I think I've opined on this before.... but somewhere midway through med school I made the discovery that *in general* it took about 5 passes over the material before I felt I knew it well.
The first pass was usually cursory. I'd try to understand everything, but it would feel like it was going so slowly, and that I'd never be able to master everything.
The second pass was generally better. The meager base I'd built on the first pass would enable me to go a little faster. I'd feel a little more confident.
Then about a week before the test I'd go over the material again. I'd freak out because I'd realize that I didn't know as much as I thought I did.
A few days before the test would be pass #4. This would be more of the same, but the freak outs would happen less.
And right before the test would be pass #5. The quick overview, remind yourself run through of the material.
Maybe that's not how you study, but it worked pretty well for me. I've never been somebody who's able to sit down with brand new material and master it the first time just by reading through it slowly and carefully.
Since coming to grad school I've had to readjust to the feeling that I won't ever really master the material to the degree I did when I was taking science classes. But whatever. The focus is different in grad school and the work really never truly ends. At least in med school you'd get to hang loose the weekend after an exam....
I remember when I learned how to study sufficiently for my science classes. I was a freshman in college taking general chemistry -- stoichiometry -- and I was getting a B+. I was doing the problem sets every week and felt ok about them, but when I'd get a new problem I'd freeze up and not be able to do it. And I'd make stupid mistakes on tests that resulted from my lack of confidence and intimacy with the details of the material.
At the end of the quarter I realized what I was doing wrong. My friend E (who later became a Rhodes scholar) was getting an A, and she was doing EVERY. SINGLE. PROBLEM. at the back of the book before the test. Our chem text book had a companion study guide which made this easier. It would show you not just a number for the answer, but what the thought process was as well. Sure, E was also very smart and great at math, but she worked her little behind off as well.
So the next quarter I resolved to do the same. And I was moderately successful at it, getting an A-. The only problem I had then was that I didn't completely *understand* some of the concepts, and made a few stupid mistakes.
Finally spring quarter, I got the hang of it. Well, I got the hang of it after reverting to my original strategy (of not doing every problem) and failing the first exam. The second exam I got a 94. And the mean was a 50.
Things looked up after that. When I came back to school for my post-bac I tried to adopt similar study strategies, and they worked swimmingly. The only class I had problems in was Physics. The problem with Physics was that there was no companion study guide to teach you how to do the problems* and you had to rely on the homework problems to study for the tests. As I've said before, hw problems are never enough! Also, I hadn't taken calculus for 10 years.
Ochem? Not a problem. Sure, I spent probably 15 - 20 hours per week outside of class on this class, but the material was *definitely* masterable. You just have a lot to cram inside your head, kind of like you do in med school. My friend M suggested doing all the problems in the text for this class as well. And you know something? M is now a Rad Onc resident at a very prestigious program and one of the smartest and most talented scientists I know.
Why am I telling you (dear readers) all of this? Because there is this myth that you have to be "smart" to do well in hard science classes. The truth is that they just require more solid knowledge and practice than social science/humanities classes and leave very little room for BS. But in the end, I think hard science classes are easier in a way because you won't get a B+ if your professor disagrees with your interpretation of the text. You either know the material or you don't, and that is completely within your control.
You just have to put in the hours.
*I don't know why Math based classes are often like this. It's as though they're trying to make the subjects inaccessible to people who don't have "natural talent" and get everything the first time and with no effort so that the people who do can feel good about themselves.
**This post was inspired by AD2B.
13 Pearls of Wisdom:
Thanks for this post. It's hard to keep reminding myself of this, especially when I am competing with people who can master everything in the first read, but I completely agree.
You rock!
Thank you :)
Ad2b (really)
Kate -- I don't care what anyone says, nobody masters it on the first read. Ok, maybe there are some people who are fantastic at math -- I've met a few -- who get Physics on the first read. However these people often suck at memorization heavy fields because they aren't used to grinding it out. Of course they will say that memorization is for "stupid" people, but I just say that being a good memorizer is a different kind of smart.
And who cares anyway. You want to be a doctor right? That takes brains AND hard work, but really mostly the latter.
Thanks so much for this! I often feel that I have to put in more time than others to perform on tests. This is a great reminder that people are working really hard. Such great motivation to keep going.
There are always people who claim to have 'never studied' and whatnot before a test.
They are invariably full of shit.
This is the exact method I use to study for all of my classes. Its part of the reason why I have problems in my business classes because NO ONE studies like this. They want the quick fix for a test, and that's it. Drives me nuts.
I'm a big fan of the read. revise. repeat. method. I take notes while reading, and I can be confident that I know the material well when I can recall almost all the information simply by glancing at my notes from the first or send read-through.
Re: the "never studied and aced it", yes, most likely those people are just out to make others freak out in seeming over-confident or are too cool to admit that they do anything as nerdy as studying. BUT, with that being said, that's exactly what happened to me with languages. Somehow my brain is like a dry sponge when it comes to languages, and I really never did study for tests and I got A's on everything in the languages I learned during high school and college. Unfortunately that does not extend to Math or science, and I work(ed) my rear off to master those.
I spent 8 solid hours today in the library, holed up in a conference room, wired on Concerta, plowing through the assigned work sheets, and starting in on the end-of-chapter problems.
1/6th of the way through, and the problems are getting easier for me to put the numbers where they belong, hit the numbers on my calculator, get a result, and then verify that the result makes sense qualitatively (equilibrium probs).
I am doing all the problems. Am thinking for cumulative final, I should do the problems from the chapters I just got tested on.
BTW, I did okay on exam. He wrote and said I can still nail an "A" in the class... no panic.
Thanks again, OMDG, really!
Ad2b
GS -- I was that way with biology. Not so much with *reading* it, but if you tell me something in a coherent way, I tend not to forget it.
Hi there, been following you for a while now, as always thanks for the blog.
By some freak happenstance I managed to complete 2 years calculus before I started physics, chemistry, or any of my core engineering classes. Though math does lie in my talent wheel house, I found that it was time and experience, more than talent that helped me in the math based sciences. When you've been doing algebra non-stop for that long it just becomes another language that you speak. The level/intensity/time of exposure to all that math stuff is what really mattered.
Memorization based science classes, on the other hand, were/are the bane of my existence. You are 100% right on not having the frame of mind or resilience to grind it out.
Thanks for this post--I went through a phase in college where I decided I was just not smart enough to get good grades before realizing that I was taking too many classes to give any of them a good effort. My next semester I took fewer courses so I had time to do every physics problem in every chapter, and found that I could really understand the material.
I tutored high school girls in math and chem for a couple years, and it drove me NUTS because as soon as the answer was more than 1 step away, they would revert to "I'm just not good at math". I wish there was a a way to help kids see that learning things takes work, and not to be discouraged if they don't get it immediately.
I finally learned how to study, properly, during veterinary school. Really.
I'm not proud of it and wish I'd figured this out long before then. The secret for me was to read the material BEFORE the lecture (I am a remarkably poor auditory learner), read it again a day or two after the lecture (to reinforce, while it was still familiar) and then read/prepare a study guide and review 3-4 times much as you do, prior to the exam. That worked.
After acing pathology, I began to truly believe those extra hours of intensive work could make the difference between B+/A- and A. Prior to that point, I'm afraid I believed those FOS "I understood it the first time" types.
Old Boy -- So totally true. After busting my butt in chem I actually discovered that I really really liked it. I wish I'd had more practice at the math before I went into Physics. Seriously. I was at the point where I couldn't even remember how to get fractions out of the denominator it had been so long. I still did well, but I think it would have stuck, AND I would have enjoyed it a lot more had I been more practiced.
On the plus side, Physics was what finally made me understand what a sin function meant. I loved mechanics, it just really stressed me out. :-)
And you know, I'd hardly say I'm *gifted* at math. I don't often get things the first time. I do, however, ALMOST ALWAYS get things the second time. And why is it that a person is either "good" or "bad" at math? I'm solidly on the good side of in between.
Thank you for this! I've always said the way I study for finals is the way I should have studied for lecture exams; it's not until the end of the semester that I do all the problems in the book, realizing the mistakes I made on material I should have mastered earlier in the year.
I'm taking Orgo II and my next exam is in 29 days! I'm going to ROCK this exam. I know it. I'll let you know how it goes!
SoOoOo glad I found your blog. I'm 26 and an aspiring doctor and all I can think about is how OLD I will be after residency. When will I get married? Have kids?? Start ENJOYING LIFE??? Ugh... but if you are doing it, I know it is possible; I just felt like the only one!
♥ TisbA
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