Tablet and Anki

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psychmdhopeful

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Hey everyone...I wanted to get some opinions from current med. students that use Anki in their studies. This fall I intend to use the Anki system because I am a fan of flashcards and spaced repetition.

However, in making the cards, I've read that some topics don't transfer over so well (such as physiology). So, I was thinking of buying a tablet to be able to draw diagrams or whatever onto the Anki cards. For those of you that have used Anki, did you think a tablet was necessary to create good cards? Can I make great cards with just a regular laptop or will I be losing out on some material? I would prefer not to spend the extra money buying a tablet or laptop convertible if I don't need to. Thanks!

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Hey everyone...I wanted to get some opinions from current med. students that use Anki in their studies. This fall I intend to use the Anki system because I am a fan of flashcards and spaced repetition.

However, in making the cards, I've read that some topics don't transfer over so well (such as physiology). So, I was thinking of buying a tablet to be able to draw diagrams or whatever onto the Anki cards. For those of you that have used Anki, did you think a tablet was necessary to create good cards? Can I make great cards with just a regular laptop or will I be losing out on some material? I would prefer not to spend the extra money buying a tablet or laptop convertible if I don't need to. Thanks!

Making cards on a tablet is super slow and you won't be drawing diagrams on the tablet version. It basically allows you to study on the go - don't think of it as a place to make cards.
 
Making cards on a tablet is super slow and you won't be drawing diagrams on the tablet version. It basically allows you to study on the go - don't think of it as a place to make cards.

Agreed. I've been an Anki power user for a while. I never ever make cards on my iPad unless there is something so important at the moment that I want to capture it immediately. That is rare. Card-making is really cumbersome on the iPad app.

Laptop is fine. What is it specifically that you think won't "transfer over well" to Anki? I made a solid physiology deck during MS1. I used BRS Physiology and I had the web version, so I used its diagrams. Use figures from eBooks - they are way better than anything we all could make.

Now, for actually reviewing your cards, Anki mobile is definitely the way to go. I make my cards on my laptop, and review them on iPhone/iPad. The mobility is key.

Good luck. If you want to check out my physio deck as a guide, you can DL it here

It doesn't have the images anymore (for copyright reasons), but the content is all there.
 
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Since you can easily copy/paste images into anki I've never had an issue with making flash cards on my laptop. I could see some people saying flash cards may not be best for certain conceptual points of physio, but if you're having trouble with it you could always supplement with question sets.
 
Anki is the way to go, imo. You might have to get creative at times, but you can use Anki for virtually everything in medical school.
 
However, in making the cards, I've read that some topics don't transfer over so well (such as physiology).

You can make a fine physiology deck. The key is that you learn the concepts in context first, and then break it down into cards for review.

For instance, you might want to learn the process that thyroid hormone is synthesized. You can do that easily by image occlusion or cloze deletion (where step 1 is one cloze, step 2 is another, and so forth). So each card is essentially like, after the step were X happens, what process happens next and what do you make?

You might want to learn about the regulation and function of insulin. I have a bunch of cards that are like 'what is the effect of insulin on X'. It helps that you learned that in general, insulin promotes anabolism, but the cards effectively remind you of specific processes.
 
I've found the secret to Anki in med school is to use it sparingly. Like habanero hot sauce.
 
I've found the secret to Anki in med school is to use it sparingly. Like habanero hot sauce.

I disagree. I think the key to using Anki in med school is to douse everything in it. Like habanero hot sauce.
 
I've had variable success with Anki and physio. I think what you really have to do is actually understand it FIRST then make the cards as a review (vs. making the cards then learning...that could be the wrong way of doing it anyway, but whatevs). You need to have a good big-picture understanding with physio, so learn the basic big picture concepts first then use Anki to get the nity gritties.

I've just copied and pasted diagrams into my cards if I needed.
 
Thanks for the advice everyone! Sounds like a laptop will work just fine and I will go with that...I just wasn't sure if having a tablet to sometimes annotate directly into a card would be useful enough to justify the extra cost.

Anyways, for those that use it pretty heavily, how many cards do you guys normally review in a day? It seems kind of daunting to continually create cards for class and then having to review old ones...I'm mainly worried about finding enough time in the day to learn the material, create the cards, review the new cards, and review the old cards.
 
Anyways, for those that use it pretty heavily, how many cards do you guys normally review in a day? It seems kind of daunting to continually create cards for class and then having to review old ones...I'm mainly worried about finding enough time in the day to learn the material, create the cards, review the new cards, and review the old cards.

Time is a challenge. I do 70 reviews a day on average. I am falling behind. I wonder if anyone has altered the default settings to have the reviews spaced differently.
 
Hey everyone...I wanted to get some opinions from current med. students that use Anki in their studies. This fall I intend to use the Anki system because I am a fan of flashcards and spaced repetition.

However, in making the cards, I've read that some topics don't transfer over so well (such as physiology). So, I was thinking of buying a tablet to be able to draw diagrams or whatever onto the Anki cards. For those of you that have used Anki, did you think a tablet was necessary to create good cards? Can I make great cards with just a regular laptop or will I be losing out on some material? I would prefer not to spend the extra money buying a tablet or laptop convertible if I don't need to. Thanks!
I used anki for everything before I got to systems blocks. No I only used it for micro and pharm, if at all. I used to make one side of the card a questions and just copy/paste a lecture slide onto the back of the card that contained the answer. I think this was a good plan bc many test questions are on stupid details that may or may not be contained in a possibly completely correct answer that you would have came up with.

Also, I don't think anki is good for physio bc understanding physio was much more "big picture" learning. Using flash cards didn't help me grasp the whole system.
 
Thanks for the advice everyone! Sounds like a laptop will work just fine and I will go with that...I just wasn't sure if having a tablet to sometimes annotate directly into a card would be useful enough to justify the extra cost.

Anyways, for those that use it pretty heavily, how many cards do you guys normally review in a day? It seems kind of daunting to continually create cards for class and then having to review old ones...I'm mainly worried about finding enough time in the day to learn the material, create the cards, review the new cards, and review the old cards.

Don't worry, you're probably not gonna have enough time/drive to review material everyday on top of learning the old material anyways, regardless of whether you're using anki, making notes, reading books, or learning by osmosis.

I make cards while listening to the lectures (I don't go to class), rather than trying to listen to lecture/go to class and then make note cards later. I sometimes have to pause the lectures if I'm getting behind making cards, but seeing as I'm listening to them at 1.5X, I still get through them in a fast time. I don't try to review everyday. I'm sure if I was more motivated it would help, but, whatever. I review all the cards I've made at least once during the weekends, and 3-5 times in the two days before the test.

I don't think you want to use their normal review options for regular exam studying, because it is more designed for long-term memory, not 2 week cram blocks. I am using anki the "appropriate" way right now with this monster FA deck https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/2374623780 I guess I'll figure out next year when I start practicing for the boards if it actually works or not.
 
I don't think you want to use their normal review options for regular exam studying, because it is more designed for long-term memory, not 2 week cram blocks.

What type of timing strategy did you adopt for the 2 week cram blocks? (Did you change the settings to give you different intervals?)
 
Don't worry, you're probably not gonna have enough time/drive to review material everyday on top of learning the old material anyways, regardless of whether you're using anki, making notes, reading books, or learning by osmosis.

I make cards while listening to the lectures (I don't go to class), rather than trying to listen to lecture/go to class and then make note cards later. I sometimes have to pause the lectures if I'm getting behind making cards, but seeing as I'm listening to them at 1.5X, I still get through them in a fast time. I don't try to review everyday. I'm sure if I was more motivated it would help, but, whatever. I review all the cards I've made at least once during the weekends, and 3-5 times in the two days before the test.

I don't think you want to use their normal review options for regular exam studying, because it is more designed for long-term memory, not 2 week cram blocks. I am using anki the "appropriate" way right now with this monster FA deck https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/2374623780 I guess I'll figure out next year when I start practicing for the boards if it actually works or not.

:O That deck! Thanks for sharing! Maybe if I'm REALLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY bored this summer, I'll take a peak at it...has it been accurate and correct so far? Have you reorganized the deck? It looks like it's all one deck, but I'll probably want to go through and separate them by subject since we haven't done any micro or immuno yet.
 
:O That deck! Thanks for sharing! Maybe if I'm REALLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY bored this summer, I'll take a peak at it...has it been accurate and correct so far? Have you reorganized the deck? It looks like it's all one deck, but I'll probably want to go through and separate them by subject since we haven't done any micro or immuno yet.

I made my own 2013 deck. I would recommend making your own deck for the newest version of First Aid. The 2012 book is probably one of the worst First Aids in all of First Aid history (ridiculous amount of errors). After making my 2013 deck and then going BACK to correct errata, I can tell you that it's #1 a pain, #2 hard to unlearn something you've driven home with Anki. So yeah, I wouldn't use someone else's deck - it didn't take me that long to do after I developed a solid method.

Which brings me to the most important point: The first few years are about learning how you'd like to learn as much as they are about performance. So if you want to use Anki, best to learn how to use it really well now - so you can use it through residency, even as an attending. I plan to use the program sparingly for the rest of my career - built largely on a lot of trial and error over M2.
 
I made my own 2013 deck. I would recommend making your own deck for the newest version of First Aid. The 2012 book is probably one of the worst First Aids in all of First Aid history (ridiculous amount of errors). After making my 2013 deck and then going BACK to correct errata, I can tell you that it's #1 a pain, #2 hard to unlearn something you've driven home with Anki. So yeah, I wouldn't use someone else's deck - it didn't take me that long to do after I developed a solid method.

Which brings me to the most important point: The first few years are about learning how you'd like to learn as much as they are about performance. So if you want to use Anki, best to learn how to use it really well now - so you can use it through residency, even as an attending. I plan to use the program sparingly for the rest of my career - built largely on a lot of trial and error over M2.

Again, thanks for the responses everyone - they really are quite helpful. John, when you made your FA 2013 deck, did you do it along with classes during first and second year? I was thinking of developing good deck-building methods throughout the first semester of M1 since I've heard that using FA during first year courses can be fairly low yield. Also, would you be willing to share some of the trial and errors that you would suggest to someone new to Anki? Thanks!
 
Again, thanks for the responses everyone - they really are quite helpful. John, when you made your FA 2013 deck, did you do it along with classes during first and second year? I was thinking of developing good deck-building methods throughout the first semester of M1 since I've heard that using FA during first year courses can be fairly low yield. Also, would you be willing to share some of the trial and errors that you would suggest to someone new to Anki? Thanks!

If you want to ask me questions on specifics you can PM.

But yeah, I tried to use a program called GT but got frustrated - then switched to anki. I made anki cards for FA but then realized that I wanted to use the newest book, so switched to 13 in Jan of 2013 (release date) for a summer 2013 test.

I agree with that, you don't really need to touch FA until M2... and honestly, I would wait until 6 months before your exam or when the new FA comes out for the year you take the exam ~ Jan.
 
Which brings me to the most important point: The first few years are about learning how you'd like to learn as much as they are about performance. So if you want to use Anki, best to learn how to use it really well now - so you can use it through residency, even as an attending. I plan to use the program sparingly for the rest of my career - built largely on a lot of trial and error over M2.

:thumbup::)

Long-term retention of knowledge is a problem for everyone, not just students. If you think about it, the reason Anki (and SR in general) works is because it simulates how we learn things in real life. As a resident or attending, you see a lot of the same stuff over and over. That is your spaced repetition. When the brain sees something more than once, that signals that the stimulus is worth remembering. But imagine if we remember every single thing that came in our view every day. That would be a mess! So the brain is selective - it waits for something to show up a couple of times and then says, "hey, this is important. I should probably remember this".

For the stuff a physician sees all the time, Anki is not necessary, since real life is doing the spacing and the testing and the repetition. But for the stuff that we don't see everyday but that is still worthwhile remembering (the zebras), that is what Anki is ideal for. And also for things that are not yet part of daily practice (new recs, etc.).

So Anki (or SR in general) is a life-long knowledge management system. That's how I use it, and it's why I'm so enthusiastic about it.

The key question for me these days is the following: given that so much can be easily retrieved on the web (by mobile phone and maybe Google glass soon :D), what stuff is worth committing to memory?

That's the question for all docs in the 21st century I think. Good computer algorithms will likely take over a lot of what we do, so the question is, what knowledge is critical for humans to know? I know in the short term, cramming Step 1 minutiae pays off big time in terms of career prospects, but for the long term, for my career, what should I spend time maintaining in memory? Discuss. :)
 
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:thumbup::)

Long-term retention of knowledge is a problem for everyone, not just students. If you think about it, the reason Anki (and SR in general) works is because it simulates how we learn things in real life. As a resident or attending, you see a lot of the same stuff over and over. That is your spaced repetition. When the brain sees something more than once, that signals that the stimulus is worth remembering. But imagine if we remember every single thing that came in our view every day. That would be a mess! So the brain is selective - it waits for something to show up a couple of times and then says, "hey, this is important. I should probably remember this".

For the stuff a physician sees all the time, Anki is not necessary, since real life is doing the spacing and the testing and the repetition. But for the stuff that we don't see everyday but that is still worthwhile remembering (the zebras), that is what Anki is ideal for. And also for things that are not yet part of daily practice (new recs, etc.).

So Anki (or SR in general) is a life-long knowledge management system. That's how I use it, and it's why I'm so enthusiastic about it.

The key question for me these days is the following: given that so much can be easily retrieved on the web (by mobile phone and maybe Google glass soon :D), what stuff is worth committing to memory?

That's the question for all docs in the 21st century I think. Good computer algorithms will likely take over a lot of what we do, so the question is, what knowledge is critical for humans to know? I know in the short term, cramming Step 1 minutiae pays off big time in terms of career prospects, but for the long term, for my career, what should I spend time maintaining in memory? Discuss. :)

I think your blog is what turned me on to Anki in the first place. So thanks for that :thumbup:

Anyway, you bring up an excellent point: What should I remember?

I would actually tend to focus on the fundamentals and not the zebras. Why? Because in my study of mastery, the people who have become excellent at anything have ridiculous level of fundamental understanding. The zebras don't show up that often and you can look them up (as you said). Every field has a ton of important fundamentals - and they can constantly change. Keeping up with these and being able to recite them in your sleep would be helpful for your career. There's recognition, then there's reciting, then there's reciting when you are on 3 hours of sleep and can only recite things like your phone #. That's where you want your fundamentals... and that's what I would use Anki for. But that's just one man's perspective.

I will say this, I've had my ups and downs with the program. So much of M1 and M2 is BS and not worth remember for another week let alone a career.
 
I was thinking of developing good deck-building methods throughout the first semester of M1 since I've heard that using FA during first year courses can be fairly low yield.

A lot of FA content is first-year material. Use FA throughout the preclinical curriculum.
 
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