Studying with Anki only?

[DrFizition]

Has anyone been able to successfully study for a class primarily with Anki cards, and maybe drawing pathways/ doing practice exam/questions? Is this possible?

I was thinking of going to lecture (first review of material), developing anki cards (second), and continuously reviewing the cards (3+ review), drawing necessary pathways until it's in my head, then just doing practice exams.

Anyone follow a similar style?

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[MedNation907]

I know many of my colleagues do this, and it can be a pretty sufficient primary resource but I would still consider others like Robbins and Coltran for extra pathology exposure, Sketchymicro or picmonic for when they apply, and I'm sure there are other great resources you'll come across. I personally don't use Anki, I'm not a fan of blunt memorization. I will say though, and you'll soon find out yourself, that finding a group of students to help you in this process is probably short of a necessity. There's too much information for one person to comfortably make flashcards, especially if it's going to be a primary resource for learning the information. Students at my school have a calendar that they all share and each of them have a specific agenda for entering flashcards into their deck, this is what you should plan on doing as well. Best of luck.

 

[avgn]

There's too much information for one person to comfortably make flashcards, especially if it's going to be a primary resource for learning the information.

Solutions:
1) Get faster at making cards. Learn the Anki keyboard shortcuts.
2) Make better cards. Don't make convoluted cards with more than 2 parts.

Studying off of other people's cards is more low-yield since a huge part of the Anki system is the process of thinking and learning that goes into making cards. Can't make good cards if you don't know the material.

A friend of mine is at a top med school and near the top of his class, uses Anki as his only studying resource. Even when he watches Pathoma or Sketchy he Ankis them. I've looked at the simple cards he makes. So definitely possible but obviously YMMV since some people's brains just don't work well for Anki

 

[doyouhaveaflag]

I did almost exactly this. I went to class every day and made flashcards on that day's material plus Pathoma and First Aid. I also used Kaplan Qbank and the Robbins Review of Pathology question book throughout the year, especially for exam prep.

Pros: For me, there's no better way to stuff knowledge into my brain than spaced repetition flashcards. I don't get much from just reading powerpoints over and over, I need brute force! Try it and see what works for you. If it doesn't work for you, try something else. You might find a happy medium like using the Brosencephalon deck. I have a lot of friends who swear by it.

Cons: Hugely time consuming, especially since I kept my deck cumulative through all second year rather than starting fresh each block (although I archived cards with esoteric class stuff I knew I'd never see again). By the end, I was going through several hundred cards of old material per day. You can't get behind or before you know it, you'll have 1000 cards sitting there waiting for you. Anki needs a vacation mode!

 

[Crayola227]

omg.... the only way that worked for me was writing by hand in pencil!!

even if i was cramming and it wasn't even going to be readable later,
the act had to be done by hand

huh I guess I didn't realize how right the people who said MS1/2 is like mental masturbation until now

 

[DocWinter]

People at my school do it and it works out just fine. I personally can't and don't like flashcards, but if that is how you learn best, go for it.

I second the notion of making them yourself, not using someone else's. Half the learning is in the creation.

 

[MedNation907]

I agree making notecards is more thought-provoking then sharing the workload, but I don't think it cheapens group work. Instead of spending the time after reading through a lecture thinking of the important points, and then physically putting them into Anki.. You could just review a lecture yourself and have a deck already made for it. And that is multiplied by ~40 slides per lecture. We don't write the questions in qbanks that we use religiously for prep, I don't see how it's any different. You have a question that has an answer, which you should know whether your wrote the question or not..

 

[AlbinoHawk DO]

Has anyone been able to successfully study for a class primarily with Anki cards, and maybe drawing pathways/ doing practice exam/questions? Is this possible?

I was thinking of going to lecture (first review of material), developing anki cards (second), and continuously reviewing the cards (3+ review), drawing necessary pathways until it's in my head, then just doing practice exams.

Anyone follow a similar style?

I do similarly to this with Quizlet cards. Just watch lecture while highlighting and annotating the most HY of each lecture then build my cards and only study those. Most of the time I never again touch the ppt, only do so if I feel ready 2-3 days before the exam to then memorize some unlikely testable minutiae in case I get that one or two rare questions (can't really remember this paying off now than 1-2 points on a test I would have passed anyway).

 

[futuremdforme]

I used flashcards exclusively for studying and did very well in MS1. I tried sharing flashcards with my classmates, but I preferred mine to theirs, so I didn't continue with that.

 

[MatCauthon]

It works for some people, but it seems kind of inefficient compared to all the other ways of studying out there. I have seen medical students make some of the most beautiful notes, illustrated with diagrams, charts, and tables that compare and contrast the key material. The notes were usually compressed to just a few pages. These students usually do very well-- I even know of one that sold her notes to other students. When I started preparing notes like hers, my scores started going way up. If one is going to make flash cards, they need to turn it into more of a creative process than just rote memory.

Also, one time-tested piece of wisdom that someone shared to me is this: The best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else. This method can greatly help long-term retention. It also greatly helps when on rotation when you can succinctly explain detailed clinical information.

 

[OnePunchBiopsy]

I would use anki and the mod Image Occlusion 2.0 (there are youtube tutorials on how to use it). Basically you take a screenshot of a page (such as a powerpoint presentation, a table, a thought diagram) and make cards out of the picture. One time I screenshot a page of definitions for a quiz and made 340 notecards in about 20 minutes.

I used anki to cram lecture to free up time to study for Step 1.

Unfortunately anki became too much to keep up with during 3rd year.

 

[Mr. Beefy Lion]

I did almost exactly this. I went to class every day and made flashcards on that day's material plus Pathoma and First Aid. I also used Kaplan Qbank and the Robbins Review of Pathology question book throughout the year, especially for exam prep.

Pros: For me, there's no better way to stuff knowledge into my brain than spaced repetition flashcards. I don't get much from just reading powerpoints over and over, I need brute force! Try it and see what works for you. If it doesn't work for you, try something else. You might find a happy medium like using the Brosencephalon deck. I have a lot of friends who swear by it.

Cons: Hugely time consuming, especially since I kept my deck cumulative through all second year rather than starting fresh each block (although I archived cards with esoteric class stuff I knew I'd never see again). By the end, I was going through several hundred cards of old material per day. You can't get behind or before you know it, you'll have 1000 cards sitting there waiting for you. Anki needs a vacation mode!

How many cards would you review during non exam cram time? Also, how long would that take you to complete typically?

 

[ThePenguin21]

I studied almost exclusively with Quizlet during my first year and made close to 20,000 cards. It's similar to anki but is more user-friendly imo. I had a lot of success. So, overall, exclusively flash carding works. There are things that are very obviously not "flashcardable" and you'll know what I mean and what to do instead when you get there. One caveat -- you'll feel like you're working too hard sometimes, and that may be true. I like to be exhaustive which is both a virtue and a vice sometimes. I also disagree with some of the posters above and feel like I definitely could achieve understanding and not "just memorization" through flashcards.

Question for everyone else: Is it possible to approach board studying the same way (i.e. flashcarding FA, Pathoma, and UWorld)? I don't mean to hijack this thread so please continue answering OPs question too. Thanks!

 

[doyouhaveaflag]

How many cards would you review during non exam cram time? Also, how long would that take you to complete typically?

By the end of the year, about 250 old card were coming up each day, plus the 50-100 I made each day (which Anki gives to you twice). It usually took 2-3 hours to go through all the reviews for the day. It's making the cards that's so time consuming for me.

The good/bad news is we had exams every two weeks, so I only had to cram 800 or so the day before them as a final review. I would also go through all the powerpoints one last time the day before an exam to make sure I didn't miss any small detail that I didn't make a flashcard for.

 

[doyouhaveaflag]

Question for everyone else: Is it possible to approach board studying the same way (i.e. flashcarding FA, Pathoma, and UWorld)? I don't mean to hijack this thread so please continue answering OPs question too. Thanks!

I made flashcards from UWorld and continued going through my daily cumulative cards during dedicated study time. It remains to be seen whether or not this made for a successful step 1 (fingers and toes crossed), but it definitely helped me learn the material in UWorld. My second pass average was 97%.

 

[MedNation907]

How do you anki dwellers rate brosencephalon?


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[ski89]

How do you anki dwellers rate brosencephalon?


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I tried it but didnt like it. In my experience, people that like brosencephalon tend to be more casual anki users. Most of us that use anki nearly exclusively like to make our own cards and have very specific ways of doing things. I made nearly 10k cards during M1 so I got pretty good at making them to my liking to maximize my efficiency.

 

[piii]

Can anyone explain to me their settings set ups for their Anki decks? Like steps, graduating internal, easy interval, starting ease. If you are making cards for each lecture everyday and reviewing, what are your settings like?

 

[piii]

I left all of the settings you listed as is. The only settings I changed are the new cards per day and total reviews per day.

For new cards per day, I change it depending on how backed up my decks are and how late in the block it is. If I still have 300 new cards to get through and I only have a week and a half until the exam, I'll ramp it up to 75 new cards a day. Otherwise I usually keep it 25-50 or else it can get overwhelming. I'll also do more new cards per day if it's easier stuff that I'm breezing through pretty quickly.

For total reviews per day, I try to do all of the reviews due for that day, which is typically in the 100-200 range. So I just set the max reviews at like 500.

Okay thanks! Do the reviews just get filtered in with the new cards when you start a session? Sorry, new to Anki.

 

[cbrons]

Anki is a flash card program. So how can you study with "anki alone"? Unless ur method of studying is just to memorize a bunch of random factoids that you spend no time actually learning to understand.

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[Azete]

I mentioned this in a previous Anki thread, but in my experience Anki is great for slaying med school exams. My problem with it was my practical knowledge was basically nonexistent; I knew a lot information and my recall was great, but when it came time to apply what I learned I was less than useless. I figured this wouldn't serve me very well for my clinical years, so I stopped using it.

Honestly, there are enough really solid external resources available that spending time making Anki cards -- unless you're exceptionally good at it -- probably just isn't as time efficient as other things. Spaced repetition works well for just about everybody though, so those that say Anki doesn't work clearly haven't used it properly.

 

[Styrene]

The thing is, is that not everyone is organized enough or neat enough to make those sorts of outlines. I'd rather smash my hand with a hammer than make outlines like that. It takes my maximum effort just to create something readable in that regard.

It works for some people, but it seems kind of inefficient compared to all the other ways of studying out there. I have seen medical students make some of the most beautiful notes, illustrated with diagrams, charts, and tables that compare and contrast the key material. The notes were usually compressed to just a few pages. These students usually do very well-- I even know of one that sold her notes to other students. When I started preparing notes like hers, my scores started going way up. If one is going to make flash cards, they need to turn it into more of a creative process than just rote memory.

 

[MatCauthon]

The thing is, is that not everyone is organized enough or neat enough to make those sorts of outlines. I'd rather smash my hand with a hammer than make outlines like that. It takes my maximum effort just to create something readable in that regard.

And ANKI doesn't take organization?

To be honest, I know many students that make very rough diagrams and outlines and do very very well. Some students I know barely make any notes at all. ANKI is just one study form of many, but I personally prefer methods that don't involve so much time to make.

Some med students are so smart they don't need any of these methods. For the rest of the students, creating some sort of notes to reference in the future is very important. ANKI isn't the only way to that, but is probably the most time-consuming way to accomplish that goal.

 

[mehc012]

And ANKI doesn't take organization?

To be honest, I know many students that make very rough diagrams and outlines and do very very well. Some students I know barely make any notes at all. ANKI is just one study form of many, but I personally prefer methods that don't involve so much time to make.

Some med students are so smart they don't need any of these methods. For the rest of the students, creating some sort of notes to reference in the future is very important. ANKI isn't the only way to that, but is probably the most time-consuming way to accomplish that goal.

a) I love your username so much!
b) Meh, I find Anki and outlines take the same amount of time for me. I basically make an outline into Anki, and then interconnecting concept-integrating questions, only I can copy/paste textbook text and pics so it goes pretty quickly. The biggest difference is that I don't feel like the follow-up review takes as much time with Anki. I don't really need either to learn things for the initial test as long as I go to lecture, but I need reinforcement for the long-term, so that's why I went with it.
c) This is all going to be different for everyone, so meh. To each their own. Maybe I'll quit Anki halfway through, who knows.

 

[MatCauthon]

Thanks for the Props on the username!

Did you see that the Wheel of Time TV rights have been obtained by a major studio? They haven't announced the studio yet, but I am definitely hoping for something on the scale of Game of Thrones!

http://www.tor.com/2016/04/28/tv-ri...d-by-new-studio-with-jordan-estates-approval/

 

[mehc012]

Thanks for the Props on the username!

Did you see that the Wheel of Time TV rights have been obtained by a major studio? They haven't announced the studio yet, but I am definitely hoping for something on the scale of Game of Thrones!

http://www.tor.com/2016/04/28/tv-ri...d-by-new-studio-with-jordan-estates-approval/

Oooh, interesting! I'd imagine they'd cut the complexity down a LOT, though...as it stands it gets too splintered to be very TV-amenable. If it were done well, though, it'd be amazing!

Note: This is totally still on-topic because you'd probably fare well to create an Anki deck just to keep track of all the detailed, concurrent threads in the WoT books, lol!

 

[kb0275]

I mentioned this in a previous Anki thread, but in my experience Anki is great for slaying med school exams. My problem with it was my practical knowledge was basically nonexistent; I knew a lot information and my recall was great, but when it came time to apply what I learned I was less than useless. I figured this wouldn't serve me very well for my clinical years, so I stopped using it.

Honestly, there are enough really solid external resources available that spending time making Anki cards -- unless you're exceptionally good at it -- probably just isn't as time efficient as other things. Spaced repetition works well for just about everybody though, so those that say Anki doesn't work clearly haven't used it properly.

How do you use anki for anatomy?

 

[hopefulERdoc251]

How do you use anki for anatomy?

Image occlusion up the ass. Find a book/online diagrams (netters, clinically oriented anatomy, your lecture slides, netanatomy) and image occlude the structures you'll be tested on.

Also, most of our anatomy written questions had some clinical emphasis on it. For MSK/neuro (as these were the most application heavy for me), I would do cloze deletions for structure and function. Example: "Function of the {{c1::medial rectus}} is to {{c2::adduct the eye::function}}".

It's largely rote memorization, and you supplement it with practice questions to test your knowledge (clinical anatomy is clutch for this). Hope this helps!

 

[Azete]

How do you use anki for anatomy?

You can make Anki work for anatomy, but there are far better ways to learn it.

 

[kb0275]

Image occlusion up the ass. Find a book/online diagrams (netters, clinically oriented anatomy, your lecture slides, netanatomy) and image occlude the structures you'll be tested on.

Also, most of our anatomy written questions had some clinical emphasis on it. For MSK/neuro (as these were the most application heavy for me), I would do cloze deletions for structure and function. Example: "Function of the {{c1::medial rectus}} is to {{c2::adduct the eye::function}}".

It's largely rote memorization, and you supplement it with practice questions to test your knowledge (clinical anatomy is clutch for this). Hope this helps!

How many cards did you make for each lecture? And did you make one for each fact on ppts?

 

[mehc012]

How many cards did you make for each lecture? And did you make one for each fact on ppts?

This kind of question always gets asked and I've never understood it. Every school has a different number of lectures per week, every professor has a different ppt style, every student has a different flashcard style. How on earth could someone come up with a 'card/lecture' stat, and if they did, what are the odds its relevant to a different school's setup?

 

[hopefulERdoc251]

How many cards did you make for each lecture? And did you make one for each fact on ppts?

Yeah each school and each style is different. My school likes testing nit picky details so I had more cards than what others probably have. As for the facts/ppt slide...at least what I've noticed at my school is that either the lecturer has 2-3 facts/slide and expands on each fact during the lecture, or lecturers have hella facts on each slide but only talks about a few of them (which are the ones ultimately tested). Each lecturer is different and so you'll have to watch/attend lectures to figure that out.

For instance: my physio cards would be 60-70 cards, but my anatomy/histo would be up to 120/130 cards/deck because of using image occlusion, so it really depends.

 

[Medin2017]

Yeah each school and each style is different. My school likes testing nit picky details so I had more cards than what others probably have. As for the facts/ppt slide...at least what I've noticed at my school is that either the lecturer has 2-3 facts/slide and expands on each fact during the lecture, or lecturers have hella facts on each slide but only talks about a few of them (which are the ones ultimately tested). Each lecturer is different and so you'll have to watch/attend lectures to figure that out.

For instance: my physio cards would be 60-70 cards, but my anatomy/histo would be up to 120/130 cards/deck because of using image occlusion, so it really depends.

how many decks per exam?

 

[mehc012]

how many decks per exam?

Why on earth do you care?

You should really try to have one deck going at a time and differentiate by tagging.

 

[Medin2017]

Why on earth do you care?

You should really try to have one deck going at a time and differentiate by tagging.

doesn't hurt to know what successful people are doing. Why does that bother you so much lol you already made your point that it's different for everyone.

Yea I'll do that when school starts since in undergrad I had too many decks

 

[Goro]

Has anyone been able to successfully study for a class primarily with Anki cards, and maybe drawing pathways/ doing practice exam/questions? Is this possible?

I was thinking of going to lecture (first review of material), developing anki cards (second), and continuously reviewing the cards (3+ review), drawing necessary pathways until it's in my head, then just doing practice exams.

Anyone follow a similar style?

There's data that successful students use a variety of resources to study from.

 

[mehc012]

doesn't hurt to know what successful people are doing. Why does that bother you so much lol you already made your point that it's different for everyone.

Yea I'll do that when school starts since in undergrad I had too many decks

Spinning your wheels in useless specifics about someone else's study habits DOES hurt. That's how neuroticism grows into setting meaningless metrics for yourself.

I always like to have 1 deck for each current subject (e.g. Cardio/Pulm and Anatomy) and then one deck for all prior knowledge you plan on knowing long term.

 

[Medin2017]

Spinning your wheels in useless specifics about someone else's study habits DOES hurt. That's how neuroticism grows into setting meaningless metrics for yourself.

I always like to have 1 deck for each current subject (e.g. Cardio/Pulm and Anatomy) and then one deck for all prior knowledge you plan on knowing long term.

Imitation is unnecessary but if you see someone else's take on certain things, you can sometimes pick up bits and pieces that can add to how you normally study.

 

[hopefulERdoc251]

how many decks per exam?

Once again, I go a bit overboard and have a deck for every week (i.e week 1 anatomy, week 1 physio, etc).