Know your weakness!
I remember a wise professor once telling me that my medical school experience would be similar to standing in front of a spouting fire hydrant with my mouth open. Needless to say, it was. Gearing up for boards can be a daunting task. Most of us tend to gravitate to subjects we enjoy and focus our study efforts accordingly. If you are applying Neurology and reading about cerebellar tumors as we speak, you may want to ask yourself why?
Consider taking the following approach. Take a few minutes to make a list of all the subject areas that will be tested on your boards starting with your least favorite and ending with your strongest subject. Then, start from the top and construct a dedicated study schedule geared toward mastering your least favorite subjects first. If you are into sports, think about it like a football team gearing up for the draft. If you are the Saints and have one of the most effective offenses in the game, maybe it’s time to draft some defensive talent? It is often said that a team is only as strong as its weakest player. The same goes for your study program. A critical step in your preparation lies in the ability to first recognize then address your areas of weakness.
Although you may have an idea of this in your mind, it is best to use an objective assessment tool. Some turn to a single assessment exam such as COMSAE for this purpose. Others use subject charting similar to what we offer with COMBANK for this purpose. Regardless of how you do it, it is very important to objectively identify your strong and weak areas. The more insight you have into this, the better off you will be.
When it comes time to creating a study plan, we advocate for one that takes a balanced approach. Once you’ve exhausted yourself with subjects you despise, reward yourself with some you love. By no means should you ignore your strengths; just make them stronger. Balance in your study program will allow you to improve your defense while fine-tuning your offense. Once you fill in your gaps, you will be unstoppable on game day!
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