If you prefer to learn while doodling small drawings near your notes or use plenty of colors and highlighters for titles and keywords like me, then you probably belong to the so called “visual learners” group of people. Our brain works at its peak when we can visualize the concepts that we learn and picture them big and colorful as opposed to boring black-on-white text. In my case it was so extreme, that sometimes I was even able to recall material during the exam, based on the doodles that I did on my notes!
As a medical student, be it in Italy or elsewhere, you have to study efficiently – there is just too much to learn and too little time to do it. During my medical studies in Italy I was wasting tons of paper sheets for my preparation, so I was looking for some erasable alternative. The first think that came to mind was to buy one of those white boards with erasable pens that you hang on your wall. But moving apartments on a yearly basis and having a minimalist lifestyle was not very compatible with the idea of drilling holes and carrying a huge board around. Eventually I found something that has literally blown up my mind and I was using it for every exam preparation since then.
The magic Dry-erase Quartet Whiteboard has all the advantages of a normal white-board but zero of the setup-hassle. It comes as a roll of several big plastic poster-sized (A1) sheets that you can stick on any smooth surface such as a wall, a door or even on a window – but the genius part is that is has no glue! The stickiness comes from a very strong electrostatic charge that keeps the sheet on the wall without leaving any marks after removal! Then you use any standard erasable markers for whiteboards and voila! You can draw any diagram, any mind-map and schema that you can imagine and correct and improve it as many times as you want.
My own Magic Whiteboard in the dorms
The film surface is really smooth and made especially for erasable whiteboard markers, so that you can redraw and correct your beautiful mind-maps and charts until they are perfect! Although each of the sheets is approx. 60 cm x 80 cm / 24 x 31 inches large, you can stick several of them side-by-side and get a MEGA whiteboard over your wall. The film stays firmly on the wall without loosing the “charge” that keeps it there.
Every day you can add details, improve and perfect it a bit and have it spatially associated in your memory to that same wall (those of you who have learned how our memory works best, will know what I mean). My own experience with the Magic Whiteboard was extremely positive, so I totally understand the 4,5 stars reviews it got on Amazon. I remember perfecting my diagrams meticulously during the semester, so that I ended up rolling those sheets back for later or taking a photo of the chart.
Give it a try and tell me what other tools are you using to improve your studying.
Alex is a graduate of the Harvey Medical Program at University of Pavia and is the founder of MEDschool.it. He is a Resident in Ophthalmology and a Researcher in Ophthalmic Gene Therapy in Germany.
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