Firecracker

[JackShephard MD]

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med.firecracker.me

New medical education website rooted in an adaptive learning platform. Looks impressive, check it out.

Cheers.

 

[Ophthoseidon]

I think 16-17,000, but that's based on a calculation of my percent completion so it's not 100% accurate

 

[nabilesmail]

After winter break all we have is neuro, msk, psych, and behavioral. A lot of the MSK stuff I've seen before and behavioral and psych I think will be an easy task. The biggest worry for me I think is neuro and finishing all the micro (antimicrobials, etc.)

I think we have Renal, MSK, Neuro, Psych, Derm, but well be done with antimicrobial/micro etc.

Still not sure how I should approach this haha, perhaps I'll try to finish up Renal since its important, and other than that, finish small amount of topics I missed, and up my cards/day to say 300-350 to build mastery up

 

[mymembernames]

I think 16-17,000, but that's based on a calculation of my percent completion so it's not 100% accurate

Thanks! When I go to the website it says 35000 so maybe that's for everything - step 1 and 2.

Does anyone know how FC compares to the FA flash facts? I couldn't find much info on the pros/cons of each.

 

[Ophthoseidon]

I think we have Renal, MSK, Neuro, Psych, Derm, but well be done with antimicrobial/micro etc.

Still not sure how I should approach this haha, perhaps I'll try to finish up Renal since its important, and other than that, finish small amount of topics I missed, and up my cards/day to say 300-350 to build mastery up

I'm currently using their recommended amount but I think once I have everything flagged I'll probably do 3-400 per day as you said, to get mastery up

 

[mymembernames]

Does anyone know how FC compares to the FA flash facts? I couldn't find much info on the pros/cons of each.

 

[TheRobin]

Currently sitting at 20% banked. My goal is to have 100% banked ideally by the end of February, but I'm going to have to really kick into high gear to achieve that. How about you guys?

 

[StevensBibi]

Hi guys

I'm an M1 who's been using FC and I'm getting kind of overwhelmed. I have about 150-160 questions a day and I'm not able to keep up with the pace while handling med school curriculum. How are people doing this?

 

[TheRobin]

Hi guys

I'm an M1 who's been using FC and I'm getting kind of overwhelmed. I have about 150-160 questions a day and I'm not able to keep up with the pace while handling med school curriculum. How are people doing this?

How long does 150-160 questions take you to do? For me, that would take me about 1.5 hours to review.

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Hi guys

I'm an M1 who's been using FC and I'm getting kind of overwhelmed. I have about 150-160 questions a day and I'm not able to keep up with the pace while handling med school curriculum. How are people doing this?

You have to make it a priority. 150-160 isn't horrible. If you're focused you can do that in an 45 minutes- an hour depending on your mastery. Really unfocused maybe 2-2.5 hours. Either way if you're sleeping 7-8 hours/day you still have 14 more hours to do stuff. The biggest thing is just managing your time, especially if you have mandatory class like my school

 

[justabanana]

Quick FC question for those who have used it alongside M1, most interested in those who've taken their step 1 already and rocked it: Did you flag topics that were briefly mentioned but that weren't covered in detail, and then learn the material on your own/from FC? Or did you wait until the topic is covered in detail to flag it? Things like: we talked about how Vancomycin works on terminal D-ala D-ala to prevent peptidoglycan formation. That was all we talked about vancomycin. FC has a lot more on it than that so if I flagged it I'd be learning a lot of stuff from FC, including organisms I don't know anything about, which doesn't necessarily sync up with school.


Also just to briefly mention the time thing.. I was having trouble doing FC in a timely manner as well. I wanted to fill in too many details and really get a firm understanding of things. Real meticulous-like. Getting a full in depth understanding and recall of FC, as well as learning my class material, seems unsustainable for me time-wise. I ended up setting a timer that makes a quiet beep every 30 seconds. I try hard to have a question answered, reviewed, and rated within a time frame that I don't hear it beep more than one time. A few questions take longer, but this amps up the pressure and it's really sped up how fast my brain drags out answers. My recall rate has probably decreased some, but the time I spend on FC has easily more than halved so it's been a worthwhile trade-off for me.

 

[StevensBibi]

You have to make it a priority. 150-160 isn't horrible. If you're focused you can do that in an 45 minutes- an hour depending on your mastery. Really unfocused maybe 2-2.5 hours. Either way if you're sleeping 7-8 hours/day you still have 14 more hours to do stuff. The biggest thing is just managing your time, especially if you have mandatory class like my school

Ugh yeah it's taking me like 2-2.5 hours to get through 160 Qs. But I've been taking notes and stuff on material I don't understand. Should I stop doing that and just see what I retain?

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Ugh yeah it's taking me like 2-2.5 hours to get through 160 Qs. But I've been taking notes and stuff on material I don't understand. Should I stop doing that and just see what I retain?

If I don't understand something I usually just google it. I don't really take notes from firecracker unless I think it's important to annotate something into First Aid

 

[TheRobin]

Ugh yeah it's taking me like 2-2.5 hours to get through 160 Qs. But I've been taking notes and stuff on material I don't understand. Should I stop doing that and just see what I retain?

I'd drop the note-taking. In Legacy, you can click on a topic and review the content before you do the questions. Is this not a thing with the new MD version?

 

[Ophthoseidon]

I'd drop the note-taking. In Legacy, you can click on a topic and review the content before you do the questions. Is this not a thing with the new MD version?

You can look at the information. I almost never do though, but it's available

 

[smarts1]

Is it just me or is the new algorithm giving the rest of you less questions than usual? I got 250 questions before but now I'm getting anywhere between 210 and 230...

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Is it just me or is the new algorithm giving the rest of you less questions than usual? I got 250 questions before but now I'm getting anywhere between 210 and 230...

Yeah I'm about 190 right now, but it's adaptive now and it wasn't before. Before it only took into account goal score and test date, so it treated all of us M2's who have been using it for a year like an M1, so you would expect the load to decrease once the features were implemented. It makes sense, if you already have 40% of the bank mastered you shouldn't be doing as much as someone who just started.

 

[StevensBibi]

I was going through this thread and realized that there aren't many reviews from people that used firecracker, took the boards, and attribute their good results somewhat to using firecracker. Does anyone know where to find more reviews of firecracker's usefulness? I figured the Step1 thread would have some but I haven't see any.

The issue I'm having is that while firecracker seems useful so far in theory (I'm an M1), I'm slowly realizing that it may be useless. I'm not in a systems curriculum and most of 1st year material is not relevant to the boards. I feel that I'm just wasting time during M1 by using this. I can see the usefulness during M2, but even then, I'm not able to find any reviews of people that say 'Yes, in fact using FC was helpful...and here is why"

Anyone?

 

[Ophthoseidon]

I was going through this thread and realized that there aren't many reviews from people that used firecracker, took the boards, and attribute their good results somewhat to using firecracker. Does anyone know where to find more reviews of firecracker's usefulness? I figured the Step1 thread would have some but I haven't see any.

The issue I'm having is that while firecracker seems useful so far in theory (I'm an M1), I'm slowly realizing that it may be useless. I'm not in a systems curriculum and most of 1st year material is not relevant to the boards. I feel that I'm just wasting time during M1 by using this. I can see the usefulness during M2, but even then, I'm not able to find any reviews of people that say 'Yes, in fact using FC was helpful...and here is why"

Anyone?

There are definitely people in this thread that have commented on it being useful that have done super well. There is also data (although could be selection bias) that supports their claims. You can pretty much google "firecracker scored 250" or whatever and you will find countless testimonials about people using it to score very well. I also think that many people who score really will disagree with "most of 1st year material is not relevant to the boards".

 

[TheRobin]

I was going through this thread and realized that there aren't many reviews from people that used firecracker, took the boards, and attribute their good results somewhat to using firecracker. Does anyone know where to find more reviews of firecracker's usefulness? I figured the Step1 thread would have some but I haven't see any.

The issue I'm having is that while firecracker seems useful so far in theory (I'm an M1), I'm slowly realizing that it may be useless. I'm not in a systems curriculum and most of 1st year material is not relevant to the boards. I feel that I'm just wasting time during M1 by using this. I can see the usefulness during M2, but even then, I'm not able to find any reviews of people that say 'Yes, in fact using FC was helpful...and here is why"

Anyone?

Stick with it. Flag a reasonable amount of topics as you go through M1, e.g. 2 new topics / day. If you need to take a few days off a week to focus more on coursework, that's fine, too. Just make sure to keep up with your daily reviews. Then, when the summer comes around, work on flagging as much FC as you can before M2 starts. If you start M2 with 60-70% flagged, then you'll be in a really strong position when it comes time to hit up Qbanks and NBMEs.

Edit: I've not taken Step 1 yet, but I wish that I had started FC last year as an M1. Read through posts by kirbymeister and mcloaf. They had great success with FC.

 

[EsotericAlchemy]

I really dig FC, but I haven't kept up with the cards at all lately. We take step 1 early at my school (early Feb 2016) so I have about 3 mos left. Should I keep doing cards or am I too far behind? 250 / day?

 

[theKeithF]

What's going on everyone? I know a few of you have had some questions that I haven't gotten to yet. Major apologies - I've been in a cave obsessing about the new adaptive layer we recently added. Hope you guys have found that and the stack visualization to be major improvements.

Now that we've launched the new adaptive layer and modeled it out to make sure it works solidly for the vast majority of use cases, we're planning on letting the algorithm rest for a while, meaning we won't be making any major updates to it in the near future (with the exception of addressing edge cases that might pop up here and there). Instead, we're focusing on adding a few new and improved features, and I'd love your input on how to do these best.

Many of our users have requested a far more robust note-taking experience. That, along with the ability to shuffle questions back into the same review session (a la Anki), are two of our most requested features. My team and I have designed what we think is a vastly improved experience for both of these, but I'd love to show you guys what we're thinking so you can help us build it the right way. If this is something you're interested in, I suggest we pick a time next week to all jump on a webinar together. I'll walk through the proposed updates, and you guys can give your candid feedback. I know folks have very specific ideas regarding what the best implementation of these features is, and I'd like to hear those in advance so we have enough time to make adjustments.

Let me know if this is something you all are interested in, as well as if there are any particular days/times next week that we could schedule this. Cheers!

 

[nabilesmail]

What's going on everyone? I know a few of you have had some questions that I haven't gotten to yet. Major apologies - I've been in a cave obsessing about the new adaptive layer we recently added. Hope you guys have found that and the stack visualization to be major improvements.

Now that we've launched the new adaptive layer and modeled it out to make sure it works solidly for the vast majority of use cases, we're planning on letting the algorithm rest for a while, meaning we won't be making any major updates to it in the near future (with the exception of addressing edge cases that might pop up here and there). Instead, we're focusing on adding a few new and improved features, and I'd love your input on how to do these best.

Many of our users have requested a far more robust note-taking experience. That, along with the ability to shuffle questions back into the same review session (a la Anki), are two of our most requested features. My team and I have designed what we think is a vastly improved experience for both of these, but I'd love to show you guys what we're thinking so you can help us build it the right way. If this is something you're interested in, I suggest we pick a time next week to all jump on a webinar together. I'll walk through the proposed updates, and you guys can give your candid feedback. I know folks have very specific ideas regarding what the best implementation of these features is, and I'd like to hear those in advance so we have enough time to make adjustments.

Let me know if this is something you all are interested in, as well as if there are any particular days/times next week that we could schedule this. Cheers!

This would honestly be perfect. I do feel that there is a bit of inefficiency with a Score of 1 sometimes not giving you a look at the card again for a few days (If you have a lot of material flagged with a fair amount of low scores)- this leads to a repetitive cycle of Learning, Forgeting, Learning , Forgetting. With a Anki-ish implementation of reshuffling, that would for the most part solve this!

Could you also take a look into being able to Edit Questions/Answers (Sometimes parts of a card that seem important have no direct question so there is no direct recall. This would also allow for a more personal experience.

 

[CyberMaxx]

Good to see you back here @theKeithF . I think the ability to re-review your daily cards (particularly by score so that you could redo 1's or 1's and 2's) would be a huge help. I've gotten into the habit of transporting cards that I keep on getting wrong (i.e. list of 6 things) into anki so that I can get that constant repetition I need to get the card down cold. Avoiding this extra hassle would be great, and I strongly believe that if you made re-reviewing daily cards a smooth process it would actually allow people to get through their daily reviews faster (rather than rating a card a 2 and studying its contents for 5 minutes they could rate it an move on knowing that they would see it again that day.

Also, I have been wondering how the new algorithm works for seeing cards again that you have repeatedly rated highly. Lets say, for example, I rated a card a 5 several times between last August and now, is there any chance that with the new algorithm I might not see that card again before my exam (7 months away) if I constantly have other cards that I'm rating lower? With the old algorithm I believe that it was not possible to push a card back further than 3 months, are there any constraints like that with the new system?

 

[justAstudent]

Good to see you back here @theKeithF . I think the ability to re-review your daily cards (particularly by score so that you could redo 1's or 1's and 2's would be a huge help. I've gotten into the habit of transporting cards that I keep on getting wrong (i.e. list of 6 things) into anki so that I can get that constant repetition I need to get the card down cold. Avoiding this extra hassle would be great, and I strongly believe that if you made re-reviewing daily cards a smooth process it would actually allow people to get through their daily reviews faster (rather than rating a card a 2 and studying its contents for 5 minutes they could rate it an move on knowing that they would see it again that day.

Also, I have been wondering how the new algorithm works for seeing cards again that you have repeatedly rated highly? Lets say, for example, I rated a card a 5 several times between last August and now, is there any chance that with the new algorithm I might not see that card again before my exam (7 months away) if I constantly have other cards that I'm rating lower? With the old algorithm I believe that it was not possible to push a card back further than 3 months, are there any constraints like that with the new system?

+1
I've been doing the same also.

 

[polylux]

Does anyone have experience with Firecracker when it comes to beyond Step 1? Is it useful for shelf exams or Step 2? Just wondering if I should bother with the 48 month sub or just stick with the 24 month. Thanks!

 

[Bancrofti]

What's going on everyone? I know a few of you have had some questions that I haven't gotten to yet. Major apologies - I've been in a cave obsessing about the new adaptive layer we recently added. Hope you guys have found that and the stack visualization to be major improvements.

Now that we've launched the new adaptive layer and modeled it out to make sure it works solidly for the vast majority of use cases, we're planning on letting the algorithm rest for a while, meaning we won't be making any major updates to it in the near future (with the exception of addressing edge cases that might pop up here and there). Instead, we're focusing on adding a few new and improved features, and I'd love your input on how to do these best.

Many of our users have requested a far more robust note-taking experience. That, along with the ability to shuffle questions back into the same review session (a la Anki), are two of our most requested features. My team and I have designed what we think is a vastly improved experience for both of these, but I'd love to show you guys what we're thinking so you can help us build it the right way. If this is something you're interested in, I suggest we pick a time next week to all jump on a webinar together. I'll walk through the proposed updates, and you guys can give your candid feedback. I know folks have very specific ideas regarding what the best implementation of these features is, and I'd like to hear those in advance so we have enough time to make adjustments.

Let me know if this is something you all are interested in, as well as if there are any particular days/times next week that we could schedule this. Cheers!

I think the option to see something the same session would be cool. It could be ranked as a "0" as opposed to some other number, and the final value given after seeing that question again (1-5) being what goes into the system and what it uses to generate when you see that question next.

Also, I don't really read this thread anymore. Glad updates are being made, but there is no plan to get rid of legacy, correct? As it stands, I still prefer this much more than the new platform.

 

[theKeithF]

Does anyone have experience with Firecracker when it comes to beyond Step 1? Is it useful for shelf exams or Step 2? Just wondering if I should bother with the 48 month sub or just stick with the 24 month. Thanks!

I'll leave it to the actual students on this thread to give you their personal impressions, but just a few quick thoughts: M3 is by far our fastest growing group of students, so there is certainly a large number of students using the system for wards and Step 2. Also, we often ask past FC students who have been successful on either Step 1 or 2 to explain how they used FC to achieve their score. We post these to our blog fairly often. If you're curious, here's a link to one that was posted today. Hopefully that sheds a bit of light, but obviously let me know if you have any specific questions. I'll do my best to respond quickly.

 

[theKeithF]

I think the option to see something the same session would be cool. It could be ranked as a "0" as opposed to some other number, and the final value given after seeing that question again (1-5) being what goes into the system and what it uses to generate when you see that question next.

Also, I don't really read this thread anymore. Glad updates are being made, but there is no plan to get rid of legacy, correct? As it stands, I still prefer this much more than the new platform.

Great stuff. That's very similar to the implementation we are currently proposing. The two main problem here - what we are most focused on avoiding - revolve around recency bias. First, we don't want students to incorrectly assume they know the concepts better than they really do simply because they've seen it several times in a short amount of time. Second, we need to keep in mind how the algorithm should be affected. We certainly don't want to log each review within the same session as different review sessions because it will trick the algorithm into thinking you've seen the question many times, thus assigning it at incorrect intervals in the future. A few of the many considerations that make this more involved than just adding a quick shuffle back in button.

As for Legacy - no plans to get rid of it, and no urgency for you to transition over if you're finding success with it. Just keep rocking it.

 

[theKeithF]

This would honestly be perfect. I do feel that there is a bit of inefficiency with a Score of 1 sometimes not giving you a look at the card again for a few days (If you have a lot of material flagged with a fair amount of low scores)- this leads to a repetitive cycle of Learning, Forgeting, Learning , Forgetting. With a Anki-ish implementation of reshuffling, that would for the most part solve this!

Could you also take a look into being able to Edit Questions/Answers (Sometimes parts of a card that seem important have no direct question so there is no direct recall. This would also allow for a more personal experience.

Mind if I DM you to ask a bit more about the second part of this, i.e. edit questions/answers? Now is a great time for me to really dive into features like this.

 

[nabilesmail]

Mind if I DM you to ask a bit more about the second part of this, i.e. edit questions/answers? Now is a great time for me to really dive into features like this.

Absolutely, sorry for the incoherent writing, I usually check the thread when I'm half asleep in bed. I'm assuming DM is like Private Message? Regardless, I'd love to explain my idea.

 

[CyberMaxx]

That's very similar to the implementation we are currently proposing. The two main problem here - what we are most focused on avoiding - revolve around recency bias. First, we don't want students to incorrectly assume they know the concepts better than they really do simply because they've seen it several times in a short amount of time. Second, we need to keep in mind how the algorithm should be affected. We certainly don't want to log each review within the same session as different review sessions because it will trick the algorithm into thinking you've seen the question many times, thus assigning it at incorrect intervals in the future.it.

I think rather than a separate button (such as a 0 button), the ability to review your cards would make this feature more manageable. That way you wouldn't have to decide whether your want to spend more time re-reviewing each card as you rate it, you would just follow your normal system for rating cards and then choose whether or not to review them once you are done. This would also be advantageous as sometimes you might have time to really hammer away at firecracker cards while other days you might be squeezing firecracker into a very busy schedule. If you made it where you could choose to review your low rated cards for that day it would be something extra you could do when you had time rather than a de facto part of your work-flow.

As far as recency bias goes, I would suggest that you create some incentive for re-reviewing your cards (because after-all it will help you know them better), but make it a small incentive. For example, in the new 0.1 - 1.0 memory score system, perhaps each numerical ranking score could be assigned a 0.05 numerical value such that getting a 4 on a card in which you previously got a 2 would allow the algorithm to reschedule the card in the next lower memory score bracket (i.e. 0.9 to 0.8). Also you could have each time you do a card in a single day, no matter how many times you review it, just count as one review in the algorithm.

Wow, that was a lot, obviously I am spending a little to much time with Firecracker these days 😉

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Great stuff. That's very similar to the implementation we are currently proposing. The two main problem here - what we are most focused on avoiding - revolve around recency bias. First, we don't want students to incorrectly assume they know the concepts better than they really do simply because they've seen it several times in a short amount of time. Second, we need to keep in mind how the algorithm should be affected. We certainly don't want to log each review within the same session as different review sessions because it will trick the algorithm into thinking you've seen the question many times, thus assigning it at incorrect intervals in the future. A few of the many considerations that make this more involved than just adding a quick shuffle back in button.

As for Legacy - no plans to get rid of it, and no urgency for you to transition over if you're finding success with it. Just keep rocking it.

I really think having the 0 button would be helpful. And as far as the algorithm, don't count reviews that you hit 0 for. I think it's the student's responsibility to understand what they know and don't know. For example, if you hit a card 4 times in a day as 0 and then rate it a 5 afterwards, what was the point of rating it a 0? It's going to only be a problem for certain people who don't realize it's a button to help you remember the next day, not so you can't see it for 2 weeks. You'll just have to make sure you explain the button's utility well when you introduce it.

 

[justabanana]

I'm really looking forward to reviewing same day questions!

Algorithm wise, maybe the '0' button is treated as a 1 in the algorithm. I also prefer a "Review cards you marked as 0 today" option that you can click after doing your daily set, rather then reshuffling them into the deck. The algorithm could then just completely ignore all reviews that occur from the "See cards you marked as 0 today." button being clicked.​

 

[theKeithF]

I think rather than a separate button (such as a 0 button), the ability to review your cards would make this feature more manageable. That way you wouldn't have to decide whether your want to spend more time re-reviewing each card as you rate it, you would just follow your normal system for rating cards and then choose whether or not to review them once you are done. This would also be advantageous as sometimes you might have time to really hammer away at firecracker cards while other days you might be squeezing firecracker into a very busy schedule. If you made it where you could choose to review your low rated cards for that day it would be something extra you could do when you had time rather than a de facto part of your work-flow.

As far as recency bias goes, I would suggest that you create some incentive for re-reviewing your cards (because after-all it will help you know them better), but make it a small incentive. For example, in the new 0.1 - 1.0 memory score system, perhaps each numerical ranking score could be assigned a 0.05 numerical value such that getting a 4 on a card in which you previously got a 2 would allow the algorithm to reschedule the card in the next lower memory score bracket (i.e. 0.9 to 0.8). Also you could have each time you do a card in a single day, no matter how many times you review it, just count as one review in the algorithm.

Wow, that was a lot, obviously I am spending a little to much time with Firecracker these days 😉

So we're actually planning on doing both, i.e. 1) a shuffle question back into the same review session feature, and 2) a post-review session summary, from which you can unmark topics you realize you haven't learned and/or launch a follow-up review session of questions with low review scores. The real question for you guys is: which should we do first? We're a small, scrappy team, so it's really important for us to prioritize and sequence updates in an order that corresponds most closely with what you guys want/need the most. My plan was to start with the shuffle feature, but if you all disagree, just let me know.

And by the way, lol re: spending too much time with Firecracker. That's the story of my life.

 

[Ophthoseidon]

So we're actually planning on doing both, i.e. 1) a shuffle question back into the same review session feature, and 2) a post-review session summary, from which you can unmark topics you realize you haven't learned and/or launch a follow-up review session of questions with low review scores. The real question for you guys is: which should we do first? We're a small, scrappy team, so it's really important for us to prioritize and sequence updates in an order that corresponds most closely with what you guys want/need the most. My plan was to start with the shuffle feature, but if you all disagree, just let me know.

And by the way, lol re: spending too much time with Firecracker. That's the story of my life.

Shuffle by far is the most important (imo, and also factual 🙂)

 

[Guero]

Well, it looks like I need to redact much of my prior contributions re: FC. I'll instead be using FC in an entirely new way to supplement my USMLERx and my early UWorld subscription. I've decided to abandon my traditional FC plan, since I tend to learn more from questions and applications than rote memorization.

Also, I think it'd be very valuable for our underclassmen if some of you return after Step scores are released to relate what worked for you and what didn't per your respective platform (Legacy vs MD). I'd be interested myself. Good luck to all!

 

[TheRobin]

Also, I think it'd be very valuable for our underclassmen if some of you return after Step scores are released to relate what worked for you and what didn't per your respective platform (Legacy vs MD). I'd be interested myself. Good luck to all!

Will do. Just send me a reminder during July.

 

[skarabrae]

Has anyone used the Firecracker qbank questions? Impressions?

I have done Rx, Kaplan and will probably finish Uworld with room for more questions and am curious if anyone thought the FC qbank was worthwhile.

 

[justAstudent]

Sorry for going a bit off topic, but how often are you guys using the "5 rating?" I find myself hitting 4 most of the time instead of 5. Rating a card with 5 and not seeing it again for 120 days makes me feel a bit uncomfortable as I feel like I'll forget it. However, now that I have about 60% flagged I find that I have to do about 500 cards a day and I'm wondering if I should maybe use the 5 rating a bit more. What is your guys opinion? How often do you rate a card with 5?

 

[Guero]

Will do. Just send me a reminder during July.

Thanks! I put a reminder in my phone.

 

[ATypicalLymphocyte]

Thinking about dropping FC during dedicated (or last week at least)... thoughts?

 

[theKeithF]

Thinking about dropping FC during dedicated (or last week at least)... thoughts?

Great question. Going to piggy back on this if I can. Curious about how you all go about making the most of dedicated. Would love some insight into this. A few questions:

• How far out from the boards will you begin dedicated prep?
• How will you spend your time during dedicated?
• What resources will you use?
• What's your main focus during dedicated? e.g. Covering the remaining material, mastering what you've already covered, taking as many full-length practice exams as possible, etc.

We're launching an updated Q-bank soon, and I want to make sure I understand this group's study behavior.

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Great question. Going to piggy back on this if I can. Curious about how you all go about making the most of dedicated. Would love some insight into this. A few questions:

• How far out from the boards will you begin dedicated prep?
• How will you spend your time during dedicated?
• What resources will you use?
• What's your main focus during dedicated? e.g. Covering the remaining material, mastering what you've already covered, taking as many full-length practice exams as possible, etc.

We're launching an updated Q-bank soon, and I want to make sure I understand this group's study behavior.

1. ~6 weeks
2. I'm not sure what this is asking, it seems like a combination of 3 and 4
3. FC, UFAP, Sketchy
4. Taking NBME exams to find out my weaknesses, reviewing those weaknesses, and learning application (questions/google)

 

[Ophthoseidon]

Thinking about dropping FC during dedicated (or last week at least)... thoughts?

I plan on using it still, maybe an hour or so in the morning before I get rolling. We'll see when the time comes if I feel the same.

 

[CyberMaxx]

1. How far out from the boards will you begin dedicated prep?
2. What resources will you use?
3. What's your main focus during dedicated? e.g. Covering the remaining material, mastering what you've already covered, taking as many full-length practice exams as possible, etc.

1. 5 weeks
2. resources:

a. goljan/pathoma/first aid monstrosity that I'm creating
b. UWorld
c. sketchy medical
d. maybe firecracker if I think its still useful. I hope to have it mastered well before dedicated so we'll see​

3. hopefully just reviewing stuff and taking NBMEs

P.S. This is just my opinion but is a Q Bank really necessary for firecracker? There are already more Q Banks out there than most people can get through.

 

[TheRobin]

Great question. Going to piggy back on this if I can. Curious about how you all go about making the most of dedicated. Would love some insight into this. A few questions:

• How far out from the boards will you begin dedicated prep?
• How will you spend your time during dedicated?
• What resources will you use?
• What's your main focus during dedicated? e.g. Covering the remaining material, mastering what you've already covered, taking as many full-length practice exams as possible, etc.

We're launching an updated Q-bank soon, and I want to make sure I understand this group's study behavior.

1) My school gives close to 4.5 weeks for dedicated. I'd like to take the test a little earlier, though, so that I have a week off before third year starts.
2) Qbanks and NBMEs with targeted review from other sources as needed.
3) UWorld (maybe Rx, too), Firecracker, Pathoma/Goljan, Sketchy
4) Main focus during dedicated will be question blocks from UWorld.

 

[TheRobin]

P.S. This is just my opinion but is a Q Bank really necessary for firecracker? There are already more Q Banks out there than most people can get through.

Agreed. Not to mention that there may be diminishing returns with using more qbanks. Personally, I plan on using UWorld and Rx exclusively (the latter because I already paid for it at the beginning of the year).

 

[TheRobin]

Thinking about dropping FC during dedicated (or last week at least)... thoughts?

Aren't you already 100% flagged? If so, won't your daily reviews theoretically go down to a more manageable amount within the next few months?

Ultimately, the decision will be with you if you want to stick with it. I know kirbymeister posted that he stopped FC before dedicated to do the tried-and-true UFAP, while mcloaf continued during dedicated. The end result didn't seem to be too different, perhaps suggesting that the bulk of FC's utility comes from daily use in the months leading up to dedicated prep time.

 

[TheRobin]

Also, how far along are you guys with flagging thus far? I'm around 25% banked, and hoping to use my time during winter break to make some serious progress. I'll be taking Step in June and want to be at least 90% completed with FC by spring break.

 

[abolt18]

Great question. Going to piggy back on this if I can. Curious about how you all go about making the most of dedicated. Would love some insight into this. A few questions:

• How far out from the boards will you begin dedicated prep?
• How will you spend your time during dedicated?
• What resources will you use?
• What's your main focus during dedicated? e.g. Covering the remaining material, mastering what you've already covered, taking as many full-length practice exams as possible, etc.

We're launching an updated Q-bank soon, and I want to make sure I understand this group's study behavior.

I don't remember exactly how long I had. I believe I used 4 of the 7 weeks I had off. I was 75% flagged at that point. I didn't flag anything extra unless I just needed to drive home a principle that I was getting wrong in UWorld.

Dedicated consisted of UWorld, a couple NBME's, reading pathoma a couple more times, and I used firecracker solely to hit the stuff that I was weak on. I would go to my breakdown and select to review all the questions rated a 1. When that was done I did all the questions rated a 2 (there were like a thousand of them). I stopped at that point. It was a nice way to ignore the 3, 4, and 5 material that I had a better handle on and really focus on things that I wasn't remembering.