The false sense of learning / memory while studying.

[wnorwood]

Evidence Based Learning at www.PABoardReview.org

 

I have spoken to a large number of student and practicing PAs who are preparing to take the PANCE or PANRE. I noticed those who have an aptitude for studying and scoring well on exams don't know necessarily how they do it. The most common response I hear is: "I just do".

By the way I used to be in the, "Not so good at taking tests" category. I had a lot of anxiety in preparing for and taking exams because of my lack of skills. Taking examinations and scoring well is not an intelligence issue but a skill that can be mastered.

I have invested an extensive amount of time in the evidence of studying for and scouring well on medical exams.

I have written one of those critical skill below. Any feedback is welcome.

 

Have you ever studied for a long period of time (Reading, video, audio). And while studying everything makes sense. You go to bed,

wake up the next morning and you don't remember a fraction of what you studied. How does this happen? How do we correct for this wasted time?

 

Dr. John W. Pelley a neurobiologist and professor at Texas Tech University medical school explains it this way. When we are reading new information. There is temporary phosphorylation at the neuron synapses. The signal (Phosphorylation) has a half-life for some time. If no active decision is made while studying (i.e active learning) the signal decays and no memory is made.

 

The way to correct for this wasted time is by actively making decision while learning. Joe Gilboy gives details in his lectures, on how to best achieve this style of learning.

 

One of the concepts Joe shares, is to take a disease and write down broad details of what you know about that condition. By doing this you are required to use both cognitive (memory, decision making) and motor function (Writing what you know in a liner fashion).

Dr. Pelly explains it this way. The use of information to make a decision and action sustains the signal between the neuron synapses (phosphorylation) which leads to gene activation. Which leads to synthesis of new proteins and consolidation. The end result is memory.

 

Don’t fall into the false sense of learning by merely covering vast amounts of information.

Always use active learning techniques while studying. More on this in future posts.

[EMEDPA]

When I was in PA school we had pass/fail exit orals covering the entire program. one of the best ways to study for this was make differential dx lists based on a symptom and then think through the workup for each dx.as that was how the orals were done. given a common symptom we had to give a min of 20 causes and they could ask as much detail as they wanted about anything listed

for example sx is dyspnea. you come up with a huge ddx, one of which is PE. what is the workup, treatment, etc for PE, etc

[UGoLong]

The most useful lecture I had in PA school was from the head of the study skills lab at the college. She said that we should be willing to try different methods to learn and that different courses might require different techniques. I found that the only way I could remember things well was to organize the torrent of factoids in some way. That "way" did indeed differ from subject to subject.

 

In anatomy -- my nemesis -- only rote repeating with plastic models worked. The dissection exposed features to learn, but they were too quickly obliterated as the process progressed.

 

Studying from a textbook or notes taken in class didn't work that well for me. After most of my classes, I built outlines of the material (usually in Microsoft Word), organizing the physiology, pathophysiology, symptoms, diagnostics, and treatments with the condition. If necessary, I'd paste in diagrams, etc from other sources. Kind of like my own CMDT.

 

In pharmacology, I drew (on paper) family trees of medications, using colors to highlight their strengths, weaknesses, interactions, etc. 

 

Regardless of the specific technique, I then had something to review when I studied. I would eventually pare the material down to just that that I felt I wouldn't remember (or hadn't yet internalized). The result was what I would review the morning of the test.

 

Perhaps your physiological description is what I was doing; manipulating the information and, in the process, building connections that would let me remember it in a useful form.

[gbrothers98]

Great points made here.

A useful topic for both students and practicing PAs.

OP explains self generation, basically making the topic your own.

E and his oral exam are an example of elaboration and reflection. Many specialties do an oral exam at least initially in combination with a written exam. On a local level, PA programs would do well to institute oral exams in conjunction with OSCE for pending grads.

UGL makes 2 great points. First, get some help studying, very rare to have a specific class in HS or college that gives instruction in this topic. Many students can just outwork the material in high school and college. PA school is a whole other nut.

2nd is taking notes in a way that makes sense rather than heading, list, sublist. Trees, mind maps, other notation system. Just do whatever works for you but you have to do something.

My plug is a book I just finished reading, Make it stick, The science of successful learning, Peter C. Brown, et al. If I was a prePA student or a practicing PA studying for the PANRE or a CAQ, I would take a look at this text. If in PA school, time compressed, read just chapter 8 and have some faith in the advice.

G Brothers PA-C

[SoCalPA]

This sounds like a good read before I start PA school next year.