Discussion

Critical thinking help

Aug 18, 200520 yr

Does any one Know of any sites or books were I can practice my Critical thinking skills. I just started nursing school 2 months ago, and I'm having some difficulty with choosing the best answer. Anything would help thanks.

Aug 19, 200520 yr

This is probably not the answer you're looking for, but in my experience it is difficult to learn critical thinking in two short months. This takes time to learn and IMO you have to learn the basics first. It will come, especially with a little more experience.

This book is a required book for our first semester of our program (I'm now a senior NS). While it might not be exactly what you want, it will help you to see distractors in a test question so you have a better chance to pick the correct answer.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0803611625/qid=1124417244/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/104-4963540-9087104

Good luck to you! Wish I could have helped more.

Actually, I just found this while surfing. It looks really good for what you're wanting. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0803610564/ref=pd_sim_b_5/104-4963540-9087104?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance

Aug 19, 200520 yr

Does any one Know of any sites or books were I can practice my Critical thinking skills. I just started nursing school 2 months ago, and I'm having some difficulty with choosing the best answer. Anything would help thanks.

Hi-

Those critical thinking questions can be so frustrating. I discovered a book by Kaplan that showed you step by step how to read the questions and choose the best answers especially when prioritizing pt needs/procedures or who to see first. Also, I found it helpful the whole way through school to use the NCLEX study guides. When you first start doing the questions look at all the rationales-the once you got correct and the ones that you missed so you can see why one answer is better than the rest.

Not too much help. Good luck in school!!

Aug 19, 200520 yr

Author

Thanks, The worst thing about it is my tearcher is really mean, she gets mad if you ask questions. She never said our first test was all going to be critical thinking. I'm passing the tests, not by much but i'm passing. I just wanted to get a better understanding of it.

Sep 22, 200619 yr

Its funny that you bring this subject up. Im in my last year of nursing and I have a huge knowledge base but my critical thinking test skills are crap. I was talking to my teacher today after clinical and mentioned the fact that is not that I am not putting forth 100% its just that it is hard to conform to this type of thinking. (Tricky questions) If you hear of any resources let me know. I'll keep an eye out. Good Luck!

Sep 22, 200619 yr

One good way to learn critical thinking is to practice.

Take your test afterwards and find someone that you can talk to about the ones you missed and critically chat about the tests. It comes with practice now.

Sep 22, 200619 yr

Experts

critical thinking is a purposeful, reflective and goal directed activity that aims to make judgments based on evidence rather than conjecture. it is based on the principles of science and the scientific method. critical thinking is a reasoned interactive process that requires the development of strategies that maximize human potential. got that? that's the scholarly definition. some of the nclex preparation books discuss this subject, but only on a few pages of the entire book. someone recently posted and recommended this particular book: prioritization, delegation & assignment by linda lacharity, et al. in checking the book out on barnes and nobel i found that there were one or two others by nursing writers. that particular book was mentioned on this thread https://allnurses.com/forums/f50/delegation-priority-help-179178.html the above mentioned book had exercises in it. so, did the other one that i also found on the b&n website. you might also do a search on allnurses using the word "prioritization" to find other threads on this subject since it is something of concern, especially when it comes to nclex testing.

on a practical level you might want to explore some information about prioritizing which involves critical thinking because it involves making judgments. i have websites for that, but they almost all are aimed at business people, so you have to make the connection to nursing as you read through them. basically, the logic of it goes like this: you have to make a determination and distinction between which tasks are important and those that are urgent. now, for nurses, this can change at a moment's notice. something that was not so important an hour ago can suddenly become urgent. so, you need to have a little group of questions to ask yourself when deciding what you should be doing and when.

what is the most important thing for me to be doing right now?
what deadlines have i got? if deadlines are now then they win. is your deadline negotiable? can you buy extra time and do it later? (see the link below about procrastination.) if the deadline is non-negotiable, stop what you are doing and go do it.
what happens if i don't do this? (this is the most frequently asked time management question) question the value of everything you do and how you do it. think through your routine tasks or tasks that simply take too much time - are you doing them for a reason or from habit? is this important? is this urgent? do i have to do this? can i do this differently?

http://www.mindbodyword.com/resources/how_to/prioritize_tasks.html - how to prioritize tasks to manage work time. while this doesn't really apply to nursing, the concepts are sound and can be applied to a nurse working on a busy nursing unit. at first make written todo lists on what ever sheets of paper you use for report or note taking. eventually, you can do these lists mentally, but it takes many, many weeks, perhaps months to get to that point.

http://www.time-management-guide.com/prioritizing.html - prioritizing effectively

http://www.ecomhelp.com/kb/inspiration/kb_prioritizing-your-day.htm - prioritizing your day to accomplish more. again, another site for business, but the principles for nursing are there and sound.

http://www.dkeener.com/keenstuff/priority.html - setting priorities.

http://www.ehow.com/how_948_manage-time.html - how to manage your time

http://www.mindtools.com/pages/main/newmn_hte.htm - time management from mind tools

http://www.ehow.com/how_2248_break-procrastination-habit.html - how to break the procrastination habit

http://www.ehow.com/how_3812_make-list.html - how to make a todo list