Dear Jacob,
As you start your first year of medical school, I am writing you this letter to offer you some words of wisdom on effective study strategies and debunk some widely accepted, yet wrong, theories. In my courses this year, I have been learning about the best ways for students to encode information, learn for longevity, and do well on exams. As I am studying to become a professor, I have found some of the things that I have learned along the way surprising. Did you know that the reputable method of identifying your learning style and catering content to be presented in that particular style for best results is actually not based on any kind of empirical research?
It’s important to remember that set-backs and frustration are signs of improvement and effort. When learning is effortful, it is more successful. It helps to think of these moments of chagrin not as failures, but as desirable difficulties because without them, there is no advancement in learning.
The most important study strategies you can employ are retrieving new learning from memory, spacing out your practice, and interleaving different problems and subjects. I will attempt to put these strategies in the context of medical school.
Retrieving New Learning from Memory: When you learn a new anatomical structure, engage in self-quizzing at the end of each chapter. Focus on the weak areas that you tend to get wrong instead of continuously engaging in the areas you are familiar with. It’s not really helpful for your learning to underline and highlight text, because re-reading really just ensures familiarity with the text, not the content. You might find that re-reading feels more comfortable, and that self-quizzing can be frustrating when the content is hard to recall. Try to remember that when the going gets tough, that’s when the learning is strengthened and the memory longevity is improved.
Spacing out Practice:
You should allow time to pass between your study sessions. Imagine you are studying for a pharmacology exam. Make some flashcards with each medication and it’s applications and contents on the back and shuffle through the cards until you master them. Do not remove the ones you recall from the deck, you want to keep going over all of the content, even if you feel comfortable with it, because in this way, your memory will be strengthened. The key is to keep periodically recovering the content you went over. Between practice sessions, take a nap or go for a run. Give yourself some time between each session. Another way you can space out your practice is to go back and forth between studying subjects. For example, study pharmacology content and then switch over to biochemistry. Following the ideology of “practice, practice, practice” is actually not useful. This rote repetition study strategy encourages short term memory use, and quickly fades.
Interleaving Practice Problems and Subjects:
Interleaving is another important study strategy. What it means is that you should interleave the types of problems and examples that you are learning. Mixing in other subjects, problem types, and skills is important to challenge yourself and encourage long term memory. When studying anatomy, don’t focus on one body part for an extended time period, try to switch it up and throw in some biology specimens or chemistry problems. You can also interleave in one subject area. For example, in Biochemistry, switch from studying the chemical components of the human body and their functions to the molecular architecture of organelles.
One last word of advice, Jacob. The more you can “elaborate” on content, more cues will be available for your recall and application of the material. Elaboration is the process of finding layers of meaning that resonate with you. For example, you can relate the material to words you already know through mnemonic device use. Personal comparisons and metaphors are your friends in medical school.
Take heart, my brother,
Kate
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