Going through zanki and not doing well on Step 1?

[dwmok001]

I'm just wondering if anyone has gone through a majority of the zanki (or whatever deck) and not done well on Step 1 (by well I'm saying under a 230). I've been going through this and hope to finish 20k worth of cards by March giving me 2 months to review before step 1. I'm just fearful that all this work is going to be in vain once I get to the actual exam. I already have pathoma and sketchy on board, doing Kaplan and usmle rx questions and will do uworld in the spring.

So for those who used the decks and didn't do well on the exam (again 230 or less) what would you have changed or added? Would you have stuck to doing the decks?

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Lnsean]

I'm just wondering if anyone has gone through a majority of the zanki (or whatever deck) and not done well on Step 1 (by well I'm saying under a 230). I've been going through this and hope to finish 20k worth of cards by March giving me 2 months to review before step 1. I'm just fearful that all this work is going to be in vain once I get to the actual exam. I already have pathoma and sketchy on board, doing Kaplan and usmle rx questions and will do uworld in the spring.

So for those who used the decks and didn't do well on the exam (again 230 or less) what would you have changed or added? Would you have stuck to doing the decks?

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

Easy...start doing some uWorld questions and see if you are integrating and learning the material. The problem with Zanki is come exam time...all you can spit out will be random bits and pieces of facts...and you won't be able to integrate or connect them in a vignette.

 

[dwmok001]

Easy...start doing some uWorld questions and see if you are integrating and learning the material. The problem with Zanki is come exam time...all you can spit out will be random bits and pieces of facts...and you won't be able to integrate or connect them in a vignette.

Agreed to that, but that's why I was doing Kaplan questions first. I wanted to save uworld for dedicated since I've heard half the people do that so that's my plan too.

I was just overall looking for people that actually went through it thinking it would help but ended up not being as beneficial.

Thanks for the reply though and input

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

 

[medicineman1234]

I'm just wondering if anyone has gone through a majority of the zanki (or whatever deck) and not done well on Step 1 (by well I'm saying under a 230). I've been going through this and hope to finish 20k worth of cards by March giving me 2 months to review before step 1. I'm just fearful that all this work is going to be in vain once I get to the actual exam. I already have pathoma and sketchy on board, doing Kaplan and usmle rx questions and will do uworld in the spring.

So for those who used the decks and didn't do well on the exam (again 230 or less) what would you have changed or added? Would you have stuck to doing the decks?

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

How have ur percentiles been on Rx and Kaplan?

 

[dwmok001]

How have ur percentiles been on Rx and Kaplan?

Haven't gotten through rx. Started Kaplan at the beginning of first year and have been going through it. Kaplan is at a 42% for everything.

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

The problem with Zanki is come exam time...all you can spit out will be random bits and pieces of facts...and you won't be able to integrate or connect them in a vignette.

This is a largely a myth.

 

[dwmok001]

This is a largely a myth.

Why do you think doing the zanki or whatever deck is worth it?

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

 

[Lnsean]

This is a largely a myth.

Not really. I've noticed that with the cards that are cloze deletions and a few people who have taken step have mentioned this. If the card is a more open ended question than it's okay...but the cloze deletion ones are problematic.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Why do you think doing the zanki or whatever deck is worth it?

Sent from my Pixel 2 using SDN mobile

Because I’ve been crushing Q bank questions for the sections that I’ve done already. And everyone I know in the class above me who did it crushed boards (all 240+).

Not really. I've noticed that with the cards that are cloze deletions and a few people who have taken step have mentioned this. If the card is a more open ended question than it's okay...but the cloze deletion ones are problematic.

Have you ever done them or are you basing your comment on other’s experience? Because in my experience yeah sure if you haven’t finished all the cards for one topic then it’s a jumble of facts but once you finish that whole subdeck all the little pieces all of a sudden become a big picture. Finishing the whole deck puts all of it together. But if you don’t do it consistently then you won’t get that benefit.

 

[Lnsean]

Because I’ve been crushing Q bank questions for the sections that I’ve done already. And everyone I know in the class above me who did it crushed boards (all 240+).



Have you ever done them or are you basing your comment on other’s experience? Because in my experience yeah sure if you haven’t finished all the cards for one topic then it’s a jumble of facts but once you finish that whole subdeck all the little pieces all of a sudden become a big picture. Finishing the whole deck puts all of it together. But if you don’t do it consistently then you won’t get that benefit.

I'm doing them now and the cloze deletion cards...your brain subconsciously memorize the stem. You'll remember what to fill in the blank with and not really understand it. You can actually test this out...if you pull up a cloze deletion card and automatically know what the answer is even without reading the whole stem...then that's a problem. There is really no thinking involved. I've read quite a few feedback on here and reddit regarding this from people who had taken step.

I'm just bringing this up as an FYI for anyone that is over relying on anki...make sure the cards are good. There are alot of cloze deletion in many of the decks that I've seen.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

I'm doing them now and the cloze deletion cards...your brain subconsciously memorize the stem. You'll remember what to fill in the blank with and not really understand it. You can actually test this out...if you pull up a cloze deletion card and automatically know what the answer is even without reading the whole stem...then that's a problem. There is really no thinking involved. I've read quite a few feedback on here and reddit regarding this from people who had taken step.

I'm just bringing this up as an FYI for anyone that is over relying on anki...make sure the cards are good. There are alot of cloze deletion in many of the decks that I've seen.

True. I was going to come add that they don’t work for everyone, and people need to do what works best for them. Zanki works for me, but that doesn’t mean it will work for everyone.

I agree that it shouldn’t be the only source of material.

 

[Lnsean]

True. I was going to come add that they don’t work for everyone, and people need to do what works best for them. Zanki works for me, but that doesn’t mean it will work for everyone.

I agree that it shouldn’t be the only source of material.

Yea, I agree. It's just that we rarely hear from people that didn't do well or did average on step.

 

[Her?]

Because I’ve been crushing Q bank questions for the sections that I’ve done already. And everyone I know in the class above me who did it crushed boards (all 240+).



Have you ever done them or are you basing your comment on other’s experience? Because in my experience yeah sure if you haven’t finished all the cards for one topic then it’s a jumble of facts but once you finish that whole subdeck all the little pieces all of a sudden become a big picture. Finishing the whole deck puts all of it together. But if you don’t do it consistently then you won’t get that benefit.

Which Qbanks are you using?

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Which Qbanks are you using?

Kaplan and Rx.

 

[Gurby]

I'm doing them now and the cloze deletion cards...your brain subconsciously memorize the stem. You'll remember what to fill in the blank with and not really understand it. You can actually test this out...if you pull up a cloze deletion card and automatically know what the answer is even without reading the whole stem...then that's a problem. There is really no thinking involved. I've read quite a few feedback on here and reddit regarding this from people who had taken step.

I'm just bringing this up as an FYI for anyone that is over relying on anki...make sure the cards are good. There are alot of cloze deletion in many of the decks that I've seen.

This is 100% a real issue. You have to be honest with yourself in assessing whether you actually knew the answer or just rote memorized it. Editing the clozes and moving the brackets around to eliminate context clues is helpful. It's also imperative to do lots of boards style QBank questions to make sure you are putting the pieces together and not ending up with a jumble of factoids.

Doing nothing but Zanki in isolation all year and then walking in to the test is probably not going to go well... But I think Zanki can lay the foundation on which you build the rest of your learning.

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

But I think Zanki can lay the foundation on which you build the rest of your learning.

For me I actually use BnB/Pathoma/Sketchy as the foundation and then do Zanki after, for me it helps tie it all together and hammer in all the details from those sources.

 

[Neopolymath]

For me I actually use BnB/Pathoma/Sketchy as the foundation and then do Zanki after, for me it helps tie it all together and hammer in all the details from those sources.

Are people doing these cards without learning the material first?! I feel like I shouldn't be surprised about what I hear medical students doing anymore, but this seems too stupid to be true. Brute forcing all those cards sounds just plain painful anyways.

And just for the record, I am doing well in my Qbank sessions doing the same thing as AG. I have not seen a single topic in school that is intellectually complicated/challenging, but on the other hand, I am pretty average at memorization. Anki is the only way to remember that this whatever cancer stains with these 6 things. To many people's disappointment, that's largely what the first two years of med school is anyways and Zanki takes care of that issue. I honestly don't see how someone could do poorly if they matured zanki to be perfectly honest.

 

[Spectreman]

I’ve been hitting Zanki with 150 new/day + reviews and it has made me a believer. At first it feels like a big grab bag of random facts, but I’ve been doing Rx along side it and I’m just blown away by how confident I feel. Was doing Rx before I started Zanki and averaged about 40% over a month, now I’m only missing 1-2 questions per test I create and it’s inevitably something I haven’t hit yet in Zanki. I’m a huge Anki fan though, I build decks for all of my class exams.

Very hopeful that this is going to come together to help me get a decent score. Obviously nervous though, which is why I ended up in this thread.

 

[Spectreman]

Are people doing these cards without learning the material first?! I feel like I shouldn't be surprised about what I hear medical students doing anymore, but this seems too stupid to be true. Brute forcing all those cards sounds just plain painful anyways.

And just for the record, I am doing well in my Qbank sessions doing the same thing as AG. I have not seen a single topic in school that is intellectually complicated/challenging, but on the other hand, I am pretty average at memorization. Anki is the only way to remember that this whatever cancer stains with these 6 things. To many people's disappointment, that's largely what the first two years of med school is anyways and Zanki takes care of that issue. I honestly don't see how someone could do poorly if they matured zanki to be perfectly honest.

My buddy who got a 267 and 100% blames Zanki for his success would go through the entire system before each block at his school, to me that seems nuts.

 

[Gurby]

Are people doing these cards without learning the material first?! I feel like I shouldn't be surprised about what I hear medical students doing anymore, but this seems too stupid to be true. Brute forcing all those cards sounds just plain painful anyways.

I just go straight for the Zanki, and look things up on wikipedia if I'm encountering it for the first time. I find brute forcing cards much less painful than listening to lectures but that's just me.

 

[Neopolymath]

I just go straight for the Zanki, and look things up on wikipedia if I'm encountering it for the first time. I find brute forcing cards much less painful than listening to lectures but that's just me.

How do you even know what some of the more vague cards are asking upon first viewing? Or are you just looking at the cards several times during your new phase? Do you not think it would be easier to watch a sketchy video before doing the sketchy cards for that section?

Edit: I don't do school lectures either aside from right before the exam (PhD written exams...)

 

[Gurby]

How do you even know what some of the more vague cards are asking upon first viewing? Or are you just looking at the cards several times during your new phase? Do you not think it would be easier to watch a sketchy video before doing the sketchy cards for that section?

Edit: I don't do school lectures either aside from right before the exam (PhD written exams...)

Maybe I don't know what they're asking. It sometimes takes me a number of times hitting "again" before a new card on new material clicks in my brain.

Maybe watching a video would be better, but at this point I hate lectures so much I can't bring myself to do it. I just hate that feeling of sitting there paying attention, and then the lecturer says something I already knew, and it's like well that was 30 seconds of time + energy wasted. It's the constant turning my brain off and on, and half-paying attention that I find draining. I was always a textbook reader in undergrad (and during M1 before I switched to Zanki) for this reason, I think. I like to either be fully engaged and using 100% effort, or fully disengaged and walking around the room.

 

[Spectreman]

Maybe I don't know what they're asking. It sometimes takes me a number of times hitting "again" before a new card on new material clicks in my brain.

Maybe watching a video would be better, but at this point I hate lectures so much I can't bring myself to do it. I just hate that feeling of sitting there paying attention, and then the lecturer says something I already knew, and it's like well that was 30 seconds of time + energy wasted. It's the constant turning my brain off and on, and half-paying attention that I find draining. I was always a textbook reader in undergrad (and during M1 before I switched to Zanki) for this reason, I think. I like to either be fully engaged and using 100% effort, or fully disengaged and walking around the room.

At my school Renal is our killer of 3rd block, apparently if fails a TON of students (like 30+) every year. So I’m going to cold turkey the renal section of Zanki during break (I guess I’ll watch Pathoma and junk for it first, so not totally cold turkey). I’ll let ya know how I feel about it. Any tips on making that approach more worth while? Besides just googling something that seems totally foreign.

 

[Gurby]

At my school Renal is our killer of 3rd block, apparently if fails a TON of students (like 30+) every year. So I’m going to cold turkey the renal section of Zanki during break (I guess I’ll watch Pathoma and junk for it first, so not totally cold turkey). I’ll let ya know how I feel about it. Any tips on making that approach more worth while? Besides just googling something that seems totally foreign.

No other tips really... Just be prepared to also do practice questions to solidify and learn to apply that Zanki knowledge.

 

[Black Coffee 24/7]

For the Anki jock riders here, make sure to download either WiWa or Zanki Step 2 right now while it’s still available on the net for third year.

Did mediocre on my first two shelves by trying to read Case Files and rely mainly on OME. Went back to crushing exams after pounding Anki cards from WiWa.

 

[iforget2]

For the Anki jock riders here, make sure to download either WiWa or Zanki Step 2 right now while it’s still available on the net for third year.

Did mediocre on my first two shelves by trying to read Case Files and rely mainly on OME. Went back to crushing exams after pounding Anki cards from WiWa.

Is it supposed to be taken down soon?

 

[Gurby]

Is it supposed to be taken down soon?

I haven't seen anyone posting about this anywhere, but I read the recent changes to Anki's TOS and found it a bit alarming. It sounded like they're going to try to crack down on people pirating / sharing stuff they technically don't have the rights to share via uploaded decks. In other words they might start making a major effort to take down decks with screenshots from Netter, FA, etc. I wouldn't be surprised if they got sued by some content provider (Rosetta Stone company or something) and now they're under pressure to care more about that stuff.

Or maybe I'm over-reacting. Realistically though there probably isn't much they can do to stop people sharing decks via SDN and Reddit, so I'm not too worried...

 

[Black Coffee 24/7]

Is it supposed to be taken down soon?

Considering that both decks have screenshots of Uworld, Uptodate, and Sketchy for contents, I would highly advise you to get them now before it's too late.

But, I recently just started using one of the decks for my baseline. I'm killing pimp questions in my current rotation right now, in which my preceptor is highly impressed with my baseline knowledge.

The above decks are necessary in order to destroy the ward and shelf exams. Pick one and stick to it. I personally like WiWa better because it has some explanation and other details with regards to the cards.

Also go from UW average in the 50s-60s to 70s-80s.

We will see about my performance on Step 2. But, I think I can crack at least the Step 2 average of around 240 at this pace.

 

[Neopolymath]

Considering that both decks have screenshots of Uworld, Uptodate, and Sketchy for contents, I would highly advise you to get them now before it's too late.

But, I recently just started using one of the decks for my baseline. I'm killing pimp questions in my current rotation right now, in which my preceptor is highly impressed with my baseline knowledge.

The above decks are necessary in order to destroy the ward and shelf exams. Pick one and stick to it. I personally like WiWa better because it has some explanation and other details with regards to the cards.

Also go from UW average in the 50s-60s to 70s-80s.

We will see about my performance on Step 2. But, I think I can crack at least the Step 2 average of around 240 at this pace.

What is your study schedule during your rotations with regards to when you try to get these cards done and when you are doing UW questions? Are you front-loading the cards super hard and then doing questions the last 2 weeks? Are you reading any sources besides doing the cards cold?

Thanks!

 

[Black Coffee 24/7]

What is your study schedule during your rotations with regards to when you try to get these cards done and when you are doing UW questions? Are you front-loading the cards super hard and then doing questions the last 2 weeks? Are you reading any sources besides doing the cards cold?

Thanks!

Pound through 600-800 cards the weekend before the start of my rotation. If not, I should be through with like 60-70% of the deck on the first day of work. I use pimp sessions on the first week to solidify my knowledge base. The best thing about being a third year medical student is that preceptors don't expect you to know any of these stuff. When you start quoting diagnostic criteria and crap like that for diff conditions, it makes you look really good.

I usually start UW and another Qbank on my second week of rotation. OME is a solid resource but about 20-30% of the stuff on the videos are outdated.

 

[Newyawk]

Let me get this straight...
fact 1 - zanki doesnt work for everyone
Fact 2 - "maturing" zanki (whatever tf that means) takes an insane amount of extra work
Fact 3 - you have to mature all of it to really get the material, so you wont know until the end if it did...

In conclusion... risk all of your extra time on a resource that isnt guaranteed to work for you and is still largely unproven, and ignore the method that has worked for many in the past (FA, pathoma/goljan, and as many questions as possible). Seems like a smart move to me.

 

[Spectreman]

Let me get this straight...
fact 1 - zanki doesnt work for everyone
Fact 2 - "maturing" zanki (whatever tf that means) takes an insane amount of extra work
Fact 3 - you have to mature all of it to really get the material, so you wont know until the end if it did...

In conclusion... risk all of your extra time on a resource that isnt guaranteed to work for you and is still largely unproven, and ignore the method that has worked for many in the past (FA, pathoma/goljan, and as many questions as possible). Seems like a smart move to me.

No no no...

I ran a test, you can too. Do the deck for one subject, will take a week or two to get one pass at a couple hours/day. Then go into Rx and do a bunch of questions on that topic. If you feel like it was tapping into the freaking matrix (my personal experience) then great, if not, you lost a little bit of time.

 

[Neopolymath]

No no no...

I ran a test, you can too. Do the deck for one subject, will take a week or two to get one pass at a couple hours/day. Then go into Rx and do a bunch of questions on that topic. If you feel like it was tapping into the freaking matrix (my personal experience) then great, if not, you lost a little bit of time.

Just fyi, he got like a 265 on step 1 without anki so he is generally against anki being something you HAVE to do. He just adds some balance to the anki wankfest that is the internet (I say that as a disciplined user myself).

 

[Newyawk]

Just fyi, he got like a 265 on step 1 without anki so he is generally against anki being something you HAVE to do. He just adds some balance to the anki wankfest that is the internet (I say that as a disciplined user myself).

Love this post. My whole mission is to add just a bit of opposition to the insane trend.
A younger friend of mine recently called me frantically a few nights before his exam bc he matured zanki but didnt have time to do much else.. unfortunately his final practice test score wasnt appealing and he decided to postpone his exam, despite months of studying. He obviously did it wrong, but if he could eff up then im sure others could too.

Just to add a bit more - my other issue with anki is the focus on details. I was scared ****less a few days before my exam bc i didnt know everything in FA (i was shooting for 260), while most of my friends had FA down. Turns out knowing every detail isnt as important as knowing how to take the exam. Questions teach you how to take the exam, details do not. Furthermore, step 1 is getting further and further away from being a purely detail-focused exam.

 

[Lawpy]

I'm concerned the Zanki hype might be too excessive. Not to mention, people read up on SDN that Zanki is awesome and led to their getting excellent scores, which leads to some unsupported and misleading assumptions that doing well in Zanki and maturing it by following a certain regimen means you're guaranteed to get a good score.

Zanki itself is probably a good resource but I think people are taking things too absolute. It goes against another advice on here that study strategies should be personalized, and just because something like Zanki may work for someone doesn't mean it works for you.

 

[Black Coffee 24/7]

Love this post. My whole mission is to add just a bit of opposition to the insane trend.
A younger friend of mine recently called me frantically a few nights before his exam bc he matured zanki but didnt have time to do much else.. unfortunately his final practice test score wasnt appealing and he decided to postpone his exam, despite months of studying. He obviously did it wrong, but if he could eff up then im sure others could too.

Just to add a bit more - my other issue with anki is the focus on details. I was scared ****less a few days before my exam bc i didnt know everything in FA (i was shooting for 260), while most of my friends had FA down. Turns out knowing every detail isnt as important as knowing how to take the exam. Questions teach you how to take the exam, details do not. Furthermore, step 1 is getting further and further away from being a purely detail-focused exam.

I completely agree with Newyawk about maturing Zanki cards being a waste of time. I did that and was completely behind the 8 balls 1 week into my dedication.

This is one of my reasons for opting for the WiWa deck instead of the Zanki deck for Step 2. Instead of trying to mature Zanki cards and reset my timeline for every card in Zanki, I instead just read a WiWa card and then continuously hit the next lowest reschedule timeline in my WiWa deck. It takes much less time throughout my second year so far.

For the ANKI jock riders in here who keep insist on maturing every minute details in the Zanki deck, some of my classmates did better or equally as solid as me on USMLE Step 1, and didn't even bother wasting time maturing any of the decks.

They just read the explanation they put for each card when the reschedule time comes up and then click on the next lowest setting, especially after maturing it to 15-20 days interval.

I completely agree with Newyawk that the best prep for USMLE Step 1 is to do as many questions as possible and understand the reasoning behind each answer.

 

[Spectreman]

Just fyi, he got like a 265 on step 1 without anki so he is generally against anki being something you HAVE to do. He just adds some balance to the anki wankfest that is the internet (I say that as a disciplined user myself).

Oh I completely thought his comment was from the perspective of someone looking for resources. I still stand by the comment that you can test it out, it doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing.

 

[Ven0m]

Zanki is a supplement. A very good one though

 

[AnatomyGrey12]

Anyone who is only using Zanki and not doing practice questions is an idiot.

Anki is a resource, albeit a great one IMO, but it needs to be incorporated into a larger study plan.

It’s not for everyone. I know 260 scorers who never touched it, and I know 260 scorers that swear by it. Everyone needs to find what works best for them.

 

[deleted645092]

For what it’s worth, I’m a dedicated Anki Master and barely used Zanki. Instead I made my own cards for every lecture starting 2nd semester of 1st year. I was able to clean up some of the earlier cards as 2nd year progressed and used those as my flashcards during dedicated. I did trial Zanki at times where I would try and get 100 cards in a night, but ended up getting better results using my own cards, because I would put an explanation into each card so I was getting some reading in while testing myself.

This was in addition to using UFAPS, but only reading through 1 system per week in First Aid during 2nd year.

 

[NecrotizingFasciitis]

This is my first time doing hardcore zanki only (as opposed to making my own flashcards, watching my school lectures, & reading Robbins) & I found that annotating FA while you work through the cards helps solidify concepts tremendously. In addition to looking up things you haven't heard of before or don't understand & watching vids (pathoma or whatever is relevant.)

Edit: Forgot to add, if i's a card with a list of separate cloze deletions & the other items in the list gives away the context & makes the card too easy, make them all the same cloze deletion so you have to memorize the entire list. You can even do this after a couple passes of the card if you need to get familiar with it first. There is definitely the potential to kind of cheat yourself with these types of cards. Gotta be tough on yourself!

 

[Spectreman]

For what it’s worth, I’m a dedicated Anki Master and barely used Zanki. Instead I made my own cards for every lecture starting 2nd semester of 1st year. I was able to clean up some of the earlier cards as 2nd year progressed and used those as my flashcards during dedicated. I did trial Zanki at times where I would try and get 100 cards in a night, but ended up getting better results using my own cards, because I would put an explanation into each card so I was getting some reading in while testing myself.

This was in addition to using UFAPS, but only reading through 1 system per week in First Aid during 2nd year.

I make my own cards for every lecture too, but my school is full of extra junk and misses huge swaths of important stuff. Zanki has been much more reliable for covering material.

 

[waytogo1]

I used Zanki throughout second year and did not do well on the exam. And as people already said on this thread, make sure you actually understand the material and can integrate it. I think I put too much faith in Zanki (believing that memorizing the cards will lead to success.) But if you use it wisely, it will surely lead to an excellent score. Another note, I think if you have time, making your own cards > Zanki, because you specifically target your weakness and as you are making the cards, you are thinking through the big pictures/trying to understand the material.

 

[Phoodie]

I used Zanki throughout second year and did not do well on the exam. And as people already said on this thread, make sure you actually understand the material and can integrate it. I think I put too much faith in Zanki (believing that memorizing the cards will lead to success.) But if you use it wisely, it will surely lead to an excellent score. Another note, I think if you have time, making your own cards > Zanki, because you specifically target your weakness and as you are making the cards, you are thinking through the big pictures/trying to understand the material.

There's a lot of info here we're missing...did you mature Zanki? Did you keep up with reviews? Other resources used? Etc.

 

[waytogo1]

There's a lot of info here we're missing...did you mature Zanki? Did you keep up with reviews? Other resources used? Etc.

I used Zanki + Boards and beyond. No I did not mature Zanki, I did majority of it though I would say 70-80%. Obviously, I also used FA and pathoma and Uworld like everyone else. Just my experience though, I'm sure a lot of people did super well by using Zanki. Anki is the best tool to remember things for long term for sure.

 

[libertyyne]

I used Zanki + Boards and beyond. No I did not mature Zanki, I did majority of it though I would say 70-80%. Obviously, I also used FA and pathoma and Uworld like everyone else. Just my experience though, I'm sure a lot of people did super well by using Zanki. Anki is the best tool to remember things for long term for sure.

what were your averages in uworld, class and MCAT if you dont mind me asking.

 

[libertyyne]

Are people doing these cards without learning the material first?! I feel like I shouldn't be surprised about what I hear medical students doing anymore, but this seems too stupid to be true. Brute forcing all those cards sounds just plain painful anyways.

And just for the record, I am doing well in my Qbank sessions doing the same thing as AG. I have not seen a single topic in school that is intellectually complicated/challenging, but on the other hand, I am pretty average at memorization. Anki is the only way to remember that this whatever cancer stains with these 6 things. To many people's disappointment, that's largely what the first two years of med school is anyways and Zanki takes care of that issue. I honestly don't see how someone could do poorly if they matured zanki to be perfectly honest.

I am a person that does this. Oddly enough after doing enough cards eventually the concepts become apparent to you. I will occasionally watch BnB or wiki something. I have been doing well on class exams and qbanks.

I concur with you that there is not more than a handful of topics in medical school that are conceptually challenging.

Everyone should obviously be assessing their own progress and seeing if the method is working for them. And if zanki doesnt work, try something else and check again.

 

[Spectreman]

I am a person that does this. Oddly enough after doing enough cards eventually the concepts become apparent to you. I will occasionally watch BnB or wiki something. I have been doing well on class exams and qbanks.

I concur with you that there is not more than a handful of topics in medical school that are conceptually challenging.

Everyone should obviously be assessing their own progress and seeing if the method is working for them. And if zanki doesnt work, try something else and check again.

I always Pathoma sections pretty heavily, but I don’t read the FA chapter before a first pass in the Zanki deck. I do highlight and snapshot my FA pdf into the cards that are confusing or if they feel like it’s memorizing some incoherent fact - this way I can read the little paragraph and remind myself what it’s about. I also personally do a much smaller deck for sketchy - so my total Zanki load is like 16k cards and ~2k for sketchy micro/pharm. overall starting that just before M2 and chipping away at it as you go has not been that terrible, I’m not crushing Qbanks, but I know for a fact I can’t just read and highlight books to learn stuff, I get very little out of that. If making your book look like unicorn barf helps you memorize, then by all means go do that.

 

[NecrotizingFasciitis]

I always Pathoma sections pretty heavily, but I don’t read the FA chapter before a first pass in the Zanki deck. I do highlight and snapshot my FA pdf into the cards that are confusing or if they feel like it’s memorizing some incoherent fact - this way I can read the little paragraph and remind myself what it’s about. I also personally do a much smaller deck for sketchy - so my total Zanki load is like 16k cards and ~2k for sketchy micro/pharm. overall starting that just before M2 and chipping away at it as you go has not been that terrible, I’m not crushing Qbanks, but I know for a fact I can’t just read and highlight books to learn stuff, I get very little out of that. If making your book look like unicorn barf helps you memorize, then by all means go do that.

The above & bolded is one of my favorite things I have ever read on here.

#Zanki4Lyfe

 

[TheHikingDoctor]

I'm doing them now and the cloze deletion cards...your brain subconsciously memorize the stem. You'll remember what to fill in the blank with and not really understand it. You can actually test this out...if you pull up a cloze deletion card and automatically know what the answer is even without reading the whole stem...then that's a problem. There is really no thinking involved. I've read quite a few feedback on here and reddit regarding this from people who had taken step.

I'm just bringing this up as an FYI for anyone that is over relying on anki...make sure the cards are good. There are alot of cloze deletion in many of the decks that I've seen.

From my experience the key is to expand on the topic after you answer the card. For instance, if I got a biochem card about a pathway asking for an enzyme, after answering the card I would say out loud every possible thing I could thing of regarding that topic. If this is missing it will cause a build up of X and cause Y disease, etc. My wife thought I was nuts but it worked for me. I could recall cards vividly on the exam. Much more than any UW or Rx question/explaination.