How to study smarter

Definitions & Key takeaways

There are a few basic tips for studying smarter that everyone should keep in mind. First, make sure you're in your favorite environment that favors your learning. Second, break the task down into smaller parts and plan out a schedule for completing each part. Third, ensure you understand the material before moving on to the next step, and practice spaced repetition. Remember also to ask yourself questions and take enough rest so that your mind processes all the information.

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All right, how are you feeling today? Hey guys, Rishi Desai here from osmosis.
Uh Thanks for joining me again this week, what I wanted to talk about this week were study tips, you know, top three study TIPSS from my uh own life, things that have helped me, uh and things that I think don't work quite as well that I kind of stumbled across and kind of figured out as I, as I went along um as background.
Uh I'm the Chief medical officer at Osmosis and I'm a pediatrician. I do pediatric infectious diseases.
And so I've had kind of a, a very traditional uh route in some ways going into medicine and in some ways, uh a very nontraditional route, you know, because I do a lot of medical education.
And so for me, uh as I was thinking about studying, I thought, you know, honestly I'm II would say I'm kind of a professional studier.
Uh every single day I come in and I'm making uh videos or questions and, and I'm looking up things and so I'm literally constantly learning, constantly studying.
And so I think studying itself has become uh for me, something that I really pride myself on and take a lot of enjoyment out of and, but it took a long time to get there.
You know, there was a lot of time when I was studying and I hated it. I thought I wasn't doing it right.
And, and I probably felt that way because I wasn't doing it right. Here we go.
Number one. So, for me, it starts with where big question.
Where, where do you like to study? And it's uh location, location, location, it's everything, right.
So, um you know, it could be the the corner spot in the library. Maybe you're that kind of study, maybe it's the coffee shop, you like that aroma, maybe it's your friend's apartment or your own apartment.
Uh or you, maybe you have a desk set up. Uh For me, I actually came back to my childhood home of studying.
This is where I got a lot of my studying done. So that's why I thought it'd be kind of fun to come back here to kinda get back in that, that spirit of it.
And actually came back here through college. I would, I would take breaks, come back here on weekends.
Uh When it came down to medical school, I was about five hours away. So I actually drove down here to study for boards and the reason location matters is the key here is that it really controls your environment.
So I would come here because I got my peace here, my quiet here, you know, my parents, you know, stepped up, they did a ton of stuff to, to pamper me frankly, um, laundry, you know, cook meals, all that kind of logistical stuff I didn't have to think about.
So I could literally just kind of focus, right? And that's what you really wanna do is focus, recharge your battery, not, not get distracted by 1000 decisions you have to make every day and really apply your focus to the thing you need to focus on, which is just learning new material.
So that's really, really crucial. That kind of important piece is location.
And so that first question again, where do you like to study? That's the first tip.
Choose it, pick it, know yourself and, and make sure you keep going back there or mix it up if that's what, what you need to do.
Number two, big tip, number two is what, what are you gonna study? And this is the biggest thing II noticed, I'll, I'll go to study with someone to study, uh, date or a friend.
And I'll say, hey, let's go study and, uh, and we'll sit down and that other person is literally just kind of t you know, twisting their thumbs, kind of like dawdling around and you're like, what are you doing?
And they're like, I'm not really sure what, what I want to do yet. Um, I haven't figured it out and they'll literally spend 30 minutes, 45 minutes, like figuring out what they wanna study.
And so for me, I try to figure out what I'm gonna study, you know, as I wake up that day, you know, I have in my mind kind of my intention for the day.
What are my goals for that day? What do I wanna get out of it?
And so know what you wanna study and the way to figure that out one way if you're not sure is spaced repetition, I can't say it enough spaced repetition, space repetition, right?
So I'm repeating the word for you. II, hope you remember that term.
And the idea is that you go over the stuff that you've learned in the last six months, right? Maybe flash cards, stuff that you haven't looked at in, in six months, you're getting right stuff, you're getting wrong.
It literally refreshes your mind. You start thinking about all the stuff you've learned.
It's like it's like going into the field and aerating the soil, getting all that hard clay up that was maybe settling down at the bottom and saying, hey, what is this stuff I really struggle with and thinking, what are the two things I wanna learn today?
That's what I wanna figure out. What do I wanna learn today.
And for me, it's always kind of the things that I'm scared about things that I don't wanna think about. So let's say that's renal physiology or learning about autoimmune diseases cause they're all gonna kinda get confused in my head or stuff.
I'm curious about like, hey, I really am super curious about such and such. Uh Someone said something, I thought it was interesting.
I didn't really get it. So I'm really curious to learn more.
So what is the stuff that you're kind of worried about and stuff you're curious about? That's the stuff I really think that you need to focus on.
So that's the what tip number three. So now we, we, we know where we are, we know what we're gonna do, how, how are you gonna study?
And this is, you know, people have 100 different answers for this. My answer, what's worked really well is you start with questions, don't go and start watching videos, don't go and start, you know, reading a book or reading notes because you're reading passively, you're not reading to actually learn, you're reading just to get through the chapter you're reading just to get through the video.
Don't do that. It's a waste of your time.
It doesn't work as effectively. So there's this idea called a testing effect.
And what it means is you go in, you do some questions and I don't care if it's stuff you've never looked at before, even in that situation, go do a question and, and questions on osmosis are organized that way.
So you can just dive and do some questions and identify what it is. That's confusing.
You know, could you figure it out? Did you read the explanation?
Did it make sense? Start kind of getting your mind into that active mode by saying, hey, you know what?
I didn't answer this question. Right.
I couldn't figure it out. Now, I'm searching now, I'm on the hunt.
I'm hunting for an answer. Now, once you've identified stuff, you're kind of struggling with, you say, OK, look, II thought I wanted to focus on renal physiology based on my space rep.
I went in and did some renal physiology questions. I got basically all of them wrong.
No surprise, right? But at least now you know the specifics.
Oh, ok. It was about ions.
I couldn't get figure out like how the ion channels worked. Ok, great.
So now that's where you start saying, OK, what is the best resource for renal physiology? What's the, the number one topic or, or place I wanna go?
Do I wanna go read a book? Do I wanna go and look at some videos?
Do I wanna go watch, you know, some memory panel? It's like what do I wanna do to really understand how the kidney works normally?
Ok, great. Make a list.
Figure out how long that list is. How many videos is that?
Calculate time and say, OK, this is about one hour of time, right? This is my hour of power.
I've figured out where I wanna study. I figured out what I wanna study now, I'm figuring out how I wanna study and I know that these are the things I wanna look at, go through those, watch those videos.
Maybe it's an hour of videos, double speed it. So that's only 25 minutes or 30 minutes and say, ok, every 30 minutes, I'm gonna give myself a minute break or a two minute break and you just know that like, hey, my break is coming just power through until I get to my break.
And the thing that's gonna drive you is the question like, what was it that I couldn't figure out? So again, go through, figure out what you wanna learn.
Dive in, watch those videos, read those parts of the textbook, really understand it well. And then you can say, OK, good.
II got it. I'm all set.
I'm ready to move on to, to maybe more questions or maybe I finished my two goals for the day. I'm for a third goal or maybe I'm ready for a uh a thing of ice cream, you know, whatever it is.
So once you ch you know, challenge yourself with a couple of goals, you, you master it through that hour of power, watching those videos, reading those, you know, bits of the textbook, go back and do the questions, make sure you understand them, you really feel good about them, then you've studied, you really understand it and then you know, down the road when you're doing space repetition, maybe you all actually get those questions, right?
Because you actually spent such a dedicated time to that. So those are my three tips again.
Where, what, how and then a little bonus tip. If you're doing these kind of things, you're obviously interested in becoming a better student, right?
That's part of your ethos. Just know that about yourself.
And if you're part, you know, in interested in being a better student, uh in addition to watching these tips, a little bonus tip is we actually put together this.
So a little how to learn in the health professions. Um My team and I worked on this.
Uh It's an incredible resource. Tons of, you know, great little images and visuals go over kind of testing effect, space repetition and a number of other tricks and strategies at work.
Uh So check that out and, and again, leave a comment, tell me what works for you, make it specific, you know, the general stuff doesn't help anyone.
So make it really specific. Where do you like to study?
What do you like to study? How do you like to study?
And then finally, uh unless I forget you should study, make a study schedule, go on.org, set up your study schedule and uh and I'll check you out again maybe next week.
Take care. Bye guys.
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