First Semester Student - is this normal?

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Hello everyone -

Please tell me this will get better.

I have never ever been so frustrated in my entire life. I am a first semester nursing student. I am SO FRUSTRATED with this program I want to scream. I don't know why they are teaching students in their 5th week all the intricacies of fluid and electrolyte imbalance, but I am not wrapping my brain around this material, and I guess I need a pep talk. There are so many discrepancies between text books, they don't actually walk through any of the skills, we just read the book and then watch videos.

In the next 4 weeks, I have 4 different tests, which would be fine, if there was any consistency between what was being lectured on, and what we were reading. I also have a scenario involving an entire head-to-toe assessment and medication passing. Remember, this is 1st semester, week 7 starts on Monday. And they haven't gone through the basics of what is expected in a head-to-toe yet, just handed us a rubric, turned us lose for 45 minutes in lab to practice with each other and didn't walk around and give any direction. I have no idea if what I am doing is right or wrong.

Am I being a wuss? Is this normal? I just wish we had some kind of instruction and consistency between the instructors, and some actual hands on time before we get thrown into a huge scenario worth like half our grade. Sigh. I need a pep talk!

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Specializes in Home Care.

Did you take your concerns to your instructors?

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Twice.

I have emailed back and forth with her, called her, and attempted to sign up with the tutor, who seems to be completely booked and isn't even getting back to me.

She just keeps telling me that I need to study as much as I can. I study for 4-5 hours minimum a day outside of class. And I have other classes. My good friend is taking the class with me and she is getting fabulous grades (I have since asked her to stop telling me her grades -- it's not helping me). But, most everyone else I have talked to is doing as bad (or worse) as I am.

I don't know if it has to do with this being this instructors first term teaching first semester students, or if I should accept that this is going to be an uphill battle for me. I wish we got more than 1.5 hours of clinical every week. I need to DO something and practice it hands on and see it in action for it to click.

I am so distressed, I don't know what to do.

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Specializes in Psych.

Sounds a little disorganized. I did Fundamentals last semester and we spent labs 5-7 (we had alternating weekends of lab and clinical after the first 4 weeks which would have been labs 1-4) on assessment, so we started cracking on it pretty much right away. I agree that not getting that practice time is rough. Do you have any handouts or paperwork about what your school expects in an assessment? If not, I highly suggest you go on youtube and look up "head to toe assessments" Lots of great videos there. Find people to practice on. Friends, family members, whatever. Physical assessments are one of those skills that you just have to repeat over and over to get comfortable with. Heck, I'm in my 3rd semester and am just NOW starting to get really comfortable doing it on the floor.

And re the F&E stuff. Yeah, that is a VERY challenging topic to learn. That was our last lecture in clinical and our first this semester in med/surg 1. Luckily we have some computer software available in our nursing computer lab that was VERY helpful when it came to reviewing fluid and electolytes.

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Specializes in Critical Care; Cardiac; Professional Development.

I cannot comment on the rigors of your semester. Nursing school is tough, pretty much anywhere you go. Some schools are more supportive than others during the process.

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Sometimes nursing school can seem more like a teach-yourself program... the coursework just breaks down various content... 1 week - 4 dozen GI issues (3 hr useless lecture; cover 250 pages on your own; then be tested with a mere 25wacky "NCLEX-style" questions that barely touch on any of the material covered) and trach tube care (show you once, leave you to flounder with each other and then mark you off for minute, inconsequential differences in technique - like the one you reviewed from the school lab's video library).

They warned us we needed to know EVERYTHING in the syllabus but didn't teach much of anything. It felt like they crammed everything onto to syllabus as their own 'CYA'. No student can complaing "we never covered that!" ... because in the thousands of pages text assigned, just about everything was touched upon, though maybe just a few words, once as an aside.

It actually discouraged me from attempting to get a deep understanding of things like fluid/electrolyte because that would take me hours of study to get and there'd be maybe 2 test questions on it; meanwhile, that would be study time taken away from covering all of the assigned reading, re-writing care plans (since instructors were rarely clear on exactly what they wanted), etc.

I found school pretty frustrating, too!

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Sometimes nursing school can seem more like a teach-yourself program... the coursework just breaks down various content... 1 week - 4 dozen GI issues (3 hr useless lecture; cover 250 pages on your own; then be tested with a mere 25wacky "NCLEX-style" questions that barely touch on any of the material covered) and trach tube care (show you once, leave you to flounder with each other and then mark you off for minute, inconsequential differences in technique - like the one you reviewed from the school lab's video library).

They warned us we needed to know EVERYTHING in the syllabus but didn't teach much of anything. It felt like they crammed everything onto to syllabus as their own 'CYA'. No student can complaing "we never covered that!" ... because in the thousands of pages text assigned, just about everything was touched upon, though maybe just a few words, once as an aside.

I found school pretty frustrating, too!

I cannot begin to tell you how much I love this post. This is EXACTLY what it feels like. The lecture feels so totally useless, because essentially my instructor is just reading all of the headings in the chapter, and not really covering anything else. :mad:

I know it will get better. Are there are good study guides that can be bought for fundamentals?

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I know exactly how you feel!! I am a first year /first semester nursing student too and you described my class environment! I am sooo confused and feel as if I am muddling through on my own! I did not expect the class format to be like this at all as I, for some reason, expected a lot more demonstration (other than videos) and other simulations to help understand the care setting.

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From a second year student, yeah thats pretty normal. You probably wont be able to digest everything that's thrown at you, so figure out what your instructors are looking for. Give up on the idea of right answers, they will write test questions that are flat out incorrect. Don't lose your cool. Ask the instructors what they think you should be focusing your studies on, and even what will be covered on the test.

Bottom line: Nursing school is a short ride on a broken roller coaster, hang on tight it'll be over before you know it.

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study groups! form one...a godsend!

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From a second year student, yeah thats pretty normal. You probably wont be able to digest everything that's thrown at you, so figure out what your instructors are looking for. Give up on the idea of right answers, they will write test questions that are flat out incorrect. Don't lose your cool. Ask the instructors what they think you should be focusing your studies on, and even what will be covered on the test.

Bottom line: Nursing school is a short ride on a broken roller coaster, hang on tight it'll be over before you know it.

Even when we ask flat out what's going to be on the test, it's not the same, LOL! Ah well. I will have to be happy with the grade I am getting and go from there.

One of the questions on the last test was so weird -

'You are walking down the street, and you see a close acquaintance that has lost 40 lbs. You feel:

1) Inspired to lose weight.

2) Uneducated in how to lose weight.

3) Depressed about losing weight.

4) (I don't remember, but it was something that was totally incorrect).'

***** What does that have to do with nursing? Even the proctor of the exam was like....'what does this have to do with anything?' when asked. Weird.

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Hahahah thats a really bad one!!! I would answer A.... the instructors are making this stuff up with the intention of teaching us "Critical Thinking". Get Inside Their Heads, just don't get stuck there ;)

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