[justgivemea75]

Hi all,

I just started studying for FAR and I’m already worried about how I’m going to pass this test. I’m doing Becker self-study and I just got done with the first homework, which hasn’t gone so well. On some of the topics, I’m literally scoring 33% and there are a few others where I’m only getting 65-70%s on them.

One thing is that I’m trying to simulate exam conditions when doing the homework as best as possible. Therefore, I do not look at my notes, What I did is that I watched the entire F1 lecture yesterday, looked over notes, and then tried all of the homework today from memory. The rest of the day, I’m going to re-read the sections that I bombed and then do the supplemental questions/F2 lecture tomorrow.

Is this the right way of doing this, or am I just a moron? I’m genuinely getting concerned about passing this test, because it’s only going to get harder and I’m already struggling. I thought that graduating from a T20 masters program and being well above average in terms of rank would put me in good shape, but so far it has been a disaster. Also, do I really need to get 75% of all the questions right to pass? That seems impossible so far.

One last pattern I’ve noticed is that I generally do OK with computational questions but struggle with concepts. For example, I nailed all of the discontinued ops calculations, changes in depreciation methods etc. but when it asks me what the maximum number of days I can extend my filing of a 10-Q is, I never remember those.

Thanks in advance!

FAR - 84
AUD - 76 (phew)
BEC - 88
REG - 77

DONE!

[Kimboroni]

I was doing the same as you for AUD– trying to answer MCQs without looking at my notes– and all it did was make me feel like I didn't know anything. So I started using my resources for the questions. It was much more effective. I learned so much more, and as I kept going, I had to refer to my resources less and less, and then when I took the test I passed.

I figure it doesn't matter if I look things up when I'm preparing, since the only time that matters is the actual exam, and up until then is all part of the learning process. The important thing for me was to keep my confidence up.

Using the in-test-bank hints really helped me zone in on what I was doing wrong (misreading, etc.). So I thought those were really helpful, since they are specific to that question and how it's written.

AUD 84 (1/9/14-Wiley books/TB + free materials)
FAR 83 (5/21/14-the above + NINJA 10 Pt Combo Lite)
REG 84 (7/9/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC/Notes)
BEC 76 (10/5/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC)

Disclaimer: My ninja avatar is not meant to imply that I have any affiliation with this site other than being a forum member. That's a pic of a T-shirt that my daughter gave me for my birthday. 🙂

[PandaBear]

I recently joined the site and I can relate to all of the posts here. I do feel overwhelmed, scared, frustrated, tired, discouraged and so on, so on. I also feel disappointed in myself as I obviously didn't study hard enough even if I promised myself I will. I “almost” passed… 5 points away, well I kept dwelling on it for two months before I moved on to the next section (that I “almost” passed again, this time 6 points away).

I don't know why but those exams are draining and I wish the materials had an intro lecture on how to deal with stress/frustration and how to move on feeling that I CAN DO IT this time around. I am officially starting over the whole process (well studying for AUD as it was my 1st test, and trying not to think about the past two failed parts) and I hope that being part of this forum will allow me to feel less down and get more motivated. I appreciate everyone's tips on how to study/review etc.

BEC - 70
AUD - May 24
REG - 69
FAR - TBD

[PandaBear]

I recently joined the site and I can relate to all of the posts here. I do feel overwhelmed, scared, frustrated, tired, discouraged and so on, so on. I also feel disappointed in myself as I obviously didn't study hard enough even if I promised myself I will. I “almost” passed… 5 points away, well I kept dwelling on it for two months before I moved on to the next section (that I “almost” passed again, this time 6 points away).

I don't know why but those exams are draining and I wish the materials had an intro lecture on how to deal with stress/frustration and how to move on feeling that I CAN DO IT this time around. I am officially starting over the whole process (well studying for AUD as it was my 1st test, and trying not to think about the past two failed parts) and I hope that being part of this forum will allow me to feel less down and get more motivated. I appreciate everyone's tips on how to study/review etc.

BEC - 70
AUD - May 24
REG - 69
FAR - TBD

[justgivemea75]

OK, 4 days in, finishing up the F2 homework and I'm still not feeling great. Getting consistent 60%s on the MC, but now, I'm getting mad because the Becker lectures feel like they're worthless for answering the questions. They take the most rudimentary examples to make you feel good about the material (I felt great about all the material in class and crushed the in-class example questions), but then on the MC, they throw you a bunch of curve balls and formulae you've never seen before!

Seriously, am I just a moron or has anyone else that has gone through Becker felt this way? I'm very seriously debating getting another guide (any cost effective advice on which one?). Becker only explains the theory of major topics and goes in-depth on what appears to be less important topics (i.e. they go in-depth on something that only is a 10 question long quiz), and this just isn't working. I would prefer a more practical approach that is no nonsense and just explains frameworks for answering questions rather than giving me a broad, theoretical overview and then expecting me to derive all the formulas/problem-solving techniques to answering questions.

Advice?

FAR - 84
AUD - 76 (phew)
BEC - 88
REG - 77

DONE!

[justgivemea75]

OK, 4 days in, finishing up the F2 homework and I'm still not feeling great. Getting consistent 60%s on the MC, but now, I'm getting mad because the Becker lectures feel like they're worthless for answering the questions. They take the most rudimentary examples to make you feel good about the material (I felt great about all the material in class and crushed the in-class example questions), but then on the MC, they throw you a bunch of curve balls and formulae you've never seen before!

Seriously, am I just a moron or has anyone else that has gone through Becker felt this way? I'm very seriously debating getting another guide (any cost effective advice on which one?). Becker only explains the theory of major topics and goes in-depth on what appears to be less important topics (i.e. they go in-depth on something that only is a 10 question long quiz), and this just isn't working. I would prefer a more practical approach that is no nonsense and just explains frameworks for answering questions rather than giving me a broad, theoretical overview and then expecting me to derive all the formulas/problem-solving techniques to answering questions.

Advice?

FAR - 84
AUD - 76 (phew)
BEC - 88
REG - 77

DONE!

[Kimboroni]

It's probably the same with any program– practicing the MCQs is what helps you learn how the questions might be asked so that you can be more prepared for exam day. I think it would be too much material to try to cover that level of detail in the actual course.

AUD 84 (1/9/14-Wiley books/TB + free materials)
FAR 83 (5/21/14-the above + NINJA 10 Pt Combo Lite)
REG 84 (7/9/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC/Notes)
BEC 76 (10/5/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC)

Disclaimer: My ninja avatar is not meant to imply that I have any affiliation with this site other than being a forum member. That's a pic of a T-shirt that my daughter gave me for my birthday. 🙂

[Kimboroni]

It's probably the same with any program– practicing the MCQs is what helps you learn how the questions might be asked so that you can be more prepared for exam day. I think it would be too much material to try to cover that level of detail in the actual course.

AUD 84 (1/9/14-Wiley books/TB + free materials)
FAR 83 (5/21/14-the above + NINJA 10 Pt Combo Lite)
REG 84 (7/9/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC/Notes)
BEC 76 (10/5/14-Wiley books/TB + NINJA Audio/FC)

Disclaimer: My ninja avatar is not meant to imply that I have any affiliation with this site other than being a forum member. That's a pic of a T-shirt that my daughter gave me for my birthday. 🙂

[Anonymous]

I'm not making light of how you're feeling. FAR is overwhelming. BUT you are only 4 days into the material. I don't know when your test is, but 4 days in is a little early to be using up your stress reserves. I studied for FAR for months and you just have to keep at it. I didn't watch lectures. I learned mostly by going through the questions in the MCQ and taking notes on the concepts that I didn't already know. I combined all of my notes with the Ninja Notes, listened to the Ninja Audio when I could and focused on just trying to understand the explanations when I got questions wrong. Try to get through all the MCQ once and the ones you get wrong at least twice. A lot of it will click and you will start to remember this stuff. It's not hard material. There is just so much of it that the feeling of being overwhelmed outweighs everything. Calm down and relax. Stressing this early is just going to make you lose motivation. Don't try to master everything the first time through. Get a feel for all of the material and then go back and go through it again. Repetition is the key.

[Anonymous]

I'm not making light of how you're feeling. FAR is overwhelming. BUT you are only 4 days into the material. I don't know when your test is, but 4 days in is a little early to be using up your stress reserves. I studied for FAR for months and you just have to keep at it. I didn't watch lectures. I learned mostly by going through the questions in the MCQ and taking notes on the concepts that I didn't already know. I combined all of my notes with the Ninja Notes, listened to the Ninja Audio when I could and focused on just trying to understand the explanations when I got questions wrong. Try to get through all the MCQ once and the ones you get wrong at least twice. A lot of it will click and you will start to remember this stuff. It's not hard material. There is just so much of it that the feeling of being overwhelmed outweighs everything. Calm down and relax. Stressing this early is just going to make you lose motivation. Don't try to master everything the first time through. Get a feel for all of the material and then go back and go through it again. Repetition is the key.

[Anonymous]

you know, I had the same exact problem when I started studying, probably around 4 or 5 days into the material just like you. lectures and the book seem great, I feel comfortable, I take the MCQs, I get 30%. it's scary and disheartening at first, but I've studied about 6 more days now for 5 hours a day and it's starting to be less terrifying, and I'll tell you why.

don't worry about getting MCQs wrong after lectures. the point of the MCQs after lectures isn't to test yourself on the material, they're to teach you. you say that you want something that “explains frameworks for answering questions” and that's the exact purpose of doing the MCQs following the lectures. the lectures define things, they show you how to do the basics, they explain to you the general idea of what's behind the problems, maybe do a basic example, and then the MCQs show you how to apply that knowledge by allowing you to answer questions, make mistakes, and explain to you why you made the mistakes you made, and here's what to do in the future. read those answer explanations. they are more important than the book and lecture combined. you learn stuff best by doing stuff, and every CPA review course knows and embrace this, please don't waste $1500 on another course, it won't be better. if you want to spend more money, you should spend it on ninja MCQs, but that's the same idea becker MCQs get at.

so do the MCQs. get them wrong. if you GUESS, make sure you write down that problem so if you got it RIGHT by 25% chance you can review WHY you got it right. getting problems right and not knowing why is much worse than getting them wrong and knowing why. it sucks, I know it does because it sucks every time for me, too. I recently had a really terrible time with a couple sections where I got something like 2 out of 10 questions right and I felt like, that's it, it's over, there's no way I'll ever learn this and I will never pass this test. but at the end of that section, after going through each of those 8 problems I missed, redoing them for myself, proving to myself I understood why I missed them, I felt okay.

I can't stress enough that MCQs after lectures are for learning and not testing. you get graded on the MCQs, but try to forget the grade just for a minute. getting an 80% and not understanding the material isn't good. getting a 20% and understanding is great. if becker has a study mode where it's not graded and tells you if you're right/wrong as soon as you answer, try that.

I will say that I DO care heavily about scores when I do interim/progress/diagnostic tests and when I do a final review of sorts I will definitely care more. I do these interim tests every few days and I'd say do them, because FAR is all about volume of information so you need to make sure you're both learning AND retaining, which you do via repetition, exposing yourself to old information after your brain has tried its best to dump it. I don't know how becker specifically works, but I'm sure you can put together a set of 50-60 questions pulling from material you've already covered. do that. make sure you do good on those. if you don't, work on it! this is stuff you've already gone over once or twice or three times so you should be doing good. go to sections you score low in, do the section's MCQs again, reference the book again, write down specific problems you got wrong and why, do anything to make sure you understand why you did not do good so next time you can do good.

that's all my advice for you, sorry for the long post. well, one more. I saw you mentioned “minutia” before and I'm in the same boat. I'm always getting the “according to the X standards, which of the following does not meet the criteria to be Y” and I'm like man I do not know and probably never will know them all, but if I see them all enough in MCQ practice maybe they'll stick. I will say this about minutia. if you can get a handle on the general terms, language, principles/rules underlying US GAAP and IFRS, you can guess at a lot of questions semi-successfully. and I mean really really general, not specific whatsoever. I can nail IFRS questions I have no clue about because IFRS means impairment losses can almost always be recovered and IFRS seems to be a little more strict/specific about some things and IFRS uses funny words like “profit” that GAAP never uses so when I see an answer choice that says “profit” I pick it and maybe I improved my chances. these really really stupidly broad ideas are just that, really stupid, but if they turn one wrong guess into one right guess, I'm glad to have known them. I don't expect to learn every GAAP – IFRS difference, but I can swing the odds in my favor this way.

[Anonymous]

you know, I had the same exact problem when I started studying, probably around 4 or 5 days into the material just like you. lectures and the book seem great, I feel comfortable, I take the MCQs, I get 30%. it's scary and disheartening at first, but I've studied about 6 more days now for 5 hours a day and it's starting to be less terrifying, and I'll tell you why.

don't worry about getting MCQs wrong after lectures. the point of the MCQs after lectures isn't to test yourself on the material, they're to teach you. you say that you want something that “explains frameworks for answering questions” and that's the exact purpose of doing the MCQs following the lectures. the lectures define things, they show you how to do the basics, they explain to you the general idea of what's behind the problems, maybe do a basic example, and then the MCQs show you how to apply that knowledge by allowing you to answer questions, make mistakes, and explain to you why you made the mistakes you made, and here's what to do in the future. read those answer explanations. they are more important than the book and lecture combined. you learn stuff best by doing stuff, and every CPA review course knows and embrace this, please don't waste $1500 on another course, it won't be better. if you want to spend more money, you should spend it on ninja MCQs, but that's the same idea becker MCQs get at.

so do the MCQs. get them wrong. if you GUESS, make sure you write down that problem so if you got it RIGHT by 25% chance you can review WHY you got it right. getting problems right and not knowing why is much worse than getting them wrong and knowing why. it sucks, I know it does because it sucks every time for me, too. I recently had a really terrible time with a couple sections where I got something like 2 out of 10 questions right and I felt like, that's it, it's over, there's no way I'll ever learn this and I will never pass this test. but at the end of that section, after going through each of those 8 problems I missed, redoing them for myself, proving to myself I understood why I missed them, I felt okay.

I can't stress enough that MCQs after lectures are for learning and not testing. you get graded on the MCQs, but try to forget the grade just for a minute. getting an 80% and not understanding the material isn't good. getting a 20% and understanding is great. if becker has a study mode where it's not graded and tells you if you're right/wrong as soon as you answer, try that.

I will say that I DO care heavily about scores when I do interim/progress/diagnostic tests and when I do a final review of sorts I will definitely care more. I do these interim tests every few days and I'd say do them, because FAR is all about volume of information so you need to make sure you're both learning AND retaining, which you do via repetition, exposing yourself to old information after your brain has tried its best to dump it. I don't know how becker specifically works, but I'm sure you can put together a set of 50-60 questions pulling from material you've already covered. do that. make sure you do good on those. if you don't, work on it! this is stuff you've already gone over once or twice or three times so you should be doing good. go to sections you score low in, do the section's MCQs again, reference the book again, write down specific problems you got wrong and why, do anything to make sure you understand why you did not do good so next time you can do good.

that's all my advice for you, sorry for the long post. well, one more. I saw you mentioned “minutia” before and I'm in the same boat. I'm always getting the “according to the X standards, which of the following does not meet the criteria to be Y” and I'm like man I do not know and probably never will know them all, but if I see them all enough in MCQ practice maybe they'll stick. I will say this about minutia. if you can get a handle on the general terms, language, principles/rules underlying US GAAP and IFRS, you can guess at a lot of questions semi-successfully. and I mean really really general, not specific whatsoever. I can nail IFRS questions I have no clue about because IFRS means impairment losses can almost always be recovered and IFRS seems to be a little more strict/specific about some things and IFRS uses funny words like “profit” that GAAP never uses so when I see an answer choice that says “profit” I pick it and maybe I improved my chances. these really really stupidly broad ideas are just that, really stupid, but if they turn one wrong guess into one right guess, I'm glad to have known them. I don't expect to learn every GAAP – IFRS difference, but I can swing the odds in my favor this way.

[Author]

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