Should I go to class?

[Lee Ik-jun MD]

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I went to all my classes (all are mandatory), and at first I was taking notes and studying the lectures and the notes and listening to recordings etc... That helped me with nothing at all... Instead I realized studying on my own was the best way and was way more rewarding.... I then stopped taking notes and instead started watching series in class, listening to music, browsing the interweb....
My point is unless you have an exceptional teacher, it's not worth it to waste your time on plebs...

Which medschool did you go to?
you don't have to answer that...

in my case, 2 out 3 of the faculty are good.. and some are really exceptional.
To give you an example, we have Dr. Andre Kaplan, he came up with the Fractional Excretion of Urea
a formula that most of us, especially the Medicine community use as a guide to renal dysfunction
FeUrea is better than FeNa

Anyway, he taught most of the kidney related lectures.
and it was rewarding to pick his brain after a lecture.

I don't think you'll get the same experience by watching the video.

 

[NeuroMaster316]

Which medschool did you go to?
you don't have to answer that...

in my case, 2 out 3 of the faculty are good.. and some are really exceptional.
To give you an example, we have Dr. Andre Kaplan, he came up with the Fractional Excretion of Urea
a formula that most of us, especially the Medicine community use as a guide to renal dysfunction
FeUrea is better than FeNa

Anyway, he taught most of the kidney related lectures.
and it was rewarding to pick his brain after a lecture.

I don't think you'll get the same experience by watching the video.

I'm sorry I won't disclose that lol but you're right and as I said there are exceptions... You're lucky but other people aren't and are stuck with sub-par lecturers who don't deserve the time of day... Best thing to do is attend the first two lectures, get a feel of the course if it's worth attending, and base your decision whether to skip or not on that... I want people reading this to know: DO NOT ATTEND A LECTURE JUST CAUSE YOU'RE SCARED THAT YOU MIGHT MISS OUT ON SOMETHING WHEN YOU'RE FEELING YOU'RE JUST WASTING YOUR TIME IN CLASS... In most cases, you don't need anyone holding your hands, just pick a resource and use it... Also ask those older than you about the course and what you need to cover for the exams.

 

[QualityProcess]

If you don't go to class, at least know the schedule. At my school, every time the ortho program director lectured, all the dudes gunning suddenly showed up in nice shirt and tie which is obviously a good idea. Faces at the bottom of the totem pole only become known through repetition

 

[sloop]

It's a fad-ish educational movement largely sponsored by content makers like McGraw-Hill to shift the onus on encountering the material to students.

The students learn at home through short lectures and assigned reading (as made by McGraw-Hill and others) and come to class to engage the teacher with questions, exercises, and dialogue. It originated in the physics world (which lends itself to this model of teaching) and, contrary to what some have said above, has been shown to be tremendously effective in the right hands. As with most things in life, done well, it can be powerful (like PBL). Done poorly, and... might as well stay home (like PBL).

I'm a fan because I had a renal-medicine rotation with didactics taught via a flipped classroom model. It's not for everyone or for every discipline, but it worked well for me because I'm naturally autodidactic and love inquiry-based learning. One of the best learning experiences I ever had.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/10/09/turning-education-upside-down/

Deslauriers L, Schelew E, Wieman C. Improved learning in a large-enrollment physics class. Science. 2011;332(6031):862-4.

Mcdaniel CN, Lister BC, Hanna MH, Roy H. Increased learning observed in redesigned introductory biology course that employed web-enhanced, interactive pedagogy. CBE Life Sci Educ. 2007;6(3):243-9.

I do not have experience with flipped classrooms but I have extensive experience with PBL in a relatively "pure" PBL program that had a long track record of doing it. I loved PBL and thought it was amazing. I had trouble understanding why people hated it until I realized that PBL is often done poorly and is not actually PBL but some useless one hour case study every week or two that got tacked on to a traditional curriculum. For PBL to work, you need to devote a significant amount of educational time to it, give students a stake in it, and have facilitators who keep the group on track without hijacking the group from students.

For what it's worth, I attended all the lectures during first and second year and it worked out amazingly well for me. You have to figure out what works for you. You should give the lectures a shot for a week or two, though. You might be surprised you like them.

 

[lymphocyte]

I do not have experience with flipped classrooms but I have extensive experience with PBL in a relatively "pure" PBL program that had a long track record of doing it. I loved PBL and thought it was amazing. I had trouble understanding why people hated it until I realized that PBL is often done poorly and is not actually PBL but some useless one hour case study every week or two that got tacked on to a traditional curriculum. For PBL to work, you need to devote a significant amount of educational time to it, give students a stake in it, and have facilitators who keep the group on track without hijacking the group from students.

For what it's worth, I attended all the lectures during first and second year and it worked out amazingly well for me. You have to figure out what works for you. You should give the lectures a shot for a week or two, though. You might be surprised you like them.

Yes to everything (I <3 PBL too), but I especially agree with the last part. No easy formula for success in medical school. Fail fast and keep trying until something works.

 

[JustaDO]

That for me would NOT be lectures. I daydream during class and I do not take notes. In ugrad I learned through online vids, picking the vids that were the clearest for me, as well as reading PowerPoint slides repeatedly.

Stay at home, watch videos, e-mail professor when in doubt or with questions.

 

[CharakaComplex]

Pardon, but this is ludicrous advice. You have three jobs as a preclinical student: 1) smash Step 1, 2) stay sane, and 3) don't fail. 1 and 3 tend to go together. Nobody cares about what your non-clinician biochem professor thinks about you. Clinical evaluations count for so much more. If lectures help you learn, go to lectures. If they don't, don't go. Done.

Pardon, but not everybody goes to a cushy high-end US med school where everything is perfectly objective and your teachers don't give a damn as to who you are and what you do. OP's nationality was not mentioned. I simple gave advice that I would have benefited from at the beginning of my preclinical year.

Also, it's silly to discount preclinical professors' opinions of you. Sucking up and smiling for photos has led myself and my classmates into research opportunities (which is still a great thing to have on your résumé, even if your role in the whole project is that of a coffee monkey). Further, in countries where it's a thing, it means your professor will think of you first when applications for medal exams or competitive prize exams roll around. Irrespective of if that's not how US med schools work, there's no need for a condescending tone, thank you very much.

During pre-clinical, we were only there until 5 about two days a week (sometimes only one). The other days, we were done somewhere between 12 and 2.

Ah. US med programs really are strange. The disadvantage to fewer hours is fewer opportunities to plague the teachers with questions, I'm guessing.

 

[lymphocyte]

Pardon, but not everybody goes to a cushy high-end US med school where everything is perfectly objective and your teachers don't give a damn as to who you are and what you do. OP's nationality was not mentioned. I simple gave advice that I would have benefited from at the beginning of my preclinical year.

Also, it's silly to discount preclinical professors' opinions of you. Sucking up and smiling for photos has led myself and my classmates into research opportunities (which is still a great thing to have on your résumé, even if your role in the whole project is that of a coffee monkey). Further, in countries where it's a thing, it means your professor will think of you first when applications for medal exams or competitive prize exams roll around. Irrespective of if that's not how US med schools work, there's no need for a condescending tone, thank you very much

I'm sorry that I was discourtesy. It's too easy to be rude over the Internet. But frankly your advice was bad advice for the question asked, and it's our obligation as senior colleagues to try and correct bad advice. I certainly could have been less brash.

I wish you the best of luck.

 

[GoodWillShunting]

Should I go to class in medical school (non-mandatory ones)?

This question stems from hearing different advice on the best way to be successful in med school. On one end I hear, "study the way you know best." That for me would NOT be lectures. I daydream during class and I do not take notes. In ugrad I learned through online vids, picking the vids that were the clearest for me, as well as reading PowerPoint slides repeatedly. I would also seek outside one-on-one tutoring.

On the other hand I hear "go to class! what you did In ugrad will not work in med school. You need more exposure to the material." My only qualm with this is if I'm supposed to treat med school like a 9-5 job, but I'm in lecture literally from 9-5 absorbing/hearing less than 50% of the info, wouldn't that be a waste of time for me?

Should I just wait for class to start and see what happens? I'll be going to every lecture at least for the first couple weeks regardless. I just don't want to feel guilty by not showing up to class and know I can still do well.

TLDR: should I go to lecture or skip lectures and learn the way I know best?

I posted this in another thread, but I'll post again here:

When you realize that lecture isn't benefitting you at all, and you're better on your own, the stop. Maybe the first week or so to meet classmates and stuff, but then stop. Shocked at the number of people who attend lecture and either 1) fall asleep; or 2) stare blankly at the lecturer because they're going to quickly. Both cases, they go because they have been trained to attend class and feel "guilty" for not going. Apparently, some students seem to believe that it's more logical to waste your time in lecture that doesn't optimize your learning but removes the feeling of "guilt" than it is to see what it's like studying on your own or seeking our help for alternative, more efficient ways to learn, while meeting up with classmates afterwards.

My advice: use common sense. If you do better by not going to lecture....then for Christ's sake, stop going to lecture. Nothing'll happen- no apocalypse, no judgement, no professors crying or getting offended (well, some professors will voice their 'disappointment'...but you won't be there to hear it, so it's all good). The point is to learn the best way you can. Consider it a sleezy form of 'malpractice' to do any type of behavior that doesn't result in you performing your best.

 

[CharakaComplex]

I'm sorry that I was discourtesy. It's too easy to be rude over the Internet. But frankly your advice was bad advice for the question asked, and it's our obligation as senior colleagues to try and correct bad advice. I certainly could have been less brash.

I wish you the best of luck.

I apologise for not exactly keeping it together either. I appreciate your efforts to improve upom/qualify my advice. That said, I do stand by my original statement in that it definitely won't /hurt/ to suck up and play to egos.