How Do You Study

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Two Sides

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I'm starting school this July, and I was wondering what works for you guys. In undergrad, I read the textbook, slides, and learning objectives. From posts on SDN, I've seen that reading textbooks for courses is too time consuming. Is this true?

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I'm starting school this July, and I was wondering what works for you guys. In undergrad, I read the textbook, slides, and learning objectives. From posts on SDN, I've seen that reading textbooks for courses is too time consuming. Is this true?

There was an SDN user who put together all the best advice on here a month or two ago. I'd scroll down a ways and look for it. The majority of current OMS I-IV's seemed to agree and add in little things!
 
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I'm a B student and I hand write all my notes. Takes me about three times as long as my classmates to do a lecture. But I learn while making the summaries and graphs and charts. Then I read through them all about 4-5 times before the test, spaced out and quiz myself.

So if we have like six hours of lecture on a day, it takes me like 18 hours to consider myself caught up. I don't like just listening, I like to pause and draw things out and google. I'm usually a day or two behind my classmates and get caught up over the weekend.

I know people who get B's who just reread the powerpoints over and over. I couldn't do that, I have to write down things in my own words and draw pictures to remember stuff. And typing never worked for me either.

I know a girl who seems like she has higher grades who makes millions of flashcards. I found it difficult to turn my notes into flashcards so quit trying.

I'd like to try new methods but when all your tests seem to be worth 60% of your grade, you're reluctant to experiment . . .

Oh, and I only do required readings. Never optional. If I had more free time, I'd totally read all my texts. I just work too slow to have enough free time. I really like to think about my lectures and write out weird maps and try to think of strange ways to remember stuff.
 
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Above average student

I watch the recoded lectures for the day and take really good notes on them via notability which is a PDF note taking app for iPad (I usually pause and google stuff so that my notes are ready to go when I need to study them later). This is my first pass and not much learning is done here, usually just have a general idea of what the lecture is about and how it is laid out.

Then I go back through the lectures for a second pass and this time I read through everything thoroughly and YouTube/google concepts I don't quite get. I like YouTube videos and pictures cuz when I can relate a concert to a video or picture the it sticks. This pass you should have all the concepts down and everything cleared up (you know the big picture) but don't have all details memorized.

Then I make a 3rd pass and make a high yield outline of my PPTs outlines of my lecture slides. Basically putting things into my own words (this takes some time usually 2 hours for a 1 hour lecture), but this really helps me solidify everything and after I write these out I'm usually 80% knowledgeable on the lecture.

From here I have my handwritten outlines of lectures and I read those through 2-3x before the test. And then the night before the test I make one more pass of all the lectures PPTs and quiz myself on what's on the slide before looking, it doesn't take very long cuz you know pretty much everything at this point.

Then I do practice questions from some prep company the night before the test if I have time.

Basically med school performance is very closely related to how much time you put in. I think everyone can get 85-90% on exams if they study hard enough but to get over 90% takes some skill and luck.

Lots of ways to study but the main ingredient is repetition.


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I'm a B student and I hand write all my notes. Takes me about three times as long as my classmates to do a lecture. But I learn while making the summaries and graphs and charts. Then I read through them all about 4-5 times before the test, spaced out and quiz myself.

So if we have like six hours of lecture on a day, it takes me like 18 hours to consider myself caught up. I don't like just listening, I like to pause and draw things out and google. I'm usually a day or two behind my classmates and get caught up over the weekend.

I know people who get B's who just reread the powerpoints over and over. I couldn't do that, I have to write down things in my own words and draw pictures to remember stuff. And typing never worked for me either.

I know a girl who seems like she has higher grades who makes millions of flashcards. I found it difficult to turn my notes into flashcards so quit trying.

I'd like to try new methods but when all your tests seem to be worth 60% of your grade, you're reluctant to experiment . . .

Oh, and I only do required readings. Never optional. If I had more free time, I'd totally read all my texts. I just work too slow to have enough free time. I really like to think about my lectures and write out weird maps and try to think of strange ways to remember stuff.

18 hrs * 5 lecture days/wk = 90 hrs per wk? Do you ever have time to relax if you're putting in 90hrs/wk?
 
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Watch lecture.

Take notes on paper.

Cross refer to First Aid and Pathoma and see what they have to say.

Study using both my lecture notes, and UFAP. (minus the Uworld part).

I swear it feels like I'm cheating everytime because I can bring up the exact page in my head after I've stared at the page so many damn times.

Really wish I would have started this early in the year.

Do not let people tell you to don't look into FA.

DO IT!
 
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Rule #1: you have to find what works for you
Rule #2) what worked in UG probably will not work in med school.
Go read this:
Goro’s guide to success in medical school-v.2016

And congrats on making it!
:clap::clap::clap::soexcited::soexcited::highfive::highfive::love::love::thumbup::thumbup::biglove::biglove::claps::claps::claps:

I'm starting school this July, and I was wondering what works for you guys. In undergrad, I read the textbook, slides, and learning objectives. From posts on SDN, I've seen that reading textbooks for courses is too time consuming. Is this true?
 
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Best advice I can give is to hammer home the big picture, try really hard to understand rather than memorize, and don't kill yourself with the details.

Why? Details are forgotten, usually pretty quickly. You won't remember every enzyme, transcription factor, or gene no matter how many times you look at them. But if you really understand how something works, you'll remember it forever.

I focused on minutiae the first half of MS1 and struggled a lot. Since then I switched to just seeing the high yield material as many times as possible, actually expecting my grades to drop, and I'm about to finish 6 consecutive blocks with a 4.0.

Just as an example of what I mean: If I'm learning about benzodiazepines, I spend an excessive amount of time understanding the mechanism of how that class of drugs works, and very little time with the specifics of each drug.
 
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I studied by making flashcards. I would make them based on concepts or an entire card for a disease. This meant I had about 10-15 cards per lecture rather than some classmates that made about 80 per lecture on factoids.

The key for me was learning to study less by focusing on just the most high yield things. It is a skill you develop. Initially, if something is said in class and it's on FA, that's something needed to be known. If a professor said something was a "classical presentation" or some other word that alluded importance, it meant it needed to be known. If you focus too much of your time on learning everything, you won't be efficient. By the time 2nd year on second semester was going, I was probably studying only 2-3 hours a day for course material and spent the next 3-5 hours on board prep exclusively.
 
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Daily textbook hours + Scotch while study + napping after study

Take care :)
 
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Thank you all so much for sharing your techniques/strategies! I'll read the slides, watch the lecture, take notes, reread the slides, and focus more on the high yield content. Have any of you guys tried firecracker?
 
Just chiming in here with a useful study tool: Anki Flashcards. Great way to actively engage with the material and further integrate it into your brain!
 
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18 hrs * 5 lecture days/wk = 90 hrs per wk? Do you ever have time to relax if you're putting in 90hrs/wk?

There are 168 hours in a week. My schedules have schedules. :bookworm:

And some days we only have like three hours of lecture. Those days make me giddy. Time off.
 
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I will say image occlusion on Anki was the main reason I aced histology
 
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Thank you all so much for sharing your techniques/strategies! I'll read the slides, watch the lecture, take notes, reread the slides, and focus more on the high yield content. Have any of you guys tried firecracker?
I used firecracker religiously and ended up regretting it once I saw the Bro Deck and Flash Facts by Rx. The problem with FC is that it tries to cover "everything" and not "everything" is testable on boards. Some material will be tested a lot more than others. They came out with a "High Yield" option which was stupid. They just basically cut out topics that are less testable, but this the incorrect way to approach it. The fact is that within topics some things are more testable than others. For example, FC HY cut out the WPW Syndrome, but you should know what the delta wave it creates looks like and that it is because you're bypassing the AV node even if the rest of the topic is not important. Also, if they consider a topic to be HY, then you are still covering things about it that are not HY. For example, knowing that Guillain-Barre can be from Campy or CMV is very important, but the other 4 etiologies are definitely not important to know.
 
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I used firecracker religiously and ended up regretting it once I saw the Bro Deck and Flash Facts by Rx. The problem with FC is that it tries to cover "everything" and not "everything" is testable on boards. Some material will be tested a lot more than others. They came out with a "High Yield" option which was stupid. They just basically cut out topics that are less testable, but this the incorrect way to approach it. The fact is that within topics some things are more testable than others. For example, FC HY cut out the WPW Syndrome, but you should know what the delta wave it creates looks like and that it is because you're bypassing the AV node even if the rest of the topic is not important. Also, if they consider a topic to be HY, then you are still covering things about it that are not HY. For example, knowing that Guillain-Barre can be from Campy or CMV is very important, but the other 4 etiologies are definitely not important to know.

Thanks for the helpful reply. I definitely don't want to "waste" my time by reviewing material that won't optimally help me. Do you recommend Flash Facts or Anki Bro Deck?
 
Thanks for the helpful reply. I definitely don't want to "waste" my time by reviewing material that won't optimally help me. Do you recommend Flash Facts or Anki Bro Deck?
Yes, ideally you should follow every class with either deck. I'd go with Bros because it's free.

Here is a list of what I consider the best resources:
  • Long-term = Flash Facts or Bros.
  • Biochem + Genetics + Biostats = Doctors in Training (DIT). The rest of DIT is garbage except for one video they have on the rules of 4 in neuro.
  • Microbiology = SketchyMicro. Finish all videos summer after MS-1.
  • Pharmacology = SketchyPharm. Also recommend finishing in summer after MS-1.
  • Pathology = Pathoma. I don't like the sketchypath.
  • Physiology = Physeo.
  • General Reference = FA (this you will cover anyway in bros/FF).
  • Boards = USMLE-Rx for October-to-January 2nd year, then UWorld once before dedicated and once during dedicated. All NBME exams and UWorld biostats review during dedicated.
You probably won't need to buy all these products because your classmates will have copies of them (except the QBanks).
 
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to study anatomy well one have to search for a diagram illustrating the region he want to study. he has to draw it several times till he can reproduce it from his mind without looking to the diagram. then he has to read the subject well. he has to imagine how questions on this subject and tries to answer these questions in a written manner. also he has to compare his answer with the original text to know any missed knowledge. this method is so tiring but one's can remember the knowledge so easy even after a long time
 
Hmmm.. I don't think there really is a "secret," per say. I don't think you're looking for one, but I consistently see classmates or other posters who are.

Study hard. What I have noticed so far, the only way to do with the volume overload is to combat it with raw hours of studying.

Some great ways to study that have worked for me:
Take the lecture slides and create flash cards off of them using Anki:
Image occlusion for anatomy landmarks
Basic card for muscle origin, insertion, innervation, function, blood supply
Cloze deletion for medical knowledge.
etc.


The best feature of anki, imo, is the additional information where you can add screen captures of important charts, anatomy, etc.
 
I usually just go to lecture, take notes on it and then review the previous days lectures the day after. By the Time the test comes I’ve already made 4-5 passes and barley have to study those PowerPoints.

Notecards are a great tool but I used them one
Block and then junked them for the other and saw no difference in performance.

All in all I think it comes down to like others have said 1) repition and 2) putting in work.

Also, I haven’t touched any textbooks for my medical knowledge classes EXCEPT first aid. Use that as it will be helpful for boards later on.
 
What is the type of joints which does allow any movement and there is no hope for it to do so?
 
Sorry; What is the type of joints which does NOT allow any movement and there is no hope for it to do so?
 
Best advice I can give is to hammer home the big picture, try really hard to understand rather than memorize, and don't kill yourself with the details.

Why? Details are forgotten, usually pretty quickly. You won't remember every enzyme, transcription factor, or gene no matter how many times you look at them. But if you really understand how something works, you'll remember it forever.

I focused on minutiae the first half of MS1 and struggled a lot. Since then I switched to just seeing the high yield material as many times as possible, actually expecting my grades to drop, and I'm about to finish 6 consecutive blocks with a 4.0.

Just as an example of what I mean: If I'm learning about benzodiazepines, I spend an excessive amount of time understanding the mechanism of how that class of drugs works, and very little time with the specifics of each drug.

I am at the same point in my life as OP and will be matriculating in July. I just have a question for you - aren’t minutiae details being tested in class? I assumed we would have to know that level of detail because they would test that.
 
Sit in lecture and take notes -> high yield info into anki (you'll acquire a gut feel for what is high yield - until then, if the prof. says it or if it's on the PPT) -> review anki deck with textbook as needed

That's about it and I'm doing well. No all nighters, not an excessive amount of studying.
 
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I am at the same point in my life as OP and will be matriculating in July. I just have a question for you - aren’t minutiae details being tested in class? I assumed we would have to know that level of detail because they would test that.

Sort of. The idea here is that there's so much that goes into understanding medicine, and people often neglect this part in favor of memorizing so they score highly on exams. If your goal is good grades, you can memorize slides and get an A on just about every exam you take. The downside to this is that minutiae won't stick with you (unless you deal with it every day, i.e. after you specialize), so that time you spent memorizing it was basically wasted in the long run.

Now, on the contrary, you could have spent that time looking at outside resources to really get a deeper understanding of the topic at hand. The outcome is that you have far more practical knowledge, and it tends to stick for a long time.

This is confusing, so let me offer a practical example; say you're learning about white blood cells. Now, you could spend hours memorizing the 50 CDRs your professor puts on their slides, or you could watch a few Osmosis/Najeeb/B&B videos on the same topic -- which collectively will serve as great repetition for the important concepts while simultaneously highlighting the CDRs that are high yield. Sure, you might get a question here and there on very low yield CDRs that you'll never see again, but is missing that question really going to hurt you in the long run? That's something you have to answer yourself.
 
Sort of. The idea here is that there's so much that goes into understanding medicine, and people often neglect this part in favor of memorizing so they score highly on exams. If your goal is good grades, you can memorize slides and get an A on just about every exam you take. The downside to this is that minutiae won't stick with you (unless you deal with it every day, i.e. after you specialize), so that time you spent memorizing it was basically wasted in the long run.

Now, on the contrary, you could have spent that time looking at outside resources to really get a deeper understanding of the topic at hand. The outcome is that you have far more practical knowledge, and it tends to stick for a long time.

This is confusing, so let me offer a practical example; say you're learning about white blood cells. Now, you could spend hours memorizing the 50 CDRs your professor puts on their slides, or you could watch a few Osmosis/Najeeb/B&B videos on the same topic -- which collectively will serve as great repetition for the important concepts while simultaneously highlighting the CDRs that are high yield. Sure, you might get a question here and there on very low yield CDRs that you'll never see again, but is missing that question really going to hurt you in the long run? That's something you have to answer yourself.

I think I see what you're saying. So do you think it is possible to still do well in class by focusing on gaining a deeper understanding rather than straight up memorizing? Or do you have to be 50/50 in order to get the A or B AND gain a high level of practical knowledge? I know for a fact that you'd end up being a better physician, but my main concern is for all the tests and the COMLEX/USMLE before you get to that point.
 
I think I see what you're saying. So do you think it is possible to still do well in class by focusing on gaining a deeper understanding rather than straight up memorizing? Or do you have to be 50/50 in order to get the A or B AND gain a high level of practical knowledge? I know for a fact that you'd end up being a better physician, but my main concern is for all the tests and the COMLEX/USMLE before you get to that point.

There's a certain amount of unavoidable memorization, but the latest iterations of USMLE are far more interested in testing critical thinking rather than vomiting random facts. This is why they're moving away from buzz words and adding more 3rd order questions to test whether you really understand the topic or you simply memorized some bullet points in First Aid. So, in essence, the entire premise of the strategy I'm advocating is geared towards doing well on USMLE while maybe not doing quite as well on class exams.

COMLEX is another animal, that exam is basically buzz word after buzz word and I personally can't comprehend how people could possibly do poorly on this test if they've put in a reasonable amount of studying time.
 
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What video resources do you guys prefer for first year?

Najeeb? Boards & Beyond? Lecturio?
 
Above average student

I watch the recoded lectures for the day and take really good notes on them via notability which is a PDF note taking app for iPad (I usually pause and google stuff so that my notes are ready to go when I need to study them later). This is my first pass and not much learning is done here, usually just have a general idea of what the lecture is about and how it is laid out.

Then I go back through the lectures for a second pass and this time I read through everything thoroughly and YouTube/google concepts I don't quite get. I like YouTube videos and pictures cuz when I can relate a concert to a video or picture the it sticks. This pass you should have all the concepts down and everything cleared up (you know the big picture) but don't have all details memorized.

Then I make a 3rd pass and make a high yield outline of my PPTs outlines of my lecture slides. Basically putting things into my own words (this takes some time usually 2 hours for a 1 hour lecture), but this really helps me solidify everything and after I write these out I'm usually 80% knowledgeable on the lecture.

From here I have my handwritten outlines of lectures and I read those through 2-3x before the test. And then the night before the test I make one more pass of all the lectures PPTs and quiz myself on what's on the slide before looking, it doesn't take very long cuz you know pretty much everything at this point.

Then I do practice questions from some prep company the night before the test if I have time.

Basically med school performance is very closely related to how much time you put in. I think everyone can get 85-90% on exams if they study hard enough but to get over 90% takes some skill and luck.

Lots of ways to study but the main ingredient is repetition.


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I learned the hard way that it's not just how you study that matters, but whether or not the school is run properly that also reflects on your grade. Your method is well planned and sensible, and the fact that it is helping you in your current school shows that from where I stand, your school is being run properly, but your strategy would not work at my school, ESPECIALLY as a second year.
 
pre lecture video. lecture. combine lectures notes + video notes. that makes a study guide. if anything missing i fill it with the reference text book. i put reference guide into anki. i make lots of emphasis on the pathophysiology to presentation in my anki question in order to understand it. also, sometime i utilize the feynman method with anki....a question would literally ask me to explain a concept out loud.

the point is active recall and spaced repetition. those are key.

as for the videos. youtube, lecturio and ocasionally najeeb. golden right there.

just for emphasis. reference books are for REFERENCE. they are too long to study from (in my opinion)
 
I made a pair of glasses with wind shield wipers to wipe the tears from my eyes.
I also keep a small shot glass on my books under my face to catch the tears as I continue studying.

In reality, Lecture video- Notes on word document, revise notes , mark anything that doesn't stick in my brain immediately with highlights, revise again mark anything I mess up on in red.
 
Anki is bae. QBanks are also bae (on that board prep time).



Coffee is also bae. Lots of baes.
 
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What video resources do you guys prefer for first year?

Najeeb? Boards & Beyond? Lecturio?

Big fan of B&B so far, haven’t checked out lecturio yet though. Najeeb was too long IMO (if i recall correctly), for atleast what I’m looking for at the moment
 
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What’s B&B?


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Boards and beyond! Essentially quick little 5-30min videos on almost everything in FA. Ive been kinda passively watching them so far but its a nice way to reinforce the topics
 
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I just do what I did in undergrad and it works.... just study. A better way for me to describe med school now is that it's not harder.... if you can study in undergrad you can study here. What's getting to me at least is the endurance... having to study EVERY DAY (albeit I'm not disciplined so I waste time inbetween) gets to you mentally.

I literally just watch lectures, think about it, understand it, then move on to the next lecture. If I have time, I'll review and ask myself questions about a previous lecture or just asking myself what did this lecture cover. No anki, no outside prep, no textbooks (except Netters to see pictures), and I do well. My biggest weakness is just getting burnt out and not wanting to study, then falling behind and playing catch up.
 
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I just do what I did in undergrad and it works.... just study. A better way for me to describe med school now is that it's not harder.... if you can study in undergrad you can study here. What's getting to me at least is the endurance... having to study EVERY DAY (albeit I'm not disciplined so I waste time inbetween) gets to you mentally.

I literally just watch lectures, think about it, understand it, then move on to the next lecture. If I have time, I'll review and ask myself questions about a previous lecture or just asking myself what did this lecture cover. No anki, no outside prep, no textbooks (except Netters to see pictures), and I do well. My biggest weakness is just getting burnt out and not wanting to study, then falling behind and playing catch up.

Dude I feel you on the burnout, the amount of effort/time I'm putting in now is drastically different from the first 1-2months of the semester. Still getting around the same grades, just getting a lot harder to focus and ending up with a lot more to cram before exams. Counting down the days till break lol, hoping my mental endurance gets better as we go a long
 
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I sometimes take a day off after an exam and I still do well on the next one. I call them my mental health days. Sleep in, do whatever I want all day. And I still make good grades. I don't do that if the next exam is a week or less away but if it is 2-3 weeks away, calm down people.

I don't understand why my classmates feel the need to put themselves into a continual state of panic. I'm not looking to die of a heart attack in my 50's.

Just make a schedule and stick to it. Breaks can be a part of the schedule. And make you more productive in the long-run.
 
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Mental health is probably the biggest challenge throughout your journey.

Personally, I put in 8-9 hrs of study everyday and then set a hard time to close everything off by midnight at the latest. I don't cram. Honestly, I pretty much give up on the whole preclinical grade measuring contest that seems to pervade among medical students. I still get solid grades. But, my retention has gone way up as evident by my performance in NBME exams, Kaplan Banks, and USMLERx Qbanks.

Stressing out 3-4 days before an exam by ramming up your sympathetic nervous system isn't worth it. It's a marathon more than anything. I used to think that the whole marathon mantra is straight up bs, but it seems to be the real truth as I'm going further into the process.

Work hard so that you don't have any regrets down the road to whatever future lies for you. But, most importantly, take care of yourself and DO you.
 
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Sahhhhh dudes,

Writing this to procrastinate studying cardio/pulm.

PREFACE: Visual learner; was very anti-flashcard before medical school. I've found that if you put in more time on the front end (conceptualize material & create GOOD, THOROUGH, study materials), the faster your memorization period on the back will be.

My study strategy: TWO PHASES:

Phase I - conceptualization (build a foundation; you will have gaps; it won't be that sturdy, but that's ok fam.)

Phase II - memorization (filling in the blanks of your conceptualization (foundation); nabbing them minor details that will get you those extra points, making connections and integrating the material)

PHASE I:
Synthesis of study materials & conceptualization. The previous sentence says it all; create quality, thorough study materials, and make sure while you are doing this that you understand everything that is going on. Use google, reference your text, send emails to profs, ask friends questions, etc. THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP. It takes time, but if you do it correctly it will pay off on the back end when you are making passes of material like it's nobody's business.

First Pass:
Thorough run through lecture. Make HELLA flashcards (Quizlet) of EVERYTHING you think could be testable that WOULDN'T fit very well into written notes/flowcharts. This includes: potential test questions (think outside the box; how would you write the exam?), ANYTHING the professor says that isn't in the powerpoint (uber important; collect that minutia that will get you those extra points), and anything else you think you could potentially forget (this includes easy things that you SHOULD review in case you forget them. You might remember avg. PaO2 right now, but do you want to forget on the exam because you haven't seen it since the day it was presented? No. You do not. Make a FC so that number is in your brain and you see it on a consistent basis.)

ADDED NOTE ON FC's: I find the most effective strategy is to make one deck/lecture on quizlet. This makes Pt. II of studying much more effective in the sense that, if you have a lecture you aren't very good at, you can exclusively review that deck. I'll talk about this and "long term learning" in the next section.

FLOWCHARTS. I love flowcharts. Any kind of a process (e.g. reflex arc of skeletal muscle, ion flow of a cardiac myocyte through contraction, progression of a pathology, etc.) I like to make flowcharts for anything that has to do with a stepwise process.

TABLES: Anything that is just flat out memorization that you KNOW will be tested on that you want to see on a daily basis. Especially things you should be able to readily compare/contrast.

e.g.) chemokine for immunology... gotta see these every day. If you flashcard them all out, it makes it difficult to ensure you see these on a constant basis. PLUS you want to be able to make connections that you might otherwise not be able to make with flashcards. In the context of chemokines, you want to know what cells secrete them, where they act upon, and what their function is. This is perfect for a table because with a table, you can compare and contrast them readily. With flashcards it makes this more difficult.

PHASE II: Memorization. Ok, now you have your study materials all ready to go; all you have to do is memorize the material. The benefit of this strategy is you've synthesized materials that you can review RAPIDLY. If you have weak points, simply pull that flowchart or table out, or study that deck that you made. This is where you gain a tremendous advantage over those who are just reviewing powerpoint presentations of watching videos or whatever. You can bust out repetitions of all of your material at a very fast pace. And once you bust out a few passes, you can make your studying extremely focused on weak areas.

APPROACH: Lecture by lecture. Start at the beginning and work towards the end. Make sure you memorize you written notes and your flashcards in the same session (so you can bring everything full circle; don't want to jump around too much on your second pass if you don't have to IMO; makes it easy to mix details up.)

Specifically, when it comes to Quizlet, once I memorize a lecture, I create a "Long Term Learning" folder on quizlet and label it "Cardio/Pulm Midterm" or whatever the test is you're studying for. What this does is creates a comprehensive accumulation of flashcards you can bust through as you get closer to your exam. It also allows you the option of keeping your individual lecture decks separate from your gigantic deck of cumulative information that you have already memorized. Keep busting through your lecture decks and adding them to the "Long Term Learning" deck you have created. Bust through your "Long Term Learning" deck whenever you have free time (walking to class, commercials watching TV, on the elliptical, whenever you have a chance.) What is awesome about this is, you have already memorized these long term learning flashcards. All you are doing now is reminding yourself. You can bust through these long-term learning flashcards VERY QUICKLY because you already have them memorized.

With respect to your written materials, if you are a visual learner like me, you probably like to draw things out (which is why I like flowcharts.) Draw them out as needed. Briefly look them over every day. If something is a little hazy to you, practice drawing it out a couple times.

CONCLUSION: I'm not even through my first semester yet, so this method may not always be as effective as it is now, but this is the method I have adjusted to. In the end, your performance will be dependent on how many passes you make in phase-II and how thorough your phase-I study materials are. There are pros and cons (slow on the front end, incredibly fast on the back end. More difficult for classes like anatomy, but works incredibly well for conceptual classes like immunology and physiology.) I've also found that, as I've become quicker at running through this strategy, I've been incorporating more reading on the front end (IMO conceptualization is the most important part of learning. Even if you aren't able to hardcore memorize everything in a certain lecture, if you have the concept down, you are more likely be able to rationalize your way to correct answers on test questions with a solid foundation.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS:

1.) Class Attendance - I find that attending class is only productive if I have seen the material before (pre-reading or if you are familiar with the material from undergrad.) This is because if you have a decent handle on the concepts in lecture already, you can begin phase-I while in lecture , which saves a tremendous amount of time. I'll skip lecture I don't have time to review material for or haven't seen it before in undergrad.

2.) Sick of Phase-I/Phase-II - This happens to me all the time. I'll get sick of creating study materials or sick of busting through flashcards. I highly recommend flip flopping so you don't get burnt out. Sick of making material? Cool. Memorize the deck you made yesterday. Sick of memorization? Cool. Make study materials for the lecture you skipped today.

The exam is tomorrow and you are sick of busting through the material but don't have any lecture to make study material for? Cool. Have a gin & tonic and continue to bust through flashcards (if you can successfully navigate the material whilst sipping your favorite adult beverage, you are ready;))

3.) Practice Questions: I like to do these after I have memorized all of my decks so I can get a relatively good representation of how I will do on the exam and hone in any cramming I need to do in the days leading up to the exam (but it's usually hours, not days. Lol.)

Ok, back to cardio/pulm.
-NF

P.S. Sorry if there are spelling errors or anything. I haven't proofread this. Might run through it later while I'm procrastinating again to make sure it all makes sense.
 
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Hardest part about med school is the endurance. I say it's like someone asking you to walk a mile. First day is easy, but imagine after walking 50 miles someone asks you to walk a mile that day. The distance is the same, but you're so winded and tired after a while that one mile becomes really hard.

At least endurance is my biggest issue.
 
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