Congrats! Mind giving a timeline for the qbanks, practice tests, and your preparation?
I started ~6-7mo out during Christmas break by trying to nail biochemistry in first aid. I majored in biochem during undergrad (graduated more than 6 years ago), and I'm convinced that no medical school can actually teach biochemistry well. (Plus biochem tends to be taught early in first year anyway, so people forget it by the time Step1 rolls around) That being said, I felt relearning all the biochemistry actually laid a nice foundation for a lot of the material later on (like learning all the integrated pathways of the folate/B12 cycle and where drugs play a role etc.)
Next came the QBanks. I did NOT use qbanks by section. I ONLY randomized the questions. Review answers to right and wrongs ALWAYS.
I started USMLERx after Christmas break with randomized tests from the material I'd learned from my previous semester and gradually tried to integrate topics as I went along. I used FA to try and learn some topics as I went because I didn't want to rely solely on the QBanks for information. Lectures also provided a foundation for material. I completed USMLERx by the end of my spring break in March.
During the second half of my second semester, I focused primarily on doing the Kaplan QBank. By the time of my lecture exams in May, I felt like I didn't need to study much for my exams because I had learned a lot of information just by doing the QBanks. That being said, I kept doing Kaplan questions but devoted some more time to studying for my lecture exams. By the time I finished my lecture exams, I had finished Kaplan. I hear from people "don't do Kaplan because it's too detailed." My response to that is this: If it's too detailed, then clearly you must have a deeper level of understanding or better knowledge of a subject to do well and learn from it.
Post Kaplan/Post Lecture exams: I took the weekend off and then spent our 6 week dedicated study period doing 80 UWorld questions per day. I saved UW for last because I do believe that UW is the most precious resource that's available. By this time, I felt like UWorld was merely enhancing my knowledge and filling in the gaps to concepts I'd not fully understood, but I wasn't trying to learn new things I'd never seen before (ie not trying to master all of biochem w/in 6 weeks, which a lot of people tend to do and then blame the school for not teaching them well enough)
All NBMEs and UWSAs were done over the course of the six weeks whenever I felt like testing my knowledge. I did the last three NBMEs back to back for three days close to the end of the study period.
By the time I had finished UW, I was so sick of doing questions.
By the time the actual test rolled around, I was numb to the idea of doing another 280 questions that my test anxiety was far below what I thought it was going to be.
As for other resources:
1. Pathoma was essential. Know it back to front as well as you can. I read and watched videos as needed. I used Goljan Rapid Review Pathology as a supplement because sometimes it explained things better than Pathoma. Pathoma is a highly condensed book of high yield material. Path was actually the best section per my score report.
2. I listened to Goljan Audio every morning. He's funny and he has a nice way of helping you remember things.
3. Sketchy Micro because I'm not going to sit around and memorize all these random tidbits about random microbes without any context. I was actually excited to get micro questions on the test.
TLDR: My tips:
1. Master biochemistry early and review it little by little until the actual test so you don't completely forget it.
2. Tackle weaknesses early
3. Don't memorize anything worth understanding
4. Do questions on random
5. Study with someone to keep you on track (I did the exact same study plan with my girlfriend, and we both scored 260! We were dumbfounded)
6. Take the year seriously.
7. Find balance
8. Remember: it's one exam - work your a-- off and feel proud after you get your score. Scoring higher can only help you in the long run.
Typos galore and bad grammar just happened.
