So I've been doing UWorld and doing fairly well (~70% overall but about 77% my last 5 or 6 blocks) and getting a hang of the questions and all so I decided it was about time to do the UWorld Self Assessment. I've only completed the first block and hit the brakes because something caught me WAY off guard... the vagueness. I feel like I've heard that the real Step 2 is rather vague in it's stems and descriptions but I guess I'm a bit confused how to approach this. With UWorld questions quite often all (or at least most) of the info you need to make an educated decision is there in the stems, you just need to know your stuff to get the answer, but it seems like the self assessment had a lot of REALLY vague type presentations and distractors. Kinda threw me off a bit considering both things are produced by UWorld... you wouldn't think there would be that much difference. I don't know... anyone else feel the same way? If you've already taken the real test how do you combat this? By that, I mean of course you can do World questions and get really good at knowing the info but if you get used to THAT style of question and then open up a Self assessment (and I'm assuming the real thing) and see a different way the information and questions are presented it can really throw you off so does anyone have any recommendations on how to prepare for the "randomness" and "vagueness" of the self assessments and the real thing?
UW vs UWSA
- Thread starter QuackaDO
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I'm not sure how to actually answer this, but I think you should complete the exam and you'll be pleasantly surprised. I felt that I had no idea what some of the questions were about, yet in the end my score was very good on UWSA.
The real test was a lot more straightforward than UWSA, but as weird as this may sound, I think UWorld teaches you to subconsciously know what to answer without you being 100% certain of the answer. For me, it was a matter of trusting my instinct and going ahead with it. I actually wish I had trusted my instinct more on the real test, rather than try to outsmart the question and ending up with stupid mistakes.
The real test was a lot more straightforward than UWSA, but as weird as this may sound, I think UWorld teaches you to subconsciously know what to answer without you being 100% certain of the answer. For me, it was a matter of trusting my instinct and going ahead with it. I actually wish I had trusted my instinct more on the real test, rather than try to outsmart the question and ending up with stupid mistakes.
One thing that someone at our tutoring/help center told me to do when I started doing World questions was to write on a sheet of paper 1-44. As you do the questions, put a number 1-5 of how sure you are of the answer you input down for each one (1= total guess, 2=not really sure, but something leads you that way, 3= feel good about the choice but there's some doubt, 4= pretty sure but not absolutely 100% sure, and 5= 100% sure). As I did World that kinda gave me confidence too go with my gut and move on when I could write a 4 or a 5 and as it turned out more often than not I'd hit about 90% of those (and usually in the 80-90% range when you consider 3s, 4s, or 5s. Also helped me speed up as well cuz I didn't dwell on questions too much. For whatever reason though, that first block netted me exactly ZERO 5s and only 10 4s... just felt so unsure. Glad to hear the real thing was a little more straight forward but I do agree that World teaches you to "go with your gut" even when you're not 100% sure. I sure hope you're right about the rest of this USWA though, lol!
