Know it all classmates

Nursing Students General Students

Published

Ok Im in my first semester and Im already urked by people. Its mainly people who are currently CNA's making me feel inadequate. When we go to learn a new skill they are used to doing it already on a daily basis and Im learning it for the first time, so it makes me feel should I say "dumb" when these other people can do it flawlessly and Im still going huh? It comes up because usually when we have a skills test its in pairs so they go then you go.

Im not dumb by any means and I hate feeling that way.

Do I just need to step it up a knotch to be good at the stuff by the time we get to doing it, or just get over it and learn along with everyone else?

Just wondering if anyone else has noticed this, Im sure most RN classes have alot of CNA's.

Im normally pretty soft spoken and introverted so Im thinking its just my own complex. But I hate feeling inadequate. Im hoping nursing makes me tough.

Specializes in GI and Telemetry.

I spent 20 years in sales and marketing, even rode the wave of e-commerce at it's peak, before I re-entered school to become a nurse. I was 40 at the time. Always had an interest in medicine, but never pursued it until then. Glad I waited, since I wasn't ready to be a nurse at 24!

Thank you for all what you said.

Specializes in Med-Surg/Oncology/Neuro Unit.

We had an experienced nursing-home CNA in my first semester of nursing school, not only did she skip out on skills, lectures were missed and she was lax at clinical as well. Unfortunately for her, she thought it would be a piece of cake, and was wrong, because the difference between a nurse and an aide is the aide does the skills and the RN knows the rationale for them. Needless to say, she failed clinical AND theory, and I really did feel sorry for her:(. I went to work as an CNA myself at the end of my first semester. What a bonus this has been in helping me with time management.

A sidebar: I am now an RN on the same floor where I was an aide. I respect my aides, and they respect me as well. Any nurse who doesn't respect her aides and what she can learn from them is a fool (just a general statement, not implying anyone here said that). It is also mutually satisfying when I can pass along some rationale to the aides for the tasks they perform. I feel like I'm giving back for what they've taught me, and they get more satisfaction out of performing the task. They are our eyes and ears ALOT of the time, letting them know how valuable their work is to me makes them much more open to asking me questions and letting me know subtleties that I may have missed in my assessment.

i'm in my 3rd semester.....and been there done that w/ the know it alls, most of them fall on their face in 2nd semester, because everyone is sooooo sick of them by then, that when they finally need help no one wants to be around them.....period!

if they were just "helpful" and not "in your face" type people then it would be another story. we have many cna's, ect. in my class who ARE helpful, but not arrogant!

it's the arrogant ones that no one can stand and wind up being outcasts! so, they're making their own bed, let em' lie in it!

When will nurses stop this, "I know more than you do" These are also the people who as CNA's tell the nurses on the floors what to do and as a nursing instructor seem to have no problem correcting me! I would have been sent home and only after crawling back on bloodied hands and knees begging forgiveness would I have gotten a second chance at the clinical site.

It would be OK if we shared knowledge, but for some reason we need to prove how much more we know than the next person. We work to keep our information our own just to make others look bad. Why is this and when did it start?

I had a student who said she had run a physicians office, from the administrative end, and while I was explaining some of the lab values and their implications, when she stopped me to let me know that the "cells weren't counted, they really went through a machine." I couldn't believe what I was hearing, it was one of those, "same thing only different" statements and yet when she went to turn her patient s/p rotator cuff repair, she was going to pull her up by her shoulder!!!

There will always be people who know more than us, encourage her to learn from them and don't worry, I bet the instructor already has her number!

We had more than one "know it all" in my nursing class who liked to waste the other students' time by expounding on anything or asking any question that would give them the chance to hear themselves talk. I learned to tune them out and would read ahead, or go over my notes, or just plain daydream. Yet, these people were bothersome because I realized that they were wasting my time that my tuition money had paid for. Anyone who tried to get the instructor to get back on track usually found it a lost cause, as these "know it alls" had the good graces of the teaching staff.

Specializes in Med/Surg, LTC/Geriatric.

I've been a medical office assistant for 12 years, so I don't really know anything clinical. Most of my former knowledge is medical terminology and A + P since I took it quite recently prior to nursing school.

I will offer help to others if asked, but I make a conscience effort to not come accross as a know it all in these subjects because I certainly don't know it all, although I likey know more than the majority of the students.

One classmate is a Registered Care Aid (equivilant to a CNA). She doesn't come accross as a know it all. She is very helpful in our early labs on transfers, bed baths, feeding etc.

Specializes in ICU, Mother/Baby.

This will hopefully make you feel better... There was a girl in my class that told the teacher that she had not been alseep for 48hrs and that was the reason she was nodding off in class. ( She works as a PCA ) The teacher asked her how she was going to learn from the lecture if she was so tired and nodding off. Her reply was...I already know what your teaching. The teacher responded by saying...you'll be the first one to fail.:lol2: She then announced to the class that all the people that already work at the hospitals or nursing homes need to unlearn what they have learned at work. Nursing school teaches different than what actually is done. And that usually from her past experiences those people answer questions on the test based on whats done at their workplace and the get the wrong answer.

Stay confident in yourself and only worry about YOU!! It takes time to master a skill and you will do it!!

Here is an helpful analogy that we were told in our RN program. It is used to help us discern the difference between a CNA and an RN. The CNA will be thinking...I must get these vital signs taken and entered into the computer before 8AM. The RN will be thinking...why is Mr. Jones blood pressure so low/high? It may be nice that you are NOT a CNA because I've been told by current CNAs that there is also a downfall. They have the tendency to skip steps that are taught in school because they learned to do things a certain way and bad habits are hard to break. Also, you might want to bear in mind that the CNA may seem to know more now, but when the class gets past bedmaking and vital signs, the playing field will likely even out where all students are on the same level.

Ok Im in my first semester and Im already urked by people. Its mainly people who are currently CNA's making me feel inadequate. When we go to learn a new skill they are used to doing it already on a daily basis and Im learning it for the first time, so it makes me feel should I say "dumb" when these other people can do it flawlessly and Im still going huh? It comes up because usually when we have a skills test its in pairs so they go then you go.

Im not dumb by any means and I hate feeling that way.

Do I just need to step it up a knotch to be good at the stuff by the time we get to doing it, or just get over it and learn along with everyone else?

Just wondering if anyone else has noticed this, Im sure most RN classes have alot of CNA's.

Im normally pretty soft spoken and introverted so Im thinking its just my own complex. But I hate feeling inadequate. Im hoping nursing makes me tough.

I had that problem the first clinical day, also, as I had never worked in the healthcare field at all.

I was paired with a fellow student who worked as a CNA and when we went to change an incontinent patient, she said "Have you done nothing today?" (Because I wasn't sure how to roll the patient, etc. It takes practice.)

And she was like that on a few clinicals. I eventually stood up to her, and she backed off. Coicidentally, she failed the second block, mostly due to the fact that she worked her CNA job fulltime graveyard and was burning the candle at both ends.

We ended up to be fairly close, too.

Specializes in SICU, MICU, CICU, NeuroICU.

There are know-it-alls in every class. I just ignore them and roll my eyes everytime they open their mouth.

There was a CNA in our class who was a know-it-all, apparently she didn't because she failed the OB and dropped med/surg and has to complete her senior year all over again.

I have clinical in the same place that I work (same hospital), and people probably think of me as a know-it-all, but I try not to exploit my knowledge of how things are done at the hosp. Get in and get out.

Gotta love know-it-alls. I remember during an orientation for NUR101 to welcome us in the program one girl spoke up saying how she was a CNA and asked if she could take the test LPNs took so she could skil NUR101. Nope, wrong move on her part because the instructor shot her down fast saying how most CNAs aren't properly trained and how many have picked up bad habits from their job.

I've dealt with know-it-alls in most of my classes. I was frustrated when I was in AP1+2 because there was a group of ladies who thought they knew everything. They sucked up to the teacher as well and were so nosey. They were the teacher's pets and he'd often favor them. So annoying!

Sometimes know-it-alls come in handy. All last week we had the know it all of our group prooving us wrong for the upcoming test. I actually learned a few things from her which were on the exam and got them right mainly cause she kept talking about it.

+ Add a Comment