There are excessive amounts of NBDE Part 1 review materials
available to students. The most common materials are online review courses, digital
flash cards, and the Dental Board Mastery App. Other resources include the NBDE
Part 1 Secrets, Mosby’s NBDE Part 1, Dental Essentials by Kaplan, and previous
copies of the exam from the ASDA website.
This is just a short list of what is available to us. You
must determine how you want to learn the extensive amounts of material and what
style of learning is best for you. It is also important to ask around and see
what has worked for other students.
How Did I Pick Which
Resource to Use?
The first thing that drew me in was how successful the
materials are with my peers. Online review courses have had amazing success
rates for WVU students. Many of my peers had no issues with the exam, so I knew
online review courses will help me dominate the NBDE Part I.
The two principle materials I will be using are online
review courses and digital flash cards. If you want an “all around” great
resource for studying and guiding you through your preparation, online review
courses are, in my experience, the best material.
For example, courses developed by B&B Dental have a
“trifecta” overlay that has all the content we need: all released board
questions incorporated and flash cards to make studying easy. The course is
developed to study at your own pace within four weeks, but can be completed in as
little as one week. I chose B&B because they have the most concise and comprehensive
material available.
The digital flash cards are good for “passive” studying. You
can pick flash cards from a set of more than 1,000 and go through them at your leisure.
How I Handle Classes
and Studying for The NBDE Part I
Currently, I am in the most hectic semester in dental school,
preparing to take the NBDE Part 1 in the summer. The best habit I have used to
study is preparation. I set aside about two to three hours per day to prepare
and review for exams.
I attempt to rank classes by priority. For example, a
Pathology exam with new material takes a higher focus versus an Ortho exam that
mostly requires review. I will give the Pathology exam the greatest priority.
The greatest part about this method for the NBDE Part 1 is that the online
review courses have in some ways already done this. They did the research and
came up with the “Big 5” and the high-yield questions so that students know
what subjects they should study first.
Scheduling Is Key
I highly recommend setting up a schedule to tackle the hours
of studying. I will be setting aside three weeks to prepare for the exam. The
first two weeks, for about four hours per day, I will go through the online
review courses, videos, and flash cards. The third week is set aside to finish
any material I did not get through and review.
I recommend also putting yourself around a good group of
people to help you with studying and get you through dental school as a whole.
I have a close group of friends that get along great, and I am fortunate to
have them by my side throughout all the stresses of dental school.
Lastly, do not forget to have some fun! Set aside time for
yourself to enjoy what you love. For example, I signed up for a golf scramble
right in the middle of the three weeks I will be studying for the NBDE Part 1
in order to relieve some stress.
That’s how I am preparing for the NBDE Part I. How are you
preparing?
Further Reading
Preparing
for the NDBE Part I
Beating
the NBDE with This New Mobile App
Board
Studying Strategies