school (second exposure)


Try and pay attention in class for 7 hours (I have trouble with this after a few hours I cant focus for that long)


While in class, mark the slides and topics I don’t understand or have no idea about. When I get home instead of rewatching recorded class lectures, go to google, wiki or whatever do read up on whatever they talked about to get a better understanding. This should be more time efficient than trying to relisten to what the lecturer said?
 
You're a first year? In your first classes? Don't waste time with Kaplan vids right now. They're focused on step 1, as advertised. You need to focus on doing well in school for the first year. If you do well in classes, you'll be prepared for the Step, but right now its way too far away to use those materials. Najeeb is fine, if you find them helpful.

The videos are recorded? Consider not going to classes and just studying during the day. Spend this time going over previous days lecture notes and SLIDES. Then listen to the recorded ones at 1.5 speed. Take breaks in between to keep yourself focused (this is what watching recorded videos allows you to do).
 
lymphohystiocytosis said:
You're a first year? In your first classes? Don't waste time with Kaplan vids right now. They're focused on step 1, as advertised. You need to focus on doing well in school for the first year. If you do well in classes, you'll be prepared for the Step, but right now its way too far away to use those materials. Najeeb is fine, if you find them helpful.

The videos are recorded? Consider not going to classes and just studying during the day. Spend this time going over previous days lecture notes and SLIDES. Then listen to the recorded ones at 1.5 speed. Take breaks in between to keep yourself focused (this is what watching recorded videos allows you to do).
Click to expand...


yes a MS1 just had my first week! i would love to do what you said but apparently we have these mandatory lectures we have to go to. We have a new curriculum for us and they said that if we don't go to lecture we will get be written up and lose professionalism points. They gave us all clickers. Lectures are recorded too. Maybe will stick with najeeb then. i spoke to two ms2's about the new curriculum we have ( they have the old one ) and one told me that nothing is "mandatory" until they make you sign paperwork saying you won't skip things anymore.

the old cirrriculum was 8-12 with a 1-5 hour block once a week

should i just do what you suggested starting Tuesday?
 
If lectures are recorded why is class mandatory?

Do they enforce attendance with sign-in sheets or quizzes?

You need to become more efficient with studying. If you have a course module or note service use that to study from. Don't try to memorize every detail from power point slides during lecture.

Key to success: study guides (see above) + review books (ask upperclassmen) = HY material most likely to be on the exam and step 1.

Obviously you still need to watch lectures to get the minutiae (especially if your school's exams heavily test minutiae) but that shouldn't be your main focus and you can easily blast though them at 2x speed. Worst case scenario just sit in back of the class and study on your own.
 
i have no idea why its mandatory. They give us a few questions sometimes and we answer them with the clickers we have. It only counts for participation. No sign in sheets, just the clicker questions. we also take step one 6 months early......we take in jan 2016 so I'm trying to figure out what to do to account for this along w passing my classes. Our classes are pass/no pass
 
I felt the exact same way my first week. What helped me was to make a study schedule and stick to it. I looked over lectures before class, went to class and took notes and then looked over them again that night. I set three set study days and broke down the week's stuff into chunks. Two of the three days I studied one of the two chunks and the third day i went over everything. If I stuck to my schedule, my third dedicated study day went very smoothly.

I found that this helped me feel more in control and the amount of material didn't bother me as much.

You got this 🙂
 
@skillfullhello

Many people are going thru the same thing... You just have to find a way to be effective. I am getting killed by Biochem now while I am doing a lot better in Histo. May be I have to change my study habit for biochem... Also, the pace is very different from undegrad. I was talking to one my classmates who has MPH from a top Public Health (PH) school and I was shocked when he told me that the biostats our school cover in 8 hours, the PH school he graduated from taught it more than one semester... My point is that the game is different; therefore, we have to change the way we study. If we can make to mad school, we certainly should be able to make thru...
 
People can correct me if they disagree, but I think it would be a waste of time to go to class AND rewatch the lectures, even for points that you missed. Everyone I know does one or the other, I can't think of anyone that does both. Use that extra time to go through your slides and actively learn the material instead of passively listening to it another time through. I personally get a lot more out of it to take notes while I study- write out confusing things, draw out the artery or nerve pathways in anatomy, map out the biochemical pathways, etc. Others I know like to sit down with a couple classmates and discuss the material. It takes a little bit longer to study this way, but for me at least, I've found that if you can do something to actively learn the material while you study, you retain information a lot better and therefore have to go through it fewer times. It may not work for everyone, but it is just one other idea.

I also want to second what everyone else is saying. Med school can be tough, especially at the beginning when it all hits you. Everyone feels this way at some point. You just have to keep working to find a study method that works for you. This might take a few weeks, even a few months, but know that you aren't the only one feeling this way. Try not to get too discouraged about it!
 
skillfullhello said:
So my new plan of attack is this:


Watch najeeb videos, Kaplan step 1 videos for next weeks topics and take notes (this gives me a first exposure)

Najeeb videos, while great for understanding, just take too long to watch. If you're having trouble finding free time to study, I would ditch the Najeeb videos except for topics you are really interested in or have a difficult time understanding. As for Kaplan Step 1 videos, I liked to use them as review after learning the material, but there's no reason why you shouldn't experiment.


Skim the lecture notes before school (second exposure)

This is a good idea so you know what to expect.

Try and pay attention in class for 7 hours (I have trouble with this after a few hours I cant focus for that long)

Paying attention for 3 hours of med school lectures is brutal enough as is for me. 7 hours is cruel and unusual punishment.


While in class, mark the slides and topics I don’t understand or have no idea about. When I get home instead of rewatching recorded class lectures, go to google, wiki or whatever do read up on whatever they talked about to get a better understanding. This should be more time efficient than trying to relisten to what the lecturer said?

Also a good idea. Rewatching lectures is a waste of time. Active learning >>> passive learning.
Click to expand...

Also, set a study schedule. It will be one of the best things you ever do in med school.
 
I agree with you all that a new study method may be needed and habits of undergrad maybe low yield.

Just trying to find what this new thing is
 
What allo school still does 8-5???
 
EMDO2018 said:
What allo school still does 8-5???
Click to expand...

Even more, what allo school makes you go to non-participatory lectures? Not having to go to lecture is the only thing keeping my head above water right now.

OP, my opinion doesn't mean much since I've only been in MS1 a few weeks but I think everyone feels that way in their first couple weeks. You're here because they're 95% sure that you're qualified and you'll adapt. Everyone seems to have fallen into a routine now and you will find an effective one for yourself soon enough.
 
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TheShaker said:
Even more, what allo school makes you go to non-participatory lectures? Not having to go to lecture is the only thing keeping my head above water right now.
Click to expand...
Plenty! My school (MD) is 8-3 and most of the prof take attendance... If you are absent >15%, they have the right to fail you... Some MS2 told me that has never happened, but they still have the right to fail you.
 
skillfullhello said:
Thanks for taking the time to give me advice


Can you tell us how you've been approaching everything so far? Detail what you do in class and at home.

Are lectures mandatory? Are they recorded?


So after Mondays 7 hours of lecture I went home and I started to watch the recorded lectures of that day. I usually do this to go over slides that I wasn’t sure about or when the prof just speeds through something, or I don’t quite understand what was said. I have been printing the notes out and using a pen to take notes.


This will be changing because I already have binders full of notes and I know I cannot take my notes with me everywhere in the future to reference them. So I will be getting [b\a surface pro 3 or a Lenovo yoga w a stylus [/b].
Click to expand...
Get the yoga with stylus, it's a better computer. I got my SP3 during the first week it was released and it has been nothing but hardware and software issues. They upload new firmware updates all the time that just introduce more problems.
 
Awared said:
Get the yoga with stylus, it's a better computer. I got my SP3 during the first week it was released and it has been nothing but hardware and software issues. They upload new firmware updates all the time that just introduce more problems.
Click to expand...
crap i got the SP3...they and 150 off for students and i got the base model. I have my macbook pro as my main machine i just wanted a tablet for note taking etc i saw the yoga but it was about 400 dollars more

iv had the sp3 for a day and it's been good....fingers crossed
 
skillfullhello said:
crap i got the SP3...they and 150 off for students and i got the base model. I have my macbook pro as my main machine i just wanted a tablet for note taking etc i saw the yoga but it was about 400 dollars more

iv had the sp3 for a day and it's been good....fingers crossed
Click to expand...

The SP3 is awesome. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
 
Awared said:
I've had more problems with it than I can count. Fair warning, I guess.
Click to expand...

That sucks. Only issue I had early on was the difficulty in connecting to the internet after coming back from sleep mode, which seems to have been fixed.

I don't use it in any high-powered fashion, though. So maybe that's where it falters?
 
Our school is tryin this prestudy curriculum. Basically we are in class from 8-3,4, or 5 depending on the day, and then they want us to go home and prestudy a ton of posted material and readings, etc. Come in prepared for clicker quizzes and then they skip 90% of the PowerPoint slides because they say we learned it last night. Even though they give us more work than hours we actually have to do it lol. That's my rant. So far, it's going okay. But we will see how I feel after my first exam a week from today.
 
I think the worst part about this is memorizing something, remembering it cold all day, and then forgetting it the next day. God, what a waste of time.
 
skillfullhello said:
Hi Folks,

i had my first week and its been a terrible experience. Im not sure i belong here in medical school, i am truly overwhelmed with the amount of material and how little time we have to study it. On mondays we have lectures 8-5 with some team based learning. Teusdays we have different lab and science skills sessions. Wednesdays are more lectures. Thursdays is science and skills labs again with more tbl. Friday is more lectures.

Friday we also have a lecture in the morning 8-11 and then we have a quiz over what we did the entire week ( including material from that mornings lecture)
Im pretty much at school 8-5, and i have no time when i get home to even get through what happened that day let alone to prep for the next day. Im not even sure i can figure it out like everyone says.

i have been dejected and very scared about this week, and i feel as through i won't make it. I don't even know where to begin or what to do.
Click to expand...
First, deep breath, relax.

I felt the same way my first few weeks (and truth be told I still do, but after a while you get used to feeling behind and it doesn't really bother you).
Is there any option for you to skip lectures?

I say this because I used to spend my whole day in lecture, but I never learned well from them and would end up having to re-lean the lectures afterwards anways. Once I started skipping lecture, and used that time to review/learn the lecture material my way, I found I was learning and retaining it better and I saved a lot of time by not sitting in lecture.

Thus, instead of sitting in lecture 8-5, then going home exhausted and having to review it all. You could skip lecture and learn it as best as you can in the mornings, then the rest of the day you can review others things or prepare for the next day.

If nothing else, trust in yourself. You're not alone, and others in your class are likely feeling the same as you (though they may not always show it). You got accepted for a reason, you do have what it takes, just gotta keep doing your best.
 
how do you learn things when you see them in a slide and have no idea what its referencing? google it? i am trying that now
 
Dude I just take caffeine, but its not good enough anymore. I need that Adderall, Wellbutrin, hell I might even popa molly just to stay up all night.
 
skillfullhello said:
how do you learn things when you see them in a slide and have no idea what its referencing? google it? i am trying that now
Click to expand...
Keeping in mind that the slides in our classes are pretty detailed, so usually the slides are enough, but this may be different at your school.
Google/wikipedia has been the fastest for me. I currently go through slides on my own, and if I don't understand a term, or pathway, or concept, I check wikipedia. Then I copy/paste or type the term or concept underneath the slide as I understand it (so if I go to review those slides, I have all the slides and any related side notes for clarification all right there).
If you have access to any board review books or Kaplan videos, they often times can have nice simple explanations of the material covered in class also.
 
skillfullhello said:
how do you learn things when you see them in a slide and have no idea what its referencing? google it? i am trying that now
Click to expand...
Watch the recorded lecture to see if the professor explains it better.
BRS. Wikipedia. Textbook as a last resort.
 
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