- Joined
- Jan 8, 2005
- Messages
- 1,139
- Reaction score
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After years of browsing SDN, reading people's posts about their high scores, and feeling the need to hide my less than adequate numbers behind a veil of shame, it is finally my turn.
255 BABY! - I probably sound like a jackass but we all deserve our moment in the limelight.
Anyways, I thought that since everyone on SDN just eats this stuff up, I'd share how I studied for this monstrosity of an exam.
I studied for a total of 9 weeks. The plan was 8 but I pushed back a week at the end. I was nearly about to push back another week but poor planning and a $108 prevented me from doing so.
My 4 main tools of study: First Aid, USMLE World, Flash Cards, and NBME practice tests
The overall structure of my method (if you can call it a method): Read one chapter, do one relevant USMLE World section. Repeat until finished with First Aid. Do all NBME Practice tests and reread material from questions you missed. Day before test, don't study. I tried to study the day before but all it did was make me nervous. I got no sleep and went into the test dead tired. Just read the high yield section of First Aid in the back and call it a day.
First Aid: This is your bible. I found that it was best to read small chunks at a time. A lot of people say to go through it 2-3 times. I only went over the entire thing once and then selective pages and chapters as needed while I did questions.
USMLE World: The format of the actual test is EXACTLY like this. The buttons of the program and the layout and font are exactly as you will see it test day. The real thing has shorter stems and many of the questions are much more direct, requiring only 1-2 step reasoning.
Flash Cards: These were very handy as it allowed me to study on the go. I downloaded a flash card app on my palm pre and from it I downloaded tons of free Step I flash cards made by people throughout the years. I believe the main set I used had over 3000 cards in it. I think I ended up finishing only 1/3 of the set.
NBME 1-7: I believe I did all of these except for either 7 or 5 (I forget). These are extremely helpful. Since there are over 1400 questions if you take all the tests, you will be extremely well versed in the way NBME words their questions. I saw a few questions and charts on the real thing that were extremely similar to questions on the practice tests. The score prediction is also very spot-on. In fact, I scored a few points higher than I did on the practice tests.
IF THERE IS ONE THING I CAN IMPRESS UPON YOU AFTER READING THIS, I HOPE IT WILL BE TO TAKE AS MANY NBME TESTS AS YOU CAN.
Verdict:
The real thing, in my opinion, was moderately difficult. Time is usually not an issue, but if you're like me and you're stubborn enough to spend 2 minutes on an ethics question, it will be a problem for you. My math is terrible and when I had to calculate allele frequency, one question took me about 3-4 minutes. I got the answer eventually, but I had to rush through the rest of the section. The difficulty of the questions was about average. There were a few gimmes and a few USMLE World type questions but the majority was medium length (about 3 lines long) and required 1-2 step reasoning skills. Don't worry about feeling ready about the test. People told me you can never feel ready and I didn't believe them but when it came test time, I felt wholly unprepared - but I suppose, mistakenly so.
This is about all I can think of off the top of my head. Now, if you will excuse me, I must treat myself to a new laptop and put to rest this dear friend of 6 years on which I am typing this post.
255 BABY! - I probably sound like a jackass but we all deserve our moment in the limelight.
Anyways, I thought that since everyone on SDN just eats this stuff up, I'd share how I studied for this monstrosity of an exam.
I studied for a total of 9 weeks. The plan was 8 but I pushed back a week at the end. I was nearly about to push back another week but poor planning and a $108 prevented me from doing so.
My 4 main tools of study: First Aid, USMLE World, Flash Cards, and NBME practice tests
The overall structure of my method (if you can call it a method): Read one chapter, do one relevant USMLE World section. Repeat until finished with First Aid. Do all NBME Practice tests and reread material from questions you missed. Day before test, don't study. I tried to study the day before but all it did was make me nervous. I got no sleep and went into the test dead tired. Just read the high yield section of First Aid in the back and call it a day.
First Aid: This is your bible. I found that it was best to read small chunks at a time. A lot of people say to go through it 2-3 times. I only went over the entire thing once and then selective pages and chapters as needed while I did questions.
USMLE World: The format of the actual test is EXACTLY like this. The buttons of the program and the layout and font are exactly as you will see it test day. The real thing has shorter stems and many of the questions are much more direct, requiring only 1-2 step reasoning.
Flash Cards: These were very handy as it allowed me to study on the go. I downloaded a flash card app on my palm pre and from it I downloaded tons of free Step I flash cards made by people throughout the years. I believe the main set I used had over 3000 cards in it. I think I ended up finishing only 1/3 of the set.
NBME 1-7: I believe I did all of these except for either 7 or 5 (I forget). These are extremely helpful. Since there are over 1400 questions if you take all the tests, you will be extremely well versed in the way NBME words their questions. I saw a few questions and charts on the real thing that were extremely similar to questions on the practice tests. The score prediction is also very spot-on. In fact, I scored a few points higher than I did on the practice tests.
IF THERE IS ONE THING I CAN IMPRESS UPON YOU AFTER READING THIS, I HOPE IT WILL BE TO TAKE AS MANY NBME TESTS AS YOU CAN.
Verdict:
The real thing, in my opinion, was moderately difficult. Time is usually not an issue, but if you're like me and you're stubborn enough to spend 2 minutes on an ethics question, it will be a problem for you. My math is terrible and when I had to calculate allele frequency, one question took me about 3-4 minutes. I got the answer eventually, but I had to rush through the rest of the section. The difficulty of the questions was about average. There were a few gimmes and a few USMLE World type questions but the majority was medium length (about 3 lines long) and required 1-2 step reasoning skills. Don't worry about feeling ready about the test. People told me you can never feel ready and I didn't believe them but when it came test time, I felt wholly unprepared - but I suppose, mistakenly so.
This is about all I can think of off the top of my head. Now, if you will excuse me, I must treat myself to a new laptop and put to rest this dear friend of 6 years on which I am typing this post.
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