How to avoid social media distractions when studying

STUDY TIP: Focus is the key when studying. You just need your mind and study materials. No gadgets, no internet, no music. Just you and your diligent self!

There are too many distractions for students and if you're weak, it is so easy to fall into these traps. If you're using gadgets when you study and you have an internet connection, sometimes it is very tempting to log into your social media and entertainment apps.

The GOOD and BAD Rules of Studying

There's a joke among students that studying really means stuDYING and after doing your studies you stuDIED. We have been studying for so many years from preschool to grade school, high school and college. And by the time we enter medical school, we have been students for 15-18 years of our lives! Although we are students for that long already, sometimes we feel that we still do not know how to study efficiently and effectively. We still search for the best methods of studying — what will work for us and what won't work for us. If we cannot claim that we are good students, perhaps we are breaking the rules of good studying.

Since it is exams week again, I'm sharing this article excerpted from A Mind for Numbers: How to Excel in Math and Science (Even if You Flunked Algebra) by Prof. Barbara Oakley Penguin, July 2014, with emphasis added. I only injected some annotations to tailor it for medical students. Check whether you follow the good rules or the bad rules of studying.

Mastering the ART of MEDICINE

Reference books for Physical Diagnosis. Bates' Guide to Physical Examination and History Taking (left) and DeGowin's Diagnostic Examination (right).

Learn to see, learn to hear, learn to smell. Know that by practice alone you can become an expert.  ~ Sir William Osler ~

The Physical Diagnosis (PD) course is sometimes taken for granted by the medical students, but it is actually one of the most important courses we have in medical school.

What does PD teach us?