My Pre-dedicated Step 1 Schedule

Studying for Step 1 takes into account your preparations throughout 1st and 2nd year. So I have outlined what I did leading up to the exam date.

First year 

• Focused on studying for my courses. Only used 3rd party resources for supplemental clarification. Didn’t use Anki. 

• If your school does not have a 2 pass system, I suggest learning it really well while you are in the block and start doing Anki a block later to make sure you continue to remember the material. The importance is learning the material correctly the first time so if you feel you are too busy to keep up with the reviews from the previous block, you can pause it and do it whenever you have time. I always tried to catch up on reviews after I finish an exam or a few hours every weekend. It’s difficult studying ahead for something that will happen in 2 years, but this is not the time to be complacent!! Remember the end goal 

• Have a fun summer! But there is work to do!! So make sure you are still reviewing the basics of what you learned the entire year.

Second year (July to December)

• Watched Pathoma and annotated the book with every block 

• Used Anki to review content from first year

• Used Anki for content I was learning in second year. At this point I committed to using Anki because I needed something that would help with my long term memorization and for me, it was either look at the material every single day on First Aid, or find a more active way of recalling that information aka Anki. 

• At this point, I was no longer dumping material I learned in previous blocks, I kept building them by reviewing my Anki cards. If you don’t want to use Anki, then make sure you are reviewing this material another way at least 1-2 times a week. 

• I studied for classes 5 days of the week and on the weekends, I studied for Step 1. I read through First Aid and did Anki 

Winter break of 2nd year

• Caught up on all my Anki cards

 Pre-dedicated (January 1st to May 1st)

• I planned my schedule during Winter break 

• Began my review of every single subject that will be on Step 1

• I watched all of Boards and Beyond + Sketchy Pharm / Micro and annotated extra notes into my First Aid 

• I did Anki for every video I watched 

• I did 30-40 Uworld questions a day 

• I reviewed those Uworld questions 

• This took about half my day and then the other half I would spend learning class material. At this point, your Step 1 schedule won’t line up with the school’s so it can be difficult with your brain organization but you will get used to it. I remember I started in January learning biochem again while we were doing Repro in class. Some genetic disease in Biochem actually helped me connect material in class so it all depends! Everything in medicine intersects!!! 

• Here is the Excel with my schedule for Pre-dedicated: Shanonology Step 1 Study Schedule

• Schedule 

  • 8am - 10am: Content Review

  • 10am - 11am: Practice Questions 

  • 11am - Noon: Anki 

  • Noon: Lunch 

  • 1pm - 6pm: School

  • 6pm - 8pm: Dinner/Break 

  • 8pm- 10pm: School

  • 10pm- Midnight: Anki 

  • I had a checklist of what I needed to do and so what’s important to me was not doing it exactly on time, but finishing everything by the end of the day. I took breaks, worked out, and hung out with friends in moderation. I logged about 12 hours of studying a day.

 This is a continuation of my Step 1 series so make sure you check out the other blog posts to get all the necessary information.

lub dub, Shanon