Looking for study material advice going into first year.

[arc5005]

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I know everyone has different study methods, but I'm a little confused when I will need to start studying from certain materials. I've had friends who are current med students recommend First Aid, Pathoma, Sketcy(?), UWorld, Zanki, etc... but with all these different materials, I have no idea when I need them. So can anyone kind of give me a breakdown as to when certain materials will be good to add into my study program starting in MS1, please. WHich materials should I start utilizing day 1, versus which I may need only during certain blocks/organ systems.

Also is Zanki different than just regular Anki? Is Zanki like a pre-made study deck? As someone who used Anki religiously for MCAT preparation, and created all my own decks, how do I switch over to studying to a pre-made deck? Do I continue to add my own Anki cards?

Also, trust me I am relaxing, not studying, and enjoying this time prior to school. But I'm a planner, so advice is very much appreciated.

 

[Hippocrates II]

I think it's good to have a plan coming into school. I did and it helped me out a lot this year (1st year here).

Zanki is just a deck someone made for anki. It may or may not work for you to study from, depending on how your tests are structured. I think I would have bombed this year if I had relied on zanki since my school tests on a lot of small details, but I think other people in my class have used it to varying successes, to each their own.

My strategy has been this from day one and I honestly have not changed it once - I watch lectures from home, make anki cards on them, and then do those cards every morning. I watch a few youtube channels on some subjects I find confusing/not well taught, but that's about it.

Result = Top quartile of my class despite having zero 'gunner' ambitions. Some people in my class pride themselves on knowing everything and being able to explain it to their peers (and there's nothing wrong with that, IMO), but my goal from day 1 has been to study enough to pass classes and spend the rest of my time with my wife/kids. So, I'm a big believer in anki for allowing me to do this while also doing well in classes. If you can find some smart classmates to help with the cards, that will help out a lot because I do all of my own and it's becoming somewhat unbearable in these last few blocks.

Of course this isn't the only way to study and I have many, many classmates who do much better than me without anki or other flashcard programs. You'll just have to find whatever helps material stick.

Good luck

 

[arc5005]

I think it's good to have a plan coming into school. I did and it helped me out a lot this year (1st year here).

Zanki is just a deck someone made for anki. It may or may not work for you to study from, depending on how your tests are structured. I think I would have bombed this year if I had relied on zanki since my school tests on a lot of small details, but I think other people in my class have used it to varying successes, to each their own.

My strategy has been this from day one and I honestly have not changed it once - I watch lectures from home, make anki cards on them, and then do those cards every morning. I watch a few youtube channels on some subjects I find confusing/not well taught, but that's about it.

Result = Top quartile of my class despite having zero 'gunner' ambitions. Some people in my class pride themselves on knowing everything and being able to explain it to their peers (and there's nothing wrong with that, IMO), but my goal from day 1 has been to study enough to pass classes and spend the rest of my time with my wife/kids. So, I'm a big believer in anki for allowing me to do this while also doing well in classes. If you can find some smart classmates to help with the cards, that will help out a lot because I do all of my own and it's becoming somewhat unbearable in these last few blocks.

Of course this isn't the only way to study and I have many, many classmates who do much better than me without anki or other flashcard programs. You'll just have to find whatever helps material stick.

Good luck

Thank you. When did you start watching lectures at home instead of attending lecture?! I plan to watch lectures from home as well as that is okay at the school I plan on attending. When do you think I can initiate watching lectures at home after classes start? Like second week?

 

[deleted600623]

Not to piggyback on this thread but I’m also an entering OMS1/MS1 (pending acceptance off a waitlist) but my plan was to get B&B for content review, annotate FA with lecture/B&B, Zanki for review, and Sketchy/Pathoma for review. Is this overkill?? Just trying to do “board prep” over a longer period of time that way dedicated prep is mainly for UWorld questions.

 

[Hippocrates II]

Thank you. When did you start watching lectures at home instead of attending lecture?! I plan to watch lectures from home as well as that is okay at the school I plan on attending. When do you think I can initiate watching lectures at home after classes start? Like second week?

I have literally not gone to a non-mandatory class since like the 3rd day of class. As far as I can tell you gain absolutely nothing from it unless you're the type of person to ask questions. Otherwise, you spend time physically going to school and then listening to a professor speak very slowly. Not only that, but a decent amount of our lectures have either people asking long, irrelevant questions or there is some kind of hiccup with the technology. Both of those you can just speed through when watching from home.

Not to piggyback on this thread but I’m also an entering OMS1/MS1 (pending acceptance off a waitlist) but my plan was to get B&B for content review, annotate FA with lecture/B&B, Zanki for review, and Sketchy/Pathoma for review. Is this overkill?? Just trying to do “board prep” over a longer period of time that way dedicated prep is mainly for UWorld questions.

I had similar plans when I first started. Now I'm happy to just be able to finish studying my own notes each night. Not sure what school you'll end up at, but at mine (KCU) there is so much thrown at you every single day (hours of lectures, followed by hours of mandatory labs) that it would be seemingly impossible to do all of that IMO. I guess you could, but you'd probably be studying until 2 am every day.

 

[deleted600623]

I had similar plans when I first started. Now I'm happy to just be able to finish studying my own notes each night. Not sure what school you'll end up at, but at mine (KCU) there is so much thrown at you every single day (hours of lectures, followed by hours of mandatory labs) that it would be seemingly impossible to do all of that IMO. I guess you could, but you'd probably be studying until 2 am every day.

How many hours of lecture do you have?

 

[JustPass]

SKETCHY.
Let me make sure you get what I'm trying to say.

SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY SKETCHY

 

[JustPass]

UWORLD.
Let me make sure you get what I'm trying to say.

UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD.

Alright, I'm done.

 

[Dagrimsta1]

Do some anki cards on random stuff and see if you can actually learn this way. Flash cards aren’t for everyone. If it is, then zanki (premade deck) your way through ALL your classes if you really want to. It has pretty much everything you need to do well on boards BUT NOT NECESSARILY for your school exams so tread carefully.

Sketchy, Pathoma, Uworld are more for second year so don’t get these just yet IMO.

I would give the same advice for First Aid as I did for Anki/zanki.

If flash cards aren’t your thing, then I would recommend making Condensed notes on the high yield stuff from your courses. (Personally I’m a visual learner so my notes would be super picture/diagram heavy)

Just take it easy and dont easily take advice from everyone because everyone is different. Good luck

 

[Hippocrates II]

How many hours of lecture do you have?

It varies, but it's not uncommon at our school to have 3-4 hours of dense lectures in the morning, and then spend a good chunk of your afternoon in a mandatory lab or two.

 

[Deecee2DO]

I know everyone has different study methods, but I'm a little confused when I will need to start studying from certain materials. I've had friends who are current med students recommend First Aid, Pathoma, Sketcy(?), UWorld, Zanki, etc... but with all these different materials, I have no idea when I need them. So can anyone kind of give me a breakdown as to when certain materials will be good to add into my study program starting in MS1, please. WHich materials should I start utilizing day 1, versus which I may need only during certain blocks/organ systems.

Also is Zanki different than just regular Anki? Is Zanki like a pre-made study deck? As someone who used Anki religiously for MCAT preparation, and created all my own decks, how do I switch over to studying to a pre-made deck? Do I continue to add my own Anki cards?

Also, trust me I am relaxing, not studying, and enjoying this time prior to school. But I'm a planner, so advice is very much appreciated.

Literally slides. Just slides. Everyone tries to get all fancy with board material. You dont need board material first year. Use sketchy for micro to solidify and then if you want you can use BRS , Lippincott, and/or Pretest for practice questions 2-4 days before the exams.

 

[Deecee2DO]

UWORLD.
Let me make sure you get what I'm trying to say.

UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD UWORLD.

Alright, I'm done.

First year? lmao no

 

[Deecee2DO]

Not to piggyback on this thread but I’m also an entering OMS1/MS1 (pending acceptance off a waitlist) but my plan was to get B&B for content review, annotate FA with lecture/B&B, Zanki for review, and Sketchy/Pathoma for review. Is this overkill?? Just trying to do “board prep” over a longer period of time that way dedicated prep is mainly for UWorld questions.

Woah woah slow down haha all you need are lecture slides and maybe sketchy micro to help solidify micro since its a lot of memorization. People try and complicate things with all this board prep material you dont need it first year and frankly you wouldnt even understand half of it. Wait till second year fall semester for that stuff. You can use Lipp, BRS, Pretest or kaplan for practice questions 2-4 days before the exams to apply material but thats it. You shouldnt even really be touching FA or Pathoma until start of 2nd year. FA i rarely ever use only for reference source when I am interested in learning more about a particular topic or seeing if they have a catchy mnemonic for something (it probably composes 5% if that of my study resources for M1 and I do very well in my classes)

 

[Deecee2DO]

Thank you. When did you start watching lectures at home instead of attending lecture?! I plan to watch lectures from home as well as that is okay at the school I plan on attending. When do you think I can initiate watching lectures at home after classes start? Like second week?

I started watching lectures only starting day one and it worked for me. First 2 months of med school is trial and error to see what works best. if you are an auditory learner/sponge where you hear something once and you retain a lot of it first pass then go to class. If you need to stop and start lecture rewind write stuff down etc dont go to class watch lectures. You really have to try both and see what works

 

[Deecee2DO]

I know everyone has different study methods, but I'm a little confused when I will need to start studying from certain materials. I've had friends who are current med students recommend First Aid, Pathoma, Sketcy(?), UWorld, Zanki, etc... but with all these different materials, I have no idea when I need them. So can anyone kind of give me a breakdown as to when certain materials will be good to add into my study program starting in MS1, please. WHich materials should I start utilizing day 1, versus which I may need only during certain blocks/organ systems.

Also is Zanki different than just regular Anki? Is Zanki like a pre-made study deck? As someone who used Anki religiously for MCAT preparation, and created all my own decks, how do I switch over to studying to a pre-made deck? Do I continue to add my own Anki cards?

Also, trust me I am relaxing, not studying, and enjoying this time prior to school. But I'm a planner, so advice is very much appreciated.

Also to add another point for anatomy practicals going to lab is way over hyped. You dont need it to do well. First of all they use already dissected bodies performed by the professors or TAs which are professionally done for the practicals since your work during dissection is literally a **** show most of the time so I never really learned anything. If you go to lab with a tutor like a week or two before the practicals they will teach you everything on a well dissected bodies. Try it out and see what works best for you but I never went because I was getting the same grades whether I went or not. Its also a huge time crunch like 3 hrs out of your day you could be catching up on other material

 

[JustPass]

First year? lmao no

I was goofing off... sorry.

 

[deleted600623]

Woah woah slow down haha all you need are lecture slides and maybe sketchy micro to help solidify micro since its a lot of memorization. People try and complicate things with all this board prep material you dont need it first year and frankly you wouldnt even understand half of it. Wait till second year fall semester for that stuff. You can use Lipp, BRS, Pretest or kaplan for practice questions 2-4 days before the exams to apply material but thats it. You shouldnt even really be touching FA or Pathoma until start of 2nd year. FA i rarely ever use only for reference source when I am interested in learning more about a particular topic or seeing if they have a catchy mnemonic for something (it probably composes 5% if that of my study resources for M1 and I do very well in my classes)

I agree it's a lot but my school's curriculum has us starting our first systems block in like october of first year. That's why I am thinking I need FA and pathoma. And from what I've read, B&B is a really good content source to supplement lectures because the guy is so good at teaching and he teaches literally from FA. But I agree with you on using FA only for catchy mnemonics and stuff. I just want to sort of passively go through FA as I go through blocks so that I've seen the material before when it comes time for second year and into dedicated prep.

 

[Deecee2DO]

I agree it's a lot but my school's curriculum has us starting our first systems block in like october of first year. That's why I am thinking I need FA and pathoma. And from what I've read, B&B is a really good content source to supplement lectures because the guy is so good at teaching and he teaches literally from FA. But I agree with you on using FA only for catchy mnemonics and stuff. I just want to sort of passively go through FA as I go through blocks so that I've seen the material before when it comes time for second year and into dedicated prep.

Its basic science systems not path. You wont need pathoma fall of first year trust me on this haha. Just use your schools lecture material. study the teacher before you study the class see what they test from you can do this by asking current first years or second years at your school. You are really getting too far ahead of yourself wanting to study pathoma FA and B&B fall of first year. These materials are good for supplementing material for 2nd year

 

[longerlongerlongerdrop]

It depends on your curriculum I think. From what I've gathered you are lecture based. I would just go to class/watch those and review those on higher speed and take notes on concepts you aren't sure of to study. I found it easiest to just focus on classes so far. I'm planning on amping up my board resources going into second year.

First Aid and Osmosis have been most helpful for me to study/review concepts. I've heard good things about B&B and lecturio but haven't invested yet. BRS books are helpful too but you'll probably get those passed on to you from second years. But my school doesn't really cover most content through lecture slides and I don't get a lot from flashcards, so I'd seek out advice from current students.

Congrats on your acceptance!