What to study pre dedicated? I am a below average student in class

[The Last Ankibender]

Current MS2 at a low tier US MD, I am a poor test taker, I score poorly in the MCAT. Currently in a school where all my exams are system based using NBME questions from a question bank. I always score below or average at best (low-mid 70s). I study a lot for exams, and barely pass them. I am scared for the Step 1, i will be taking it mid July with 8 weeks dedicated.

What do you recommend me to do before I start dedicated, so I can pass the exam without the stress of failing it.

Currently I dont do anki because, the first exams I was using it, I failed and it was consuming so much of my time. So any other recommendations will be welcome.

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[TragicalDrFaust]

Was a weak student OMS-1 and am now an average to above average student OMS-2. My first piece of advice is to take SDN with a grain of salt. There is a sample bias for high performers here and what works for them may not work for us. They may be naturally better at memorizing or take to certain high yield resources, such as anki, better. But many are coming from a different place from you, me or even another high performer with different learning preferences.

How do you feel about the academic advising department at your school? The advice they gave me was much more valuable than any academic advice I gleaned from SDN.

 

[Med Ed]

What do you recommend me to do before I start dedicated, so I can pass the exam without the stress of failing it.

The short answer is to study whatever you are weakest in. Dedicated is supposed to be a grand review of the content from M1/M2, along with time spent honing your test-taking skills. It's not a period to be sorting out important concepts for the first time.

There is exactly one variable that is strongly correlated with Step 1 performance, and that is the number of practice questions done by the student prior to the exam. Whether there is causation is up for debate, but it's clear that high scorers do more questions than low scorers.

Once you hit dedicated, I suggest you follow the usual advice of doing practice questions in tutor mode (for content review) and testing mode (to get you accustomed to exam conditions). As noted above, definitely reach out to academic advising if you don't already know them. They can be extremely helpful, but unfortunately the students most in need of their services are usually the ones who are least likely to ask for it.

Good luck.

 

[Billiam95]

Current MS2 at a low tier US MD, I am a poor test taker, I score poorly in the MCAT. Currently in a school where all my exams are system based using NBME questions from a question bank. I always score below or average at best (low-mid 70s). I study a lot for exams, and barely pass them. I am scared for the Step 1, i will be taking it mid July with 8 weeks dedicated.

What do you recommend me to do before I start dedicated, so I can pass the exam without the stress of failing it.

Currently I dont do anki because, the first exams I was using it, I failed and it was consuming so much of my time. So any other recommendations will be welcome.

How are you currently studying? Are you mainly using in-house lectures or NBME materials? When/how do you incorporate outside resources? What Q banks are you using, and when do you start doing questions?

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

If anki is taking up too much of your time, you are either not using anki correctly or you’re wasting time on other resources. You are likely just studying inefficiently and maybe could do with some practice in test taking skills.

 

[ortnakas]

Practice questions are key.

I personally recommend a more guided study program if you’re a below average student or test taker. I used DIT back in the day, but I took Step 1 over 5 years ago now so my info on good resources isn’t up to date.

 

[The Last Ankibender]

Was a weak student OMS-1 and am now an average to above average student OMS-2. My first piece of advice is to take SDN with a grain of salt. There is a sample bias for high performers here and what works for them may not work for us. They may be naturally better at memorizing or take to certain high yield resources, such as anki, better. But many are coming from a different place from you, me or even another high performer with different learning preferences.

How do you feel about the academic advising department at your school? The advice they gave me was much more valuable than any academic advice I gleaned from SDN.

I had a meeting with my academic advisor, her advised was ”study more”… I study almost every waking moment I have. I am just not a very good test taker, and need time to memorizes the info.

The short answer is to study whatever you are weakest in. Dedicated is supposed to be a grand review of the content from M1/M2, along with time spent honing your test-taking skills. It's not a period to be sorting out important concepts for the first time.

There is exactly one variable that is strongly correlated with Step 1 performance, and that is the number of practice questions done by the student prior to the exam. Whether there is causation is up for debate, but it's clear that high scorers do more questions than low scorers.

Once you hit dedicated, I suggest you follow the usual advice of doing practice questions in tutor mode (for content review) and testing mode (to get you accustomed to exam conditions). As noted above, definitely reach out to academic advising if you don't already know them. They can be extremely helpful, but unfortunately the students most in need of their services are usually the ones who are least likely to ask for it.

Good luck.

Thank you for the advice, I currently do for every system Kaplan, Rx and Amboss question before every exam. The sad things is I always start at 30 and finished around 50 max, that is yielding me 70s in the exams.

How are you currently studying? Are you mainly using in-house lectures or NBME materials? When/how do you incorporate outside resources? What Q banks are you using, and when do you start doing questions?

Completely NBME material, I tried in house lecture but they are out of focus with exams, since the professor that gives the class doesn’t make the questions. Mostly Bnb, pathoma, sketchy pharm and micro. Reviewing with FA

If anki is taking up too much of your time, you are either not using anki correctly or you’re wasting time on other resources. You are likely just studying inefficiently and maybe could do with some practice in test taking skills.

Maybe I am, but I dont know how to be more efficient. Trust me, I try every day to maximize my time.

Practice questions are key.

I personally recommend a more guided study program if you’re a below average student or test taker. I used DIT back in the day, but I took Step 1 over 5 years ago now so my info on good resources isn’t up to date.

Would love to know, if their is a good guided study program right now if any one knows



I appreciate everyone that have answered

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Maybe I am, but I dont know how to be more efficient. Trust me, I try every day to maximize my time.

Walk me through your day.

 

[TragicalDrFaust]

I had a meeting with my academic advisor, her advised was ”study more”… I study almost every waking moment I have. I am just not a very good test taker, and need time to memorizes the info.

I definitely get seeking advice here if that's your advisor's attitude. I know not every advisor is helpful. I still stand behind my previous advice, that not every strategy presented here will stick. 10 people could tell you 11 things and you won't have time to experiment with all of them. Or 10 people could tell you to use the same strategy, such as anki, and it might not work for you for whatever reason. My fatal mistake last year was forcing myself to do anki because I liked the idea of it, but was not using the tool properly and intuitively had a better grasp of other study methods like Feynman.

I firmly believe a vast majority of students can pass with a "reasonable" amount of study time, say 40-50 hours per week, and the issue is often efficiency or using methods that don't click. What are you currently doing to study?

 

[Billiam95]

Thank you for the advice, I currently do for every system Kaplan, Rx and Amboss question before every exam. The sad things is I always start at 30 and finished around 50 max, that is yielding me 70s in the exams.

How are you reviewing missed questions? How do you do on subsequent missed questions on the same topic? Do you think you are missing questions due to a knowledge deficit, application deficit, or misreading the questions?

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

I definitely get seeking advice here if that's your advisor's attitude. I know not every advisor is helpful. I still stand behind my previous advice, that not every strategy presented here will stick. 10 people could tell you 11 things and you won't have time to experiment with all of them. Or 10 people could tell you to use the same strategy, such as anki, and it might not work for you for whatever reason. My fatal mistake last year was forcing myself to do anki because I liked the idea of it, but was not using the tool properly and intuitively had a better grasp of other study methods like Feynman.

I firmly believe a vast majority of students can pass with a "reasonable" amount of study time, say 40-50 hours per week, and the issue is often efficiency or using methods that don't click. What are you currently doing to study?

I agree with you in general, but anki is never not going to work. It is literally just spaced repetition which has been proven to be the best way to retain info.

Now the “gold standard” anki decks like anking or whatever may not work for you. That’s totally a different issue. But anki is just spaced repetition and you can customize the “cards” to be almost any type of learning you like.

 

[TragicalDrFaust]

I agree with you in general, but anki is never not going to work. It is literally just spaced repetition which has been proven to be the best way to retain info.

Now the “gold standard” anki decks like anking or whatever may not work for you. That’s totally a different issue. But anki is just spaced repetition and you can customize the “cards” to be almost any type of learning you like.

In theory anki/spaced repetition should work but some people aren't good about using it for whatever reason. I was stubborn and made all my own decks because I felt there was too little overlap between Anking and my PhD lecturer's content. Also didn't like the style of our in-house decks and they were wrong about enough things to erode my confidence. So I dutifully made ~150 cards per day, kept up with my reviews, plus tried to mix in 10-20 new Anking cards per day for boards.

I wasn't good at making cards though, so I would keep getting them wrong and my reviews would pile up to as high as 1.4k per day, in addition to making cards, watching boards and beyond, going to labs. It tired me out.

Although it's possible to troubleshoot my anki strategy, and I sought advice here on that topic, I instantly started getting A's and B's when I used the Feynman method. I also began to enjoy studying, because it was more obvious to me that I was making progress when I could explain a new topic after reading about it and quizzing myself on it for an hour. I'm encouraging OP to find their own path of least resistance.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

In theory anki/spaced repetition should work but some people aren't good about using it for whatever reason. I was stubborn and made all my own decks because I felt there was too little overlap between Anking and my PhD lecturer's content. Also didn't like the style of our in-house decks and they were wrong about enough things to erode my confidence. So I dutifully made ~150 cards per day, kept up with my reviews, plus tried to mix in 10-20 new Anking cards per day for boards.

I wasn't good at making cards though, so I would keep getting them wrong and my reviews would pile up to as high as 1.4k per day, in addition to making cards, watching boards and beyond, going to labs. It tired me out.

Although it's possible to troubleshoot my anki strategy, and I sought advice here on that topic, I instantly started getting A's and B's when I used the Feynman method. I also began to enjoy studying, because it was more obvious to me that I was making progress when I could explain a new topic after reading about it and quizzing myself on it for an hour. I'm encouraging OP to find their own path of least resistance.

The Feynman method is probably the best because it utilizes spaced repetition, ELI5, and testing the limits of your knowledge. It’s not ideal for straight up memorization though.

Making that many cards per day is crazy.