How can I do better on the next exam?

[62442]

This is a throwaway account.

We took our first exam of our current block today. I got a 76% (passing is >70% and my school is P/F but does rank us) and the average was 81%. I don't know the standard deviation.

I'm glad to have passed, and I know pre-clinical grades aren't super important as compared to clinical grades and Step 1/2, but I really feel bad about my grade. I'm not gunning for anything super competitive, probably just peds. But I also don't expect to rock my clinical years (I'm not a super likable person, tbh) so I'm definitely not just going to hope to do well during M3/M4.

Anyways, our next exam is next Monday, and I'm kind of panicked about only having a week to adjust my study strategies.

Here's how I studied this week:

I don't attend lecture because I have a hard time focusing and the lecturers go too quickly for me to follow.
I watch the lectures online, and take notes as I watch them.
After watching the lecture, I basically re-write my notes in quiz format. So for example, if my notes says that PFK-1 is activated by fructose-2,6-bisphosphate and AMP, I'll write a quiz question saying, "What activates PFK-1?". I try to look at my notes as little as possible while making my "quizzes", so I don't just end up copying my notes and learning nothing. Every day Monday-Friday I made new quizzes for that day's lectures and then reviewed the previous days' quizzes.
On Friday I started doing practice problems from the textbook and the online practice quizzes that were provided to us. I went over the quizzes afterwards. I also looked through the relevant sections of First Aid and felt like I had mastered everything that was in there.
On Saturday I made this 20 page long study guide, where basically I used the powerpoints and said, "Okay, this slide is about galactose metabolism, let me type out everything I know about galactose metabolism from memory". And I did that for every slide of every powerpoint.
On Sunday I reviewed my study guide and was feeling really good about everything that was on there. I understood all of it and didn't feel like there were any topics that I was struggling with.

When I took the test today, it just wasn't what I expected. Looking back at my study guide, it seems like barely any of that stuff was on the exam, even though I really felt like my study guide touched on every topic that was on the PowerPoints. For example, we spent 4 lectures this week talking about glycolysis, but it seemed like only maybe 2-3 of the questions were related to glycolysis at all. A lot of the questions were just testing us on these tiny little details, and while I know the details are important, the details that they tested us on just didn't seem like the most important takeaways from lecture, if that makes sense.

I'm really not sure what to change for next week. I've done above average on all the previous exams, but none of those were really science-related (ethics, some basic anatomy stuff, etc.). I also feel like I'm at a disadvantage because I have very minimal science background compared to everyone else, so everything we're learning is pretty much 100% new to me.

Any advice on how to do better on my next exam would be greatly appreciated.

Tl;dr I barely passed my exam this week and was below average, how can I do better next week?

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[DrBowtie]

Too much time invested creating notes and study guides I suspect.

 

[62442]

Too much time invested creating notes and study guides I suspect.

Possibly, I'm just not sure what else to do though...

 

[sharkbyte]

I'd recommend looking into studying with other people. Find some people or even just one other person and review all the lectures and quiz each other. It goes both ways - other people can explain things to you that you don't know, and you can test whether you know something well by your ability to successfully explain it to others. FWIW, I did well on my first physio exam (which was a difficult test) primarily because my roommate and I discussed a lot of the material together and cleared up difficult concepts the night before.

 

[Revolution9]

I'd start by celebrating that you passed. If your school is pass/fail in preclinicals, but they do rank you, I suspect the ranking will include whether or not you passed everything the first time, but then the differentiation comes during the clinical years where honors, high pass, etc. come into play.

Bottom line, take a deep breath and exhale. Now focus on what you need to do to get a safer margin for the next exam.

 

[62442]

I'd recommend looking into studying with other people. Find some people or even just one other person and review all the lectures and quiz each other. It goes both ways - other people can explain things to you that you don't know, and you can test whether you know something well by your ability to successfully explain it to others. FWIW, I did well on my first physio exam (which was a difficult test) primarily because my roommate and I discussed a lot of the material together and cleared up difficult concepts the night before.

I did do a little bit of that, actually. I've joined a study group and will hopefully be able to meet up with them before our next exam. But I also feel like studying with a group more helps me get the "big picture" stuff, rather than the little details, which is what I feel like I'm missing.

 

[62442]

So in the last hour I've been brainstorming ways to improve my studying. My plan is:
Stop doing the whole quiz thing, it's probably not an efficient use of time.
Make my study guide throughout the week instead of at the end of the week.
Within my study guide, for every concept, include the question, "What would happen if this process stopped working?". Hopefully that will help me with the clinical questions...maybe.
Do more practice problems (but I'm not sure where to access more practice problems?)

 

[ortnakas]

Tl;dr I barely passed my exam this week and was below average, how can I do better next week?

69.5% would be "barely passing." 76% is solidly passing. I understand wanting to improve, but keep your chin up. You did okay.

 

[67552931811]

69.5% would be "barely passing." 76% is solidly passing. I understand wanting to improve, but keep your chin up. You did okay.

69.99999 is failing at my school. Good stuff.

 

[Redpancreas]

This is a throwaway account.

We took our first exam of our current block today. I got a 76% (passing is >70% and my school is P/F but does rank us) and the average was 81%. I don't know the standard deviation.

I'm glad to have passed, and I know pre-clinical grades aren't super important as compared to clinical grades and Step 1/2, but I really feel bad about my grade. I'm not gunning for anything super competitive, probably just peds. But I also don't expect to rock my clinical years (I'm not a super likable person, tbh) so I'm definitely not just going to hope to do well during M3/M4.

Anyways, our next exam is next Monday, and I'm kind of panicked about only having a week to adjust my study strategies.

Here's how I studied this week:

I don't attend lecture because I have a hard time focusing and the lecturers go too quickly for me to follow.
I watch the lectures online, and take notes as I watch them.
After watching the lecture, I basically re-write my notes in quiz format. So for example, if my notes says that PFK-1 is activated by fructose-2,6-bisphosphate and AMP, I'll write a quiz question saying, "What activates PFK-1?". I try to look at my notes as little as possible while making my "quizzes", so I don't just end up copying my notes and learning nothing. Every day Monday-Friday I made new quizzes for that day's lectures and then reviewed the previous days' quizzes.
On Friday I started doing practice problems from the textbook and the online practice quizzes that were provided to us. I went over the quizzes afterwards. I also looked through the relevant sections of First Aid and felt like I had mastered everything that was in there.
On Saturday I made this 20 page long study guide, where basically I used the powerpoints and said, "Okay, this slide is about galactose metabolism, let me type out everything I know about galactose metabolism from memory". And I did that for every slide of every powerpoint.
On Sunday I reviewed my study guide and was feeling really good about everything that was on there. I understood all of it and didn't feel like there were any topics that I was struggling with.

When I took the test today, it just wasn't what I expected. Looking back at my study guide, it seems like barely any of that stuff was on the exam, even though I really felt like my study guide touched on every topic that was on the PowerPoints. For example, we spent 4 lectures this week talking about glycolysis, but it seemed like only maybe 2-3 of the questions were related to glycolysis at all. A lot of the questions were just testing us on these tiny little details, and while I know the details are important, the details that they tested us on just didn't seem like the most important takeaways from lecture, if that makes sense.

I'm really not sure what to change for next week. I've done above average on all the previous exams, but none of those were really science-related (ethics, some basic anatomy stuff, etc.). I also feel like I'm at a disadvantage because I have very minimal science background compared to everyone else, so everything we're learning is pretty much 100% new to me.

Any advice on how to do better on my next exam would be greatly appreciated.

Tl;dr I barely passed my exam this week and was below average, how can I do better next week?

Never rely on self made notes. You spent too much time doing that. If you need to have a few Flashcards for things here or there, that's fine but you need to keep re-reading the course notes and doing questions given to you.


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[Redpancreas]

So in the last hour I've been brainstorming ways to improve my studying. My plan is:
Stop doing the whole quiz thing, it's probably not an efficient use of time.
Make my study guide throughout the week instead of at the end of the week.
Within my study guide, for every concept, include the question, "What would happen if this process stopped working?". Hopefully that will help me with the clinical questions...maybe.
Do more practice problems (but I'm not sure where to access more practice problems?)

Your process strikes me as too idealistic and it may look good on paper but I doubt along the changes you've suggested with help loads. It sounds like you're going through biochemistry, a relatively boring subject for many. Just make Flashcards for the bare essentials and contisnlg read your outlines. Any time you have a weird feeling about some section, read it and if it still doesn't click ask someone.



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[osckey]

My number one downside is wasting too much time creating notes from the lecture slides and not doing practice Q's. So I'm switching it up right now. I passed the first midterm but definitely want to nail my final. Also, try to gauge when to simply condense a lecture into a mnemonic. There were several 1-2 hour lectures that I could save 3-4 of study time on by simply condensing to a mnemonic (I'm looking at you porphyria, lysosomal storage diseases, and glycogen storage diseases).

Do practice Q's to get the shock out of the process and have those moments where you go "you can do that/they can do that?"

 

[Rekt]

I'd recommend looking into studying with other people. Find some people or even just one other person and review all the lectures and quiz each other. It goes both ways - other people can explain things to you that you don't know, and you can test whether you know something well by your ability to successfully explain it to others. FWIW, I did well on my first physio exam (which was a difficult test) primarily because my roommate and I discussed a lot of the material together and cleared up difficult concepts the night before.

Group studying is extremely inefficient. You can cover the same amount of material, many times over in the same amount of time studying by yourself.

 

[DetectiveAlonzo]

There's no secret. Memorize every slide of every powerpoint.

 

[nowanmd]

see if you can old exams my school had them in the library for us

 

[62442]

69.5% would be "barely passing." 76% is solidly passing. I understand wanting to improve, but keep your chin up. You did okay.

Thanks, I'm feeling better about it now (margarita Monday helped). And I've come to the realization that honestly, I would be 100% okay with just being your basic pediatrician at a community hospital. I'm not gunning for anything crazy. So as long as I pass, it's not like my career is doomed.

Never rely on self made notes. You spent too much time doing that. If you need to have a few Flashcards for things here or there, that's fine but you need to keep re-reading the course notes and doing questions given to you.


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I think you're definitely right, I shouldn't trust my own notes because what I think is most important is obviously not what the professors thing is important (else I would have aced this exam).

Just make Flashcards for the bare essentials and contisnlg read your outlines.

Sorry, what do you mean by contisnlg?

see if you can old exams my school had them in the library for us

Unfortunately we don't have access to old exams.


So do you guys recommend not taking notes when I watch the lecture? Should I just focus on trying to understand? I kind of like the idea of just annotating the powerpoints a little bit, maybe I'll try that tomorrow. I just gotta figure out the technical side of how to get PowerPoints onto my iPad.

 

[Redpancreas]

Thanks, I'm feeling better about it now (margarita Monday helped). And I've come to the realization that honestly, I would be 100% okay with just being your basic pediatrician at a community hospital. I'm not gunning for anything crazy. So as long as I pass, it's not like my career is doomed.



I think you're definitely right, I shouldn't trust my own notes because what I think is most important is obviously not what the professors thing is important (else I would have aced this exam).



Sorry, what do you mean by contisnlg?



Unfortunately we don't have access to old exams.


So do you guys recommend not taking notes when I watch the lecture? Should I just focus on trying to understand? I kind of like the idea of just annotating the powerpoints a little bit, maybe I'll try that tomorrow. I just gotta figure out the technical side of how to get PowerPoints onto my iPad.

Come on man...use your head lol. I meant continuing. Feel free to take quick notes during lecture. Write down maybe 10-15 key facts max. Don't turn it into a dictation like most people end up doing. Once lecture is over, re-read the text notes.

Don't give up so easily on excellence. You should always be striving to be excellence. Don't settle for 76, even if you want to be a pediatrician. You can do it!


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[Redpancreas]

Thanks, I'm feeling better about it now (margarita Monday helped). And I've come to the realization that honestly, I would be 100% okay with just being your basic pediatrician at a community hospital. I'm not gunning for anything crazy. So as long as I pass, it's not like my career is doomed.



I think you're definitely right, I shouldn't trust my own notes because what I think is most important is obviously not what the professors thing is important (else I would have aced this exam).



Sorry, what do you mean by contisnlg?



Unfortunately we don't have access to old exams.


So do you guys recommend not taking notes when I watch the lecture? Should I just focus on trying to understand? I kind of like the idea of just annotating the powerpoints a little bit, maybe I'll try that tomorrow. I just gotta figure out the technical side of how to get PowerPoints onto my iPad.

Annotating power points works when the lecture doesn't elaborate much in his PPTs. Otherwise, it's best to just listen and read the course notes. Of course anytime you have an phenomenal lecturer who includes memory tricks/rationale for things that are not in the PPT that's always good stuff to right down. Good luck!


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[62442]

Come on man...use your head lol. I meant continuing. Feel free to take quick notes didn't lecture. Write down maybe 10-15 key facts max. Don't turn it into a dictation like most people end up doing. Once lecture is over, re-read the text notes.

Don't give up so easily on excellence. You should always be striving to be excellent. Don't settle for 76, even if you want to be a pediatrician. You can do it!


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Apologies, I'm not 100% sober right now, comprehension is hard lol.

By text notes, you just mean the powerpoint, right? Unless other med schools actually give notes...because all we get is the powerpoint.

I'm definitely not giving up on improving! I just mean that if this becomes a pattern, I'm not going to let myself get all upset about it, because my dreams don't depend on me being top of the class.

 

[Redpancreas]

Apologies, I'm not 100% sober right now, comprehension is hard lol.

By text notes, you just mean the powerpoint, right? Unless other med schools actually give notes...because all we get is the powerpoint.

I'm definitely not giving up on improving! I just mean that if this becomes a pattern, I'm not going to let myself get all upset about it, because my dreams don't depend on me being top of the class.

Nice and ok. Definitely annotate the ppt then. Good luck!


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[62442]

Nice and ok. Definitely annotate the ppt then. Good luck!


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Thank you for your help.

 

[62442]

As for practice problems, I definitely think it'd be a good idea to focus on that. Does anyone have any suggestions for where to get practice problems? We are basically doing biochemistry/histology/genetics stuff right now. I'm definitely going to do BRS Biochemistry, especially since my professor literally wrote that book (that probably should have clued me in to the fact that it would be a great resource). Other than that and the few practice problems that my school provides us with, I'm not really sure what to use.

 

[Goro]

Get to your school's education or learning center, STAT. What worked for you in college isn't working here. The good news is that you still have time to get things right.

Go read my post on guide to medical student success.

This is a throwaway account.

We took our first exam of our current block today. I got a 76% (passing is >70% and my school is P/F but does rank us) and the average was 81%. I don't know the standard deviation.

I'm glad to have passed, and I know pre-clinical grades aren't super important as compared to clinical grades and Step 1/2, but I really feel bad about my grade. I'm not gunning for anything super competitive, probably just peds. But I also don't expect to rock my clinical years (I'm not a super likable person, tbh) so I'm definitely not just going to hope to do well during M3/M4.

Anyways, our next exam is next Monday, and I'm kind of panicked about only having a week to adjust my study strategies.

Here's how I studied this week:

I don't attend lecture because I have a hard time focusing and the lecturers go too quickly for me to follow.
I watch the lectures online, and take notes as I watch them.
After watching the lecture, I basically re-write my notes in quiz format. So for example, if my notes says that PFK-1 is activated by fructose-2,6-bisphosphate and AMP, I'll write a quiz question saying, "What activates PFK-1?". I try to look at my notes as little as possible while making my "quizzes", so I don't just end up copying my notes and learning nothing. Every day Monday-Friday I made new quizzes for that day's lectures and then reviewed the previous days' quizzes.
On Friday I started doing practice problems from the textbook and the online practice quizzes that were provided to us. I went over the quizzes afterwards. I also looked through the relevant sections of First Aid and felt like I had mastered everything that was in there.
On Saturday I made this 20 page long study guide, where basically I used the powerpoints and said, "Okay, this slide is about galactose metabolism, let me type out everything I know about galactose metabolism from memory". And I did that for every slide of every powerpoint.
On Sunday I reviewed my study guide and was feeling really good about everything that was on there. I understood all of it and didn't feel like there were any topics that I was struggling with.

When I took the test today, it just wasn't what I expected. Looking back at my study guide, it seems like barely any of that stuff was on the exam, even though I really felt like my study guide touched on every topic that was on the PowerPoints. For example, we spent 4 lectures this week talking about glycolysis, but it seemed like only maybe 2-3 of the questions were related to glycolysis at all. A lot of the questions were just testing us on these tiny little details, and while I know the details are important, the details that they tested us on just didn't seem like the most important takeaways from lecture, if that makes sense.

I'm really not sure what to change for next week. I've done above average on all the previous exams, but none of those were really science-related (ethics, some basic anatomy stuff, etc.). I also feel like I'm at a disadvantage because I have very minimal science background compared to everyone else, so everything we're learning is pretty much 100% new to me.

Any advice on how to do better on my next exam would be greatly appreciated.

Tl;dr I barely passed my exam this week and was below average, how can I do better next week?

 

[sharkbyte]

Group studying is extremely inefficient. You can cover the same amount of material, many times over in the same amount of time studying by yourself.

It's funny how you're making a blanket statement like that. There are so many people who have benefited from group studying. Obviously it shouldn't be the ONLY study method and it can be inefficient if you get distracted or sidetracked, but I've found it very helpful to discuss concepts with my roommates and fill in gaps that I had.

 

[DoctorLacrosse]

honestly, I did very well first year annotating PPT slides while making my first pass through lecture, then simply reading that over and over before exams. try to review a bit each day after doing that days new stuff, then also cram them all the few days before the exam also. rinse and repeat.

realize the people giving your lectures are also writing your exams. they chose their PowerPoint slides for a reason. flash cards are great for certain memorization facts, but you lose pics/diagrams that may help you remember things if you write out too many notes/cards/quizzes for yourself, plus it's an inefficient use of time. read slides over and over and I suspect you'll do better, plus anki or quizlet for the rote memorization details. just my two cents. good luck

 

[hopefulERdoc251]

For raw memorization things, use anki. I was super skeptical to begin with, and it takes some time to get used to and keep up with it until it becomes a habit, but it is the best thing for memorizing details.

 

[Dr.Forssmann]

There's no secret. Memorize every slide of every powerpoint.

i agree with this. plus also making comprehension questions? cause you can reread lecture without knowing where your weeknesses are. thats what i'm trying right now. i did pretty well on my last exam with no study guides or notes just rewatching lecture over and over. but i don't recommend that. I think you should do comprehension questions for every slide then test yourself and make sure you know every detail/concept.

Nice and ok. Definitely annotate the ppt then. Good luck!
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i did this too. Durring lecture i would take notes on the powerpoints 4 slides per page front and back. when i zoned out i made sure to make a note of it and rewatch/relisten to those parts. my notes look pretty cool. they have everything you need to know for hte exam. lecture and diagrams and such. i plan to incorporate it into first aid later on.

 

[62442]

So today we took our second exam. This past week, I totally changed my study methods. I annotated PowerPoints instead of taking notes, and instead of wasting time making study guides I focused on memorizing the PowerPoints. I also used Quizlet a bit.

I went from scoring a 76 on the last exam (5% below average) to an 83%, which is 8% above average! I'm super happy. Obviously there's still room for improvement but it does feel great to be above average and see those study changes paying off.

 

[DoctorLacrosse]

So today we took our second exam. This past week, I totally changed my study methods. I annotated PowerPoints instead of taking notes, and instead of wasting time making study guides I focused on memorizing the PowerPoints. I also used Quizlet a bit.

I went from scoring a 76 on the last exam (5% below average) to an 83%, which is 8% above average! I'm super happy. Obviously there's still room for improvement but it does feel great to be above average and see those study changes paying off.

hopefully it felt less time consuming also not having to write out a million different things. well done

 

[DrBeenThere]

Save the drinking for one night per month, after the test is over. Highlight key points and attempt to organize them in your head while highlighting. Write down small details. Try to memorize the location of the fact on the page for recall. You need to learn how to drink out of a firehose. Take in as much information as possible and study until midnight every night. Don't end the night with a drink or you'll kill your recall ability. Do as many test questions as possible after learning each section, but don't spend time trying to answer the test questions, just read them and read the answer key and try to memorize the key point as well. Focus on breadth rather than depth.

 

[62442]

Save the drinking for one night per month, after the test is over. Highlight key points and attempt to organize them in your head while highlighting. Write down small details. Try to memorize the location of the fact on the page for recall. You need to learn how to drink out of a firehose. Take in as much information as possible and study until midnight every night. Don't end the night with a drink or you'll kill your recall ability. Do as many test questions as possible after learning each section, but don't spend time trying to answer the test questions, just read them and read the answer key and try to memorize the key point as well. Focus on breadth rather than depth.

To clarify, I hardly ever drink 😛 The way my school works is that we have an exam every Monday, and then nothing else that day, so we get Mondays off (we're actively encouraged not to study so I certainly don't feel like I'm slacking off by not studying on Mondays). So of course, everyone goes out and drinks on Monday evenings.

Thanks for your advice 🙂