[Anonymous]

Just starting out with the CPA exam using Becker’s.

How do you folks find Becker’s to be the most useful? Do you folks read, watch lectures, then do HW? Do you watch one lecture section, followed by completing the HW for that section immediately after?

Becker doesn’t recommend reading, but I find that they do tend to skip over a lot in their lectures (and I’m not speaking only of the ancillary). Reading would eat up a lot of time, but I find myself to have the best assurance when I read everything line-by-line. Should I not worry too much about every single material, and that what Tim/Pete tell me in the lectures is sufficient?

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[WFGrad]

Everyone has their own opinion, but this was personally my strategy that has worked for the first two parts and hopefully will carry through the rest. I watched the lectures in a live class, went home that night and would read a section (of the chapter) and immediately do the multiple choice for that section. I'd try to finish all the work for that chapter that night. Our class was pretty unique, one chapter per day for 3 or 4 days and then a day off, so you really felt behind if you didn't finish a chapter or so a day. So, needless to say, I spent every waking moment doing Becker! I'd usually do the simulations and supplemental questions on a review day. Obviously, this can't work for everyone with tons of full time responsibilities, but I didn't think I really got the gist of everything just doing the MC without reading first. And I am not the type of person who read the textbook in college, usually just did the problems. But you could argue that I over-studied, so maybe just working the MC gets you to where you need to be. Good luck with your studying!

FAR - 5/14/2011 - 95
AUD - 5/27/2011 - 98
BEC - 7/1/2011 - 91
REG - 7/13/2011 - 84

[jimboace88]

You will find, once you get into it, that the multiple choice are much more in-depth than the lectures. It will at times seem as if the lecture you just watched was recorded on a different planet than the one the multiple choice was created on.

Having said that, I really don't think reading will help the problem any. The items they skip over during the lectures are relatively few in the “big picture” (aside from the many pages of “ancillary” material). The issue you'll probably have isn't going to be with what they didn't cover–it will be that what they DID cover was on such a shallow level that you won't be able to apply it the first time around.

The remedy to this, as most people on here will probably tell you, is the exhaust yourself on the multiple choice questions. You will learn the most from doing and re-doing those because the software has fairly detailed explanations as to why each answer is right or wrong.

FAR 07/27/11 - 87
AUD 10/01/11 - 85
BEC 11/15/11 - 87
REG 01/03/12 - 92

[kb24]

I can't speak for the entire Becker program because I had a copy of the text but no access to the lectures. I personally am very much a visual learner, though, so I definitely would have read the text no matter what the lecturer said. I disagree with the previous post on one point. If you skip the ancillary material in REG and BEC, you will be in trouble. It's more of an issue in REG, but was definitely true for me in BEC as well. It helped some in AUD and FAR but wasn't nearly as necessary.

FAR 4/1/11 - 89
AUD 4/15/11 - 85
REG 4/29/11 - 80
BEC 5/13/11 - 85

[NoScores2Display4thisSection]

I use Becker.

What I find works for me is:

1) watch the lectures on a particular topic 1-2x

2) do the set of Passmaster multiple choice question for that topic

3) repeat steps 1&2 until you're done going through all the topics for the whole chapter

4) go back and do all the Passmaster MCs 1-2x for the whole chapter

5) Continue onto next chapter and repeat steps 1-4

done

[jimboace88]

Sorry, I should have qualified my first post. I realized when kb posted that she is definitely right about the ancillary material.

If you're preparing for FAR (which for some reason I assumed you were), then the advice I gave you still stands. Otherwise, you're better off disregarding it because everyone else on this board knows more than I do regarding the other parts since I haven't prepped for them yet.

FAR 07/27/11 - 87
AUD 10/01/11 - 85
BEC 11/15/11 - 87
REG 01/03/12 - 92

[katyuser]

Becker does not say don't read. They say to read after the lecture, not before. What I did was – watch one section of a chapter, read it (everything, not just the highlighted parts) and then do the MCQs for that section – repeat till chapter is done. Worked for BEC and FAR so far.

[SoonToBeCPAChick]

I used the same strategy as @katyuser. I would watch a lecture, then go back and read through it, then do the MC. As I was reading I took notes on notecards, that way while I was at the gym I was also able to get some studying in. Got some funny looks, but I definetely did not waste a minute of my study time! I would take these notecards everywhere, I didn't use them as traditional question and answer cards, but more generally points that I wanted to make sure I knew down pat. I would literally study them in line at the grocery store, stopped at a red light, etc.

FAR 10/1/2010 =====> 90
BEC 10/28/2010 ====> 81
REG 2/2/2011 ======> 82
AUD 5/28/2011 =====> 92 ===========>DONE!!!!

[Anonymous]

Thanks everyone for the feedback! It definitely helps to understand the foundation others use to study (especially from those that passed). I'll play around and adapt to what is best for me.

[Author]

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