Study Improvement

[zherussianbear]

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Dear all,

I'm half-way with year 1, and I'm a little impotent - test-taking-wise. I read the textbooks, take notes, understand a lot of details and concepts that are perhaps superfluous for the given curriculum, and am confident in my acquiring of knowledge; however, I am consistently hovering around the 80-85% mark - a fine grade, no doubt - on tests, and just can't seem to get over the hump into the high 80s/90s. It's only a few questions' difference, and the real judgment day is probably Step 1, but I still want to improve slightly, just for ego's sake and to be sure that I'm doing it right.

I was hoping you could share your most fruitful study/test-taking strategies.
I'm trying to move out of cramming (though it's worked most of my life), and I don't want to sit and rewrite every word from the lectures (exhausting and of dubious efficacy in retention).

I should mention that I focused on math and business undergrad without a master's, and without more than the bare minimum premed requirements: not trying to get to the top, just a little higher.

Thanks!

 

[sonofva]

Dear all,

I'm half-way with year 1, and I'm a little impotent - test-taking-wise. I read the textbooks, take notes, understand a lot of details and concepts that are perhaps superfluous for the given curriculum, and am confident in my acquiring of knowledge; however, I am consistently hovering around the 80-85% mark - a fine grade, no doubt - on tests, and just can't seem to get over the hump into the high 80s/90s. It's only a few questions' difference, and the real judgment day is probably Step 1, but I still want to improve slightly, just for ego's sake and to be sure that I'm doing it right.

I was hoping you could share your most fruitful study/test-taking strategies.
I'm trying to move out of cramming (though it's worked most of my life), and I don't want to sit and rewrite every word from the lectures (exhausting and of dubious efficacy in retention).

I should mention that I focused on math and business undergrad without a master's, and without more than the bare minimum premed requirements: not trying to get to the top, just a little higher.

Thanks!

Man when I was in m1/m2 I tried everything I could, but I would literally get 89% on nearly all my tests. Sometimes that just how she goes. Just focus on crushing the boards.

 

[Wordead]

Dear all,

I'm half-way with year 1, and I'm a little impotent - test-taking-wise. I read the textbooks, take notes, understand a lot of details and concepts that are perhaps superfluous for the given curriculum, and am confident in my acquiring of knowledge; however, I am consistently hovering around the 80-85% mark - a fine grade, no doubt - on tests, and just can't seem to get over the hump into the high 80s/90s. It's only a few questions' difference, and the real judgment day is probably Step 1, but I still want to improve slightly, just for ego's sake and to be sure that I'm doing it right.

I was hoping you could share your most fruitful study/test-taking strategies.
I'm trying to move out of cramming (though it's worked most of my life), and I don't want to sit and rewrite every word from the lectures (exhausting and of dubious efficacy in retention).

I should mention that I focused on math and business undergrad without a master's, and without more than the bare minimum premed requirements: not trying to get to the top, just a little higher.

Thanks!

Nobody can really answer this for you without knowing how your exams are written. Some schools have tests written by professors - in which case, you'll probably want to re-listen to lectures for areas of emphasis and go over their notes. Others draw questions from a giant question bank based on given objectives, in which case going through all the objectives and learning from outside sources/review books is more helpful. YMMV.

 

[secants]

Man when I was in m1/m2 I tried everything I could, but I would literally get 89% on nearly all my tests. Sometimes that just how she goes. Just focus on crushing the boards.

Same. I tried going to lecture, then taking notes, then just reading our transcribed lecture notes, and then just looking at the PPTs sprinkled with textbook reading. I always ended up getting the same score range so I shifted focus to Step 1. I ended up doing very well on it so don't regret my decision.

 

[0011000100]

Same. I tried going to lecture, then taking notes, then just reading our transcribed lecture notes, and then just looking at the PPTs sprinkled with textbook reading. I always ended up getting the same score range so I shifted focus to Step 1. I ended up doing very well on it so don't regret my decision.

What did you do to focus on Step 1?

 

[zherussianbear]

What did you do to focus on Step 1?

What he said!? How'd you do it?

 

[notbobtrustme]

At least in our school, going from 80-85 to over 90% requires learning lots of minutia to get those few extra questions right. So unless you want to stress over every little tiny detail, be content with what you have. I did that for the first few exams and all it did was stress me out. Considering how low of importance pre-clinical grades are in relation to clinical grades/Step I, I would not stress over Bs (or high passes or whatever your grading scale is).

 

[achamess]

At least in our school, going from 80-85 to over 90% requires learning lots of minutia to get those few extra questions right. So unless you want to stress over every little tiny detail, be content with what you have. I did that for the first few exams and all it did was stress me out. Considering how low of importance pre-clinical grades are in relation to clinical grades/Step I, I would not stress over Bs (or high passes or whatever your grading scale is).

Yes. Diminishing returns. You have to ask whether it matters. For some it does. For others not. But we med students have an impulse to reflexively "go for the top" w/o thinking whether its in our interests. We should think more about how we spend our precious time and effort.