For those who passed: Please share your study habits

The rules are relatively fresh in my mind too...it is cut and dry...you are not to discuss the test-it is a violation of the law...how many questions you received or didn't recieve is part of the test...

And to answer your question-no it will not help them...

I'll just leave you to your belief's for the purpose of not hijacking this thread. All I'll say is it's strange how the forum title is NCLEX Discussion Forum but according to you "you are not to discuss the test-it is a violation of the law".

Nope according to Pearsonvue-

You may not disclose or discuss with anyone, including instructors, information about the items or answers seen in your

examination (this includes posting or discussing questions on the Internet, social media websites).

Candidates should be aware and understand that the disclosure of examination items before, during, or after the examination is a

violation of law. Violations of confidentiality and/or candidates’ rules can result in criminal prosecution or civil liability and/or disciplinary

actions by the licensing agency including the denial of licensure.

But I will leave you with your beliefs-me hijacking a thread...just suggesting that how I studied might not help another person because I am different from them-if you would have read my orignal post. :)

I hope you didn't assume I didn't already look up the rules on the NCSBN website. From our understanding it is referring to the discussion of the questions and answers (posting or discussingquestions, information about the items or answers seen) which would make sense since it might give people an advantage when taking the exam. That would be a clear violation. But saying how many questions before the exam stopped whether you passed or failed?

Does it disclose any information about the questions? No

Does it disclose any information on items or answer seen? No

Does it help them do any better in the exam? No

And please do not assume that i am stupid by defining "violation of law".

And maybe you should read my post clearly. I didn't accuse you of hijacking the thread. I said I wanted to avoid hijacking the thread, in case you don't understand what that means, it means discussing in length something which has nothing to do with the original topic, which is exactly whats happening now.

One more thing, if we go by your logic, everyone in this particular forum by technically "discussing the exam" is a criminal and should be denied a license.

Oh and don't worry. So as there is no room for misinterpretation, I emailed NCSBN an hour ago to clarify.

Hi There, I see stated you wouldn't do the NCSBN review course again. May I ask why? what was it that you decided it wasn't helpful? I'm testing in October and thinking of taking it?

Thanks!!

Would you recommend NCSBN questions? I am thinking of purchasing the 3-5 week package..would love to know your thoughts on that...

I pretty much made a schedule on a dry erase board. Instead of hours of studying; I made topics to study. So, if I got through a certain topic fairly quickly, then great. If I didn't, then I looked at it until I did. I had to rearrange topics a few times and change the schedule. But for the most part, I stuck with it. It helped that I had already picked a date and refused to change it. I studied Saunders Comprehensive Review and PDA by LaCharity. Then, questions from Lippencott at the end. I also did the CD that came with Saunders. If I got tired or bored, I stopped. You do not retain info. when you are not focused on what you are reading. I went and had fun also to de-stress. I studied for a month.

I got about 7 hours of sleep, ate breakfast, made sure I went to the restroom before I took the test, so I would not have interruptions. I wrote myself a note for the day of the test and cut out the letters "RN". I read the note the morning of and brought the letters with me to the testing site (left them in the car). Looked at them before I went inside to test. I also said a prayer on the way to the testing site and told myself "Let go and let God."

When I was done, I came home and tried the PVT and got the "good" pop up. Received an email reply today that I passed.

Congrats... Thank you for sharing...

It was a little pricey and not very helpful. It was a hard read review wise. I found Saunders great for review. It hit all the the main points, of course with out the med/surg background to explain why's of things. If you can read it and know why things are then it helps you remember the key/main points. Mosbys questions are tough, better than the state board questions. By which I mean if you can do them you can do nclex. You would think the state board questions would be better, but I found them confusing and not great with the rationals. with mosbys if you get it wrong you know why and don't make the same mistake. So more progress... Doing questions that don't really clarify what is right and why so you get the next ones right just are not helpful at least not to me.

1. How many hours a day did you study for NCLEX, and for how long? I studied Mon-Fri for about 5 hours each day. I did this for 2 weeks before taking the test. I found that taking NCLEX right after graduation worked best for me - graduated May 18, took NCLEX June 5th.

2. What books did you read? Any book in particular you focused on? I found Elsevier/HESI book most helpful!

3. Did you take a classroom/online review from Kaplan, Hurst, etc.? No. Too expensive.

4. Did you answer practice questions? How many per day?

YES! This is what I focused most on. 150-200/day.

5. Please share any other study habits/tips/resources/books that you feel has greatly helped you in passing NCLEX. I didn't find reading review books very helpful. To nail the questions you gotta practice the questions! Best piece of advice I can give.

Here's what I can tell you. I got an 99.29 conversion score on my hesi on the ncbon questions...60 it was all I could do to get a passing score, on some of them. I got 75 on nclex lot count of how many sata q's and was done in just over an hour. Longest hour of my life but still...