My study technique

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mpavas

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I am preparing for CFA level 1 - Dec 2015.
I’ve picked up studies after a long break…I’ve started reading from the book 1.
Few days I started reading ethcis and could not continue the motivation to finish the chapter. So jumped to Quantitaitve methods.
Just to get the momentum, I am tryng to skim through the book but not memorizing the formulas and method. Is this a good approach.
 
mpavas wrote:
I am preparing for CFA level 1 - Dec 2015.
I’ve picked up studies after a long break…I’ve started reading from the book 1.
Few days I started reading ethcis and could not continue the motivation to finish the chapter. So jumped to Quantitaitve methods.
Just to get the momentum, I am tryng to skim through the book but not memorizing the formulas and method. Is this a good approach.
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Its not bad. I did the same. Skipped ethics to last. I skimmed through the material once, then a second time and type up notes and equations, then go back and read my notes and do practice problems. It has worked so far for the first 2 levels on a time constraint….we have yet so see how it goes for level 3.
 
whic subject to read first in order to become more confident?
 
I’d say definitely keep it high level. I feel like a lot of L1 candidates get bogged down on their first pass through the material and end up scrambling to cover things at the last minute. Or they dont have enough time to go back and recover everything.
One tip, keep track of which EOC questions you think are critical or you get wrong so you can re-do those again and again.
Notecards will help cram and you’re starting early enough you should have time to create really good ones.
 
I have not read anything and just watched videos then practised exams. It is clearly (for me) the most efficient way to pass the exam without putting 300 hrs (more like 100-120). Worked for level 1 and 2 so far
 
^Should be a foolproof technique for Level III.
(Bwhahahahahahaha)
 
It depends what you mean by skimming. If you skim through it once quickly just looking at the headings and getting yourself prepared for it mentally, then go through again in detail, that’s okay.
But if you plan on skimming through all 6 books (or is there 5?) and not memorizing anything, it will still take you a few weeks possibly and i don’t know if you will remmeber anything from the beginning.
i think you can’t get away with reading the chapters and doing the EOC questions, doing it later doesn’t benefit you.
Good luck~ ^_^
 
well I was afraid it was a bad technique for level 2 and scored above 70% in all categories.
in just about 150 hrs i will have watched the videos, read a bit, done EOC 2x and done all practice exams + mock.
so far i’ve done all the above and just half of the practice exams where i score 75%. It feels definitely easier than level 2.
One needs to remember what’s your goal:
learn all the stuff in the books by heart (which you will forget in a month, and if ever you need it in your job, is just not enough anyway because cfa program is just too broad and does not go into details)
or just pass the exams in the most efficient way.
I love the program because I used to specialize a lot and this broadens my horizons but at the end of the day, I don’t want to waste the later part of my twenties putting “900+” hours reading those books: If i ever need to learn some stuff for the job, I’m better off using google and books.
This is just my 2 cents. You will read 1000+ recommendations to read the books from A to Z in this forum.
 
Glad to hear this relatively simple shortcut-technique worked for you at Levels I + II, my Island friend. Just giving early warning that this strategy (almost) never ever works at Level III. You’ll thank me later…
 
hmm. i waste a lot of time doing other stuff after getting things wrong, googleing shit or browsing etc. my advice. stay focused. dont be depressed. read the answers before reading hte question it saves time (thinking time) and helps you see waht they doin with numbers. those are some tips.
but overall, dont stress. das the technique.
 
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