 When I took my first step one exam, I got a freakishly high 159. In addition to being simply devastated, I knew I had to make some changes to get the ultimate score that I wanted. But as you can see here, I managed to get above a 250 on step one. In this episode, I'm going to show you exactly one simple thing I did to help you do the same. Hey friends, welcome back to the channel. In case you're new here, my name is Lakshman, internal medicine physician. And here on the MD journey, we make videos to help people like you succeed on the medical journey with doing it with less stress. Now a lot of you guys enjoyed the recent episode we did on how to study for step one. I've failed step-by-step, so if you haven't seen that, I'll link that down below as well as put it right here if you're watching the video version. But in today's episode, I'm going to show you a really simple yet effective method that you can use step-by-step again on how to improve your step one score. So if your first exam was like me, where you got a 159, and you want to get as high a score as possible to at least pass step one, then these are the methods for you. So step number one is to get through all of your organ systems. Often when students come to me early in their step one prep and they're saying, oh, Lakshman got a 179 or a 170, it's not good enough, I'm freaking out. And then you ask them how much they've actually studied this. Oh, I've only been studying for like three or four days. And that means that there's a lot of information they have left to cover. So I don't personally know if that low score is due to just a lack of knowledge or if they truly have some true weak points that they just didn't do well in their practice exams. And so before we start freaking out about your baseline scores, the first thing I would recommend is just to get through all of your organ systems. Now however method you use, a lot of students like to go through all of the sections of first aid. And typically I recommend trying to do that within the first two, two and a half weeks of your step one prep. Again, if you want that full breakdown of how to study for step one out of this past fail, check the link down below. And if you're a student who doesn't like to use first aid but instead using a resource like Amboss or Boards and Beyond or Physio or Sketchy or Patoma, whatever it may be, the first recommendation would be try to get through as many videos as possible within the first two to three weeks before again, you start freaking out about your score. Because bottom line is your low score currently may simply be due to the fact that you just haven't seen enough fair game information for step one. But step two and three is going to be for students who may say, I've covered everything and my score is still not as high as I want. What should I do? So step number two is to stratify across your weak topics. Now that you've gone through several practice questions and a resource like U-World as well as some practice tests, now you can actually start to see, okay, like where on average am I scoring as well as what topics are really good and what topics am I not doing so hot on? And so typically for students, I recommend that as you guys know, when you log into U-World, you'll see something like this. All of us are at different parts of this bell curve. But really what you want to find is one, where is my average? So this student, this is not mine. This is just a screenshot that I found from Reddit is scoring relatively 71% after doing a good amount of questions. And so for them, they say, okay, my average is 71. So usually what I would recommend is find those topics that are severely lower than your average. So for this student, if they're scoring something 50s or 30% on their practice questions, then that would be a topic that would be considered something weak. And on the flip side of their scoring something on the 85s and 90s, then that would be something that I wouldn't give so much attention to for step number three. So an example scenario and a student may not be crushing it like that one example we just gave, you may be scoring 55 or 60% on your world, which is completely normal the first time you're doing questions. And so if that is your average, you may identify four topics, such as biochem, microbiology, cardiology and reproductive system to be scores that you're getting within the 30 to 40%. So it's significantly much worse even compared to your average scores. Obviously, these topics are going to vary for you, but I recommend going into your own year well, going through your own MBA exams and finding the lowest four to five topics and then coming with a list before we get into step number three. Now, one of the things that we won't be talking about in today's video to avoid making it too long is really what to do with the topics you're average at or the topics you're really good at. So if you want to learn more about that approach, go ahead and check out the link down below to the Step One Academy, the step by step program that we created initially to help students score as high as a 250 or above, just like I and the other top students did, but you can use the same method to make sure you guarantee yourself a pass with a lot of confidence. If you guys are interested in that approach, as well as a program in general, go ahead and check out the link down below. And before we get into step number three, definitely have to talk about today's sponsor, which is Spickmonic. Now, one of the biggest reasons for a low score in step one is simply not having mastery of the each individual topic, despite putting hours and hours of trying to learn it. So one of my favorite ways of doing this is taking resources that are really hard to absorb, such as First Aid itself, and using resources that are nicely complementing that. Not only Pickmonic does this, but I think Pickmonic probably does the best job, in my opinion, where you can easily find the actual page of First Aid that you want to cover, so if you're learning something like genetics, you can go on page 56 of your edition of First Aid and then say, OK, I need to learn about this individual syndrome and go ahead and watch the relative videos and go from there. So in this example, I can go through this entire video, which is only two minutes about leave remaining syndrome and actually learn the different aspects of it to make sure I understand it well. And then when I'm done, I can actually go ahead and assess my knowledge by seeing if I remember the important concepts of the video through the individual quizzes. And another bonus of simply using Pickmonic in addition to the quizzes and the videos is that you can create your own playlist. So as you're going through your material, you can actually say, I want to add the specific video on Marker and syndrome to my step one playlist, and then I can come back to it and watch those individual videos. If I ever have another question that I missed on it, or if I need to do some review, or if I want to do my individual quiz questions again. So if you haven't tried out a Pickmonic and you're looking for an all-in-one resource that may be able to help you both with your medical school classes, as well as studying for step one, definitely consider giving Pickmonic a shot. So if you're interested, go ahead and click the link down below and thank you again for Pickmonic for being today's sponsor. Now let's get into step number three, which has to be my favorite, which is assigning daily slots for your individual week topics. Now that you actually identified and stratified your week topics, compare your average. Or in the last example, we said you had difficulty with topics such as cardiology, biochem, micro, and we're just going to say a reproductive system. If those are your four topics, then there are a few ways that you can give different parts of your day, different assignments to make sure that those week topics aren't so weak going forward. One of the techniques that I really enjoy using, that I recommend to a lot of students, is to use premade opti-decks, but vary strategically. So for example, if I know that I'm not doing so hot in cardiology and reproductive questions, first thing I can do is wake up in the morning, and if I have access to a premade deck, like an Anki or a Zonking card, or Bros and Cephalon, they don't really matter, they're all amazing and great, then you can go ahead and spend 30 minutes in the morning before you wake up for any of your other board questions, and saying I'm just going to do questions related to those four of the week's topics every single morning. Now keep in mind, the week topics are gonna change by week to week, you may do well on cardiology this week, and there may not be in your bottom four going forward, and then maybe GI is going to be a topic that you're scoring lower than your average on, you can always kind of cycle the deck, and then spend that morning focusing only on those four to five topics, again improving your results on your week's topics, and then you're just as good as your week's link. So even if you're somebody who doesn't like using Anki or Anki, however you like to say it, one thing you can do is one check out our video on how to use Anki like a pro in case you want a nice breakdown. A lot of people have enjoyed the videos, I'll link it down below, but you can also just use a pre-made decks and don't have to make any of your own. You can use somebody else's hard work and just make sure you know the information that's how you live for step one, but specifically for those week topics, you can make sure that your score is always on the way up. Now the second method that I like to use to make sure my week topics are stratified within my day is break down how I'm going to be doing each question block. Now typically during your dedicated, you may do anywhere from 80 to 120 questions, some students may just do one block of 40 and then work their way up. Once you're able to get to 80 to 100 questions a day, I recommend spending some time on doing only 40 of those questions specifically on those week topics. So for example, again, if I'm struggling with biochem cardiology, micro and reproductive, then one thing I could do is say, okay, my first session of the day is going to be completely random, just like I intended to. My second set of 40 questions is going to be specifically on those four topics. When I go into U-World, I'm just going to end up choosing those individual topics and make sure I'm doing those questions on random, but making sure I'm giving myself as much practice as possible. Now, those are two simple tactics that one combined together. You're making sure that you're one, you're always evaluating your weakness on a weekly basis after you take your weekly NVMe as well as going through your U-World questions, but then you adjust your weekly schedule based off of that. So next week may look a lot different than this week on what I'm going to be doing my questions and my reviews on, but you're always intending your day to improve on those week topics. Again, you're as good as your weakest link. And using this three step strategy guys, I really was able to see my score go from that 159. So I think my second exam was a two up on in 230s, 240s and ultimately above a 250 on my final step one exam. Now, obviously there's a lot that goes into doing well on step one, even though it's pass fail. So again, if you guys are interested, check out that video on how to study now that it's pass fail step by step, I'll link it down below. A lot of people have enjoyed the video this far. So hopefully you guys do too. Now, again, if you want more advanced strategies, things essentially that top students are doing to increase their effectiveness by not necessarily study 10, 12 hours a day like most students do, definitely consider checking out the step one academy which I'll link down below, even though it was initially intended to help students get the highest score possible, even though it's pass fail, you can use those same strategies to get more effectiveness and less time. So if you guys are interested, go ahead and check out the links down below as well as reviews and feedbacks from past students. As always, I truly appreciate all of you guys that make to the end of the video. If you did enjoy this video, if you got any value of it, go ahead and hit that like button to support the channel, help these videos grow on the YouTube algorithm. If you're new here, consider hitting that subscribe button notification bell to get more videos like this. If you listen to this on a podcast because yes, we do have an audio version, go ahead and check out the TMJ show. And even if you're not listening on iTunes, go ahead and go to iTunes and leave an honest review to help us reach more students and help them on their medical journey of doing it with less stress. Now that was a mouthful, but again, if you did enjoy this video, check out this video right here on how to study for step one, pass fail, step-by-step as well as this video on how to use Onky Like a Pro. Promise you'll enjoy it. But as always, my friends, thank you for being a part of my journey. Hopefully that was a little help to you guys and yours and I'll see you guys in the next one. Peace.