Farhat Lectures: 4 Steps to Study Smarter for the CPA Exam

Hello everyone. Today I'm going to walk you through four essential steps to help you prepare for the CPA exam, no matter which CPA review course you are using or which CPA section you are studying for. In my opinion, following those four steps will put you in a stronger position to sit for the exam and earn a passing score of 75 or higher. The four steps are: learn, review, practice, and retain. For each step, I will explain what you should do, why it matters, and how it prepares you for the next step. I will spend most of the recording on the learning step, which is step one, because this is where Farhat lectures add the most value. We teach you the material from the ground up, helping you build the foundation you need to get more of your CPA review course. Before you can review something, you need to learn it. CPA review courses assume you already learned the material in college, but perhaps you have forgotten the material or never fully understood it in the first place or did not cover certain topics in your college courses. And that's why the learning step matters. These four steps are also valuable for international candidates, especially those who have not studied US GAAP or familiar with the US tax system. And stay till the end because I will also discuss common mistakes students make when preparing for the exam. I want you to recognize those mistakes and avoid them so you don't create unnecessary frustration or waste valuable study time. Let's start with step one. For the sake of For I will be showing you Far Becker exam. Now, keep in mind we have FAR for Gleim, Surgent, Miles, UWorld. We have all courses, the audit for all providers, Becker, TCP, ISC. So, it doesn't matter. They're all structured the same way. For the For the sake of illustration, I will show you FAR Becker. Once you click on the course, you would scroll down. And for the FAR courses, I always have a refresh, a basic accounting module. This is This is in every course, in case you want to go back and review your basics. So, this is where you will find this information, basic accounting. Other courses don't have this. So, I have it just in case you need it. Um also, I have a welcome, uh resources, and success steps. Just look at this. There's a lot of videos here that are helpful. Make sure to introduce yourself. But, let's get going to the first step. The course is structured just like your CPA review course. In this situation, we're talking about Becker F1M1. So, how do you learn the material? What is our method? Well, let's look at uses and limitation of income statement. The first thing you see is we we take a long lesson and we break it into sub lessons. So, for example, uses and limitation of the income statement. First, you will see a video. Video means there's a lecture. It means there's a video explaining something. When there's a video, it's a lecture. When you see a pencil, it means it's an interactive exercise. So, the first step we try to give you is Let me explain it to you. And this is where we stand apart from anyone else is we explain the concept. So, I'm going to click on this link. And in this link, you will see, obviously, a lecture. A lecture about me explaining uses and limitation of the income statement. It's your traditional lecture. Except, it's Farhat lectures. It's more in much more in depth, um much more in details. We don't assume any prior knowledge. Now, right underneath this lecture, once you are done, we have what we call the interactive exercise. And I'm sure you are familiar with the saying, "Tell me and I forget." Okay? So, I'm telling you in the lecture and you will forget. And show me, I remember. I also show you. But, involve me and I understand. And this is the purpose of this interactive exercise, where you get involved and answer questions about the topic that you just learned. Now, if you're going over this, you can, for example, there's a coach here and this coach you read the problem, but you don't know how to start. You know, well, you ask the coach. And maybe you want the coach to do the first step for you. You can ask the coach to do the first step. Oh, 20x2 is 700,000 profit. Now, I think I know how to proceed. You could always input the answers. Then, before you submit, you can go down and check your work. And at the end, you can click to see a detailed solution of everything. So, this is where the involve me and I understand, this is what I'm involving you. Tell me in the lecture and I would remember, show me and I will you would remember, but this is more important. On top of that, within the lecture, we have AI. So, if you click here on this AI person, our AI will come up. Now, how how would our AI work? The first thing you can do, you can ask AI to summarize the lesson for you. So, it will summarize the lesson. So, if you want a summary of the lesson, you can summarize it and download it as a PDF and take it on the go. That's one thing you can do. Or, you can summarize the lesson in a summary table. So, I'm going to show you both. Basically, they're both summary, but sometime the table is more organized. You like to view it. So, let me increase the AI here. So, this is it summarized the table. The core concept, the purpose of the income statement, the limitation, the role, quality of earnings. Or, you can ask it to summarize it in a table. The table will be a little bit different. For certain lessons, the table might be more helpful for you. For others, the summary table the regular lesson is more helpful. It's up to you. So, here it's giving you the concept, the core definition, if there's any rules, there's any formulas, it will show you everything organized. Now, within this AI you can also download audio notes. Now, keep in mind, this audio notes is a short audio notes. Short means it's few minutes about the lecture. So, it's just there to remind you about the main concept. It's not It's not the lecture by itself, but it's helpful. Why? Because you can download this note and use it on the go. Now, this audio notes, I would revisit this audio notes when I talk about step four. Step four is the retention because this audio notes you can download and you can Once you download, you can upload on your phone and have it on the go with you. But again, in in step four I will talk about this. Create flash cards. So, for every lesson, for every single video, you can create flash cards based on that video itself. So, if you want to test yourself to make sure you understood the concept, you understood the basic terms, which is this is how you learn. You start to build your knowledge step-by-step. Knowing the material. And how do you know the material? You create flash cards. Simple questions asking you about uh what does an income statement illustrate about the company? Do you know the answer? If not, you can look at the answer. It shows whether a company is profitable or operating as a loss by comparing revenues and expenses. What do revenues on the income statement represent? Well, they represent earnings from business operation. So, breaking down everything for you step-by-step. Now, also you can generate a quiz about that specifically. So, notice we have not left the first lecture yet. We are still working. Just want to show you within the same lecture. So, generated a quiz for you to test your knowledge. So, what I showed you so far is the lecture, the interactive exercise, and the AI. Now, for every lesson what we created is a podcast. And this podcast is based on the lecture. So, what's the difference between the podcast, which you could see a microphone here, and a lecture? First of all, the podcast is an AI podcast. One more time, this is an AI podcast. However, this podcast is based on my lecture. How is it useful? This part is useful in two ways. If you want to listen to the concept again, the limitation of the income statement, because you listened to mine, you want to listen to it in a different way. This is a discussion. That's one way you can use it. Another way you could use this is to learn on the go, which is step four, to save time because the podcast is based on two people talking. You don't need to look at the screen. So, you could listen to this on the go. We're done with that. Then you have a quiz. Then, if you see a target, there is a quiz questions. Now, within the quiz, you are going to see we do have an AI within the quiz. So, let's just start to answer questions. What does the quality of earnings mean? Now, if there is a video with the quiz, sometimes there's a video for the quiz, not for not for all the questions. Hopefully all of them eventually, but not right now. If there is a video, you would see that there's a video sign on the quiz, but there's no video for this one. But, there is AI. So, if you want the AI, you can pull the AI, and you would say, "You know what? I don't know what earning uh the quality of earning is." It will explain the topic. And once you answer the question, if you want to explain the correct and incorrect answer in a different way other than the way we did it, it does for you, and it create a similar MCQ. So, you could keep on working questions about the same topic. Now, what else do we have? Well, let's look at other lessons. Here you see they have a lecture, there's interactive exercise, there's a podcast. Now, we also have a just an exercise. So, notice here, a just an exercise. A pencil, it means a just an exercise. An exercise, you can think of it as a simulation. Um some of them are they look like a simulation. I'm not going to call them simulations because once I launch my full CPA review course, I will have simulation. Just bear with me for now. But, you can consider them as a simulation for now. I'm going to consider them as an additional tool for you to help you, for example here, prepare an income statement. Do you know how to prepare an income statement? You can prepare an income statement. An exercise and has a video. Those, if you click on them, here's the difference between those and the regular exercise. Here is, you have the exercise, you have the simulation, but there's a video that explain it. So, it's not only the you can solve it, you have check my work coach and all that, then I have a video for that. So, I have a video here. So, this is where you have a video and an exercise. Again, what is the purpose for all of this? The purpose for all of this is to help you learn. This is all we're trying to do, trying to give you a strong foundation, strong foundation during step one. Step one is the most important step. Everything is built on step one. And this is where Farhat lectures, this is why you are getting the getting the subscription with us is because of this of of the resources here. Now, what I want to show you in step one as well, because this is very important, is how we can help you when it comes to simulations. Simulations are important, give students a lot of hard time. So, I need to show you that we have a tutorial for simulation, how to solve simulation. You click here. And this is the tutorial how to solve simulation. So, if you're saying, "How do you help me with simulation?" This is how we help with simulation. Help you understand the four types of simulation, help you understand how to solve them, look at actual simulation AICPA AICPA simulation, I would solve them in front of you. When do you use this? It's up to you. You could use it before you do the simulation, you could use it after. Now, how about if we have questions about the material? Do you support us? And the answer is yes. If you have any questions about a lecture, if you scroll down, right below the lecture, you can ask here. Now, if you're asking about the lecture, make sure to mention the minute, make sure to mention the the specific quote so the review team can look at your inquiry. And the same concept apply to quizzes. If you are completing a quiz, you could always click in here and you can ask your question. Be as specific as possible so the review team will have ample information to be able to assist you. Now that we have looked at step one, let's move to step >> Step two. Now you have learned the material, return to your CPA review course. Becker, UWorld, whatever that course is. You can watch the lecture, read the textbook, or review the notes. You may be comfortable watching the material at 1.5 or double the speed as long as you can follow the explanation. Choose the approach that reinforces your understanding without wasting time. As you review, ask yourself, does this make sense? When you find yourself thinking, I understand this now, this is a good sign that the learning step, step one, worked. Your review course should feel like a review, not your first introduction to the material. When something remains unclear, revisit the relevant lesson before moving on. Step three. Test your understanding with the multiple choice questions and simulation. You could use Surgent lectures comprehensive test along the questions and simulation in your own CPA review course. I recommend aiming for around 80% on your first attempt. That is a study target, not a guarantee of passing. But do not focus only on the 80%. Focus on the 20% you missed. This is what will reveal the risk, what you have missed. For each missed question, ask yourself, did I misread something? Did I misunderstand the concept? Did I apply the wrong rule? Understand why the correct answer is correct and why the answer was wrong. When you read the explanation and still don't understand it, that's a red flag. Return to the lesson and ask for clarification. Treat every missed question as an opportunity to close a gap before the exam day. Step four. This is my favorite step, the retention step. Although retention is step four, it should begin as you learn, review, and practice. Take notes on important concepts, questions you missed, and mistakes you need to avoid. Then record those as audio notes on your phone, explaining the concepts in your own words. This is where you would also use my AI audio notes and podcast resources I covered in step one. When I was studying, I used cassette tapes. Today, your phone makes this much easier. Listen while commuting, walking, exercising, doing chores, or running errands. The benefit that you stay connected to the material even when you cannot sit down for a full study session. This helps you maintain momentum rather than feeling discouraged by interruption, and you don't get demoralized because you have a continuity. I want to mention common mistakes to avoid. The first one is some people start with the review step before learning. Some students can begin with the review because they learned the material in college, they understood it in college, and they still remember it. But when you have forgotten the concept, never understood them, or never studied them in the first place, you need to learn it first. This also applies to international candidates who may have a strong accounting background but are unfamiliar with US GAAP or US tax rules. There's nothing wrong with starting from scratch. The mistake is trying to review something you have never learned in the first place. Using questions as a substitute is the second common mistake. When you would use your MCQ for learning, questions help you check and reinforce your understanding. They should not replace the learning step. Remember the four steps: learn, review, practice, retain. Explore the material through our sample course. No registration or credit card required. Invest in yourself. We are here for you. Reach out for any questions about the product. Good luck, and I hope to see you on the website.