What are they REALLY testing us on?!?!?!

[mrigas]

There are several of us in the general nursing student forum that are having the problem described below. We need your opinion GN's! Please help! Thanks...

My classmates and I are struggling in our med-surg class! Yesterday we had our third test, 50 questions, only half of which were disscussed in lecture/read in books/nclex review. The other 25 questions were "random" questions from material that we had never touched before!!! We are given "reading assignments" and "objectives" for each topic we are responsible for, but 9 times out of 10 they don't reflect the material discussed in class or in the book.

The only thing I can figure is that the objectives were written many years ago (when the professor started teaching it) and although she has changed the page #'s for the reading assignments for new editions I think she has failed to look at the content of each chapter to see how the layout is and which concepts are disscussed where. What do we do!?!?!

[Kudra]

well, the first logical step is to discuss it with the professor directly... write down exactly what points you want to make, so you don't forget anything, and approach her in a non-confrontational way... let her know what difficulties you are having and don't speak on behalf of anyone but yourself...

it could be that she didn't realize the course outline wasn't reflecting the readings, but i wouldn't be surprised if they just expect you to do a lot more independent study than what is covered in your lectures...

it could also be that they're trying to test your critical thinking skills by asking questions that are just beyond your knowledge base in order to see how well you extrapolate information...