Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ PhotoReading, Memory Optimizer PR, Med School and national board exams

I'm a 2nd year medical student and just bought the PR tapes. I have almost finished the 6th tape and have tried using the things I've learned in preparing and studying for the exams I have this week (finals), and I am hoping to benefit from PR in preparing for the national board exams the first week of June.

So far, however, I'm not finding the activation techniques to be very useful for working with powerpoint slides and handouts from my professors, and I'm concerned with how well I will be able to apply all of this to the board prep books that I need to review in the next few weeks.

I have to add that I am not the best student in this arena and was 7th from the bottom in a class of around 135 students the last I checked. My recall of the materials I have been deluged with is atrocious, prompting my to visit our learning resources specialist. Unfortunately, I (being a psychology major) knew more about learning and memory than he did, so I was referred to a nearby educational psychologist for testing. They found out that though I am in the highest levels in most of the intelligence test, I am only average to above average in the areas directly responsible for processing information into useable memory.

To make an already long story a little short, I have a learning disability in the one area I need most to prepare for these examinations coming up. For this reason I forked out the money to get this program hoping that it would be what I need to assimilate two very full years' worth of medical school information in a very short time with maximal recall. Medical board exams are very oriented toward buzzwords and minutia, two things I'm not especially good at recalling, much like my inability to recall names. Anyhow, I am despirate, since I have to pass these exams in order to go onto my third year, where the real learning (hands-on clinical stuff) happens. I would especially appreciate hearing from Paul, Dana or Pete or people who have gone through this very thing, since medical school really doesn't compare to anything else. Thanks.

I am trying to use PRing to pass Actuarial Exams which are very difficult. These exams not only includes a lot of complex math (calculus) but have a strong orientation to minutia. (Nobel Prize winner Milton Freedman went into economics only after he was not able to pass actuarial exams.) After a year and a half of trying PRing for three failed attempts at (spending over 500 hours for each) Actuarial exams, I have strong reservations about the somewhat “magical” claims they purport. I do, however, acknowledge that it has been good to increase concentration. I also think that the general approach is good. Perhaps as good as one can get. (Actually the PRing does, I think, decrease “blocks” which I think inhibit learning.) Part of the problem is that they claim that you, “only need to learn 10% of the printed material.” Well if that is an acceptable goal, then, yes, PRing works. But for purposes like your medical exams and my actuarial exams, 10% just does not cut it. I still use PRing. It is just that I do not have such grand expectations.

You mention various learning tests. Can you elaborate on them please? I am also interested in hearing about your learning disability. I wonder, sometimes, if I have one.

Hello,

I'm a medical student in India too, but I'm Malaysian. I'm doing my first year of all the basic concept's thing... It was funny, but a lot to memorised and understand. I have less problem in understanding but I do very bad in memorising.

vilik, I'm also not the so-called first grade student and I'm 'staying' in border line, I might be fail the exam very easily.

I'm used to learning the PR also, wish that it could help me in successing my goal.

OT, I agree with you, like your actuarial exams and our medical exams was needed to memorised almost every things inside the text book, if only get 10% from it, we definately fail.

I'm learning the skill, hope we can develope it very soon. The people in this forum was helpful, and kind, thanks to them.
OT and vilik, wish you good luck in your exams and all the best.

Edgard Tan

Remember to treat each chapter of a text book as a book in itself when attempting to activate it.

Also books like that where it could take to 12 hours just to learn one chapter by regular means you need to expect that you could be spending up to 4 hours on that chapter when you use the photoreading method. The more you want out of the book the more time you need to expect to spend with it. However using the photoreading system will help you get through it faster than by regular means.

If you experienced a lack of time to learn the material by regular means because it took so much time for you to grasp, you might be gratified about finally being able to learn the stuff on time. The more you want to get out of the book the more activation layers you'll need to apply.

Good luck
Alex

Keep in mind, PhotoReading is not a "memory" course.

The PhotoReading whole mind system will give you the tools to learn and comprehend from any printed material three to five times faster than regular reading and study.

To similarly boost how to utilize your memory and recall, consider the "Memory Optimizer."

Click here for full details:
http://www.learningstrategies.com/

And it's on special right now, too!

http://www.learningstrategies.com/forum/ubb/Forum8/HTML/000374.html

See Krishna's post. He's now studying for his certification

I have also already posted somewhat on this, since I did actually pass my level 1 board exams. http://www.learningstrategies.com/forum/ubb/Forum8/HTML/002345.html

Best of luck,
Bill