How many hours per day is most efficient?

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Samuel88

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This is a question I'm having a tough time with:

When do you know to terminate a study session?

I've gone for 12 hours with very short breaks, and sometimes I only study 2-4 hours and feel guilty about those days.

But I wonder, is that 4 hour day really that much worse than a 12 hour study session?

To be honest, I don't think I remember anything from the last 2 hours of that 12 hour day...


What is the best way to space out studying? How do you know when studying has become inefficient?

(By studying, I mean videos, reading texts, taking notes, etc. 1.5 hours of Anki is something I do every day besides that studying)

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This is a question I'm having a tough time with:

When do you know to terminate a study session?

I've gone for 12 hours with very short breaks, and sometimes I only study 2-4 hours and feel guilty about those days.

But I wonder, is that 4 hour day really that much worse than a 12 hour study session?

To be honest, I don't think I remember anything from the last 2 hours of that 12 hour day...


What is the best way to space out studying? How do you know when studying has become inefficient?

(By studying, I mean videos, reading texts, taking notes, etc. 1.5 hours of Anki is something I do every day besides that studying)
Im assuming youre in dedicated for step 1?
Either way, although it really depends on the person, i think for me what worked best was frequent short breaks (10 minutes every 30 min for eg) as well as longer breaks a few times a day (an hour every 3 hours for eg).
During my dedicated i took a long break (3-4 hours) at lunch rather than stopping studying at 5 pm for the rest of the day. I find that i cant do 8 hours straight effectively. More effective at short bursts. Most importantly, if you feel like youre spacing out, take a short break and refocus.
 
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When do you know to terminate a study session?

Depends on the quality of your study session.

If you read a slide/page and can't retain anything that you just read. Then its probably time to walk around, i.e. take a break. .

What is the best way to space out studying? How do you know when studying has become inefficient?

I'm a big proponent of break every 30 minutes. My version of a break is doing something active with pre-determined time frame. Examples include taking a lap around my area of the school, getting water, bathroom etc. Don't do anything passive like watching TV, facebook, insta etc.
 
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Only an m1.

I do 1 hour with 10 minute breaks every hour. I get foggy around hour 4 so I stop for lunch/gym/mandatory class/clinic then do another 2-4 hours in the evening if needed (rarely).

I have absolutely no clue how people can do more than that at a decent retention rate. If I try to learn any new material in the evening after already putting in half a day of studying/mandatory class it takes 200% longer
 
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How long is each block in step1?

For the mcat they were 1.5 hour sections so I generally aimed for that in undergrad with 15 minute breaks.
 
How long is each block in step1?

For the mcat they were 1.5 hour sections so I generally aimed for that in undergrad with 15 minute breaks.

7 blocks, no more than 40 questions per block (can vary, mine was 7 x 40) and each block has 60 minutes allotted.
 
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