Help so down and out...

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Okay so now I am in my first semester of nursing school. My first exam I made a 90(B), second 78©, third 76(D). I will admit that I did not study like I should have for the second exam so really no worries there. I have been doing good in clinical. I checked off on my meds the first time. My concern is that my test grades are decreasing. This last test I studied for hours for and I felt really confident while taking the test. Then I missed 12 out of 50. My heart is really hurting because I really felt that I knew the material, but when it comes to translating the material I am struggling. Can some please give me some type of study advice,techniques, or logic? :down: :sorry: :cry: :unsure:

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If the answer has any words like always, never then its not the answer. Also it will never be all or just on answer in select all that apply. Reword the question, take out extra info thats irrelevant, and cover the answers..try to answer it then uncover answers one by one and eliminate as you go..u will usually get it down to two answers then look at priority. .ABCs, Maslows, tube in then tubes out..etc...

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Specializes in Oncology, Critical Care.

I think in your summary you said you didnt study as hard for the second exam as you should, and thats an issue. Every day you need to spend atleast a few hours studying or reviewing so the material stays in your mind. There are many resources out there to help you do well, such as textbooks, past NCLEX question sites, lippincott, thePoint, ATI (they are excellent and i suggest them), and plenty of other resources. Personally I spend about 6 hours a day studying and I get between A and B+. Some people say they dont study and others study for only a few hours. The ones who always talk about hard tests and not doing well are generally the people who don't put in a fair amount of work. So id suggest study more, use all the different resources to do better.

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Specializes in Skilled Nursing/Rehab.

I am in my first semester of nursing school, as well, but I used to be a teacher. The idea of studying harder sounds good, but I thought you might like some concrete suggestions.

Here are my suggestions:

1) Read all of the chapters your teacher is going to lecture on BEFORE you attend the lectures.

2) Complete all of the review questions at the end of the chapters and check your answers against the book. If you don't get the right answer, make sure you understand why.

3) Review your notes from class and any powerpoints or handouts your teacher gives you frequently - like a certain amount of time each day, not just before the test.

4) Do any other practice test questions you can get your hands on. Our textbooks are from Elsevier, so there are extra review questions on the Elsevier Evolve website and they also explain the rationales for the answers to the chapter questions.

5) I bought 2 books to go along with my Fundamentals textbook: one called Test Success and one called Fundamentals Success. Both of these books have practice test questions that correlate with chapters in our textbook.

6) Join a study group with some other people who like to study the way you do. If you like to talk about things (or listen) to understand them, find some other folks who would like to discuss the material with you. If you learn by doing, practice skills/scenarios with them. If you are a visual learner, draw pictures, diagrams, or watch films or videos. Lots of people in my class make flashcards to use to review information like definitions, vocabulary, procedures. Keep some flashcards in your purse at all times so you can look them over any time you have to wait in line, etc.

Okay - that list is looking pretty long. I hope some of those suggestions are helpful for you.

So far, my experience has been that I have to do some reading every day (about 2 hours) to keep up with the readings we are assigned. Also, it is VERY helpful to do practice questions, as reading the info is not the same as reading a bunch of choices and having to choose the best one.

I hope this is helpful! Don't give up - if you are determined to succeed, you may just have to make some changes to accomplish this.

If you want to talk about this more, tell me what kinds of things you have done to study in the past, what has worked and what hasn't.

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I am in my first semester of nursing school, as well, but I used to be a teacher. The idea of studying harder sounds good, but I thought you might like some concrete suggestions.

Here are my suggestions:

1) Read all of the chapters your teacher is going to lecture on BEFORE you attend the lectures.

2) Complete all of the review questions at the end of the chapters and check your answers against the book. If you don't get the right answer, make sure you understand why.

3) Review your notes from class and any powerpoints or handouts your teacher gives you frequently - like a certain amount of time each day, not just before the test.

4) Do any other practice test questions you can get your hands on. Our textbooks are from Elsevier, so there are extra review questions on the Elsevier Evolve website and they also explain the rationales for the answers to the chapter questions.

5) I bought 2 books to go along with my Fundamentals textbook: one called Test Success and one called Fundamentals Success. Both of these books have practice test questions that correlate with chapters in our textbook.

6) Join a study group with some other people who like to study the way you do. If you like to talk about things (or listen) to understand them, find some other folks who would like to discuss the material with you. If you learn by doing, practice skills/scenarios with them. If you are a visual learner, draw pictures, diagrams, or watch films or videos. Lots of people in my class make flashcards to use to review information like definitions, vocabulary, procedures. Keep some flashcards in your purse at all times so you can look them over any time you have to wait in line, etc.

Okay - that list is looking pretty long. I hope some of those suggestions are helpful for you.

So far, my experience has been that I have to do some reading every day (about 2 hours) to keep up with the readings we are assigned. Also, it is VERY helpful to do practice questions, as reading the info is not the same as reading a bunch of choices and having to choose the best one.

I hope this is helpful! Don't give up - if you are determined to succeed, you may just have to make some changes to accomplish this.

If you want to talk about this more, tell me what kinds of things you have done to study in the past, what has worked and what hasn't.

Thank you for posting this. I am in the same boat and am super discouraged. Your post makes sense to me and I wanted to thank you. Any other tips you have would be awesome. Thanks.

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Specializes in Skilled Nursing/Rehab.

FutureNurse114: Here is a website where you can take a quick (

http://www.vark-learn.com/english/page.asp?p=questionnaire

It will tell you what your top learning styles are, and then it gives you suggestions for how to best study according to your learning styles. I found this helpful because it gave me some suggestions that I hadn't considered before.

Sorry so late - but I haven't been on this site for over a week! I had Spring Break and then some tests the week I got back to school. How are you doing?

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Specializes in Skilled Nursing/Rehab.

To the OP, CordaeP:

How are things going for you? Are they looking any better?

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Hi Cordae! I sent you a PM. Could you please check it? :)

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I am in my first semester of nursing school, as well, but I used to be a teacher. The idea of studying harder sounds good, but I thought you might like some concrete suggestions.

Here are my suggestions:

1) Read all of the chapters your teacher is going to lecture on BEFORE you attend the lectures.

2) Complete all of the review questions at the end of the chapters and check your answers against the book. If you don't get the right answer, make sure you understand why.

3) Review your notes from class and any powerpoints or handouts your teacher gives you frequently - like a certain amount of time each day, not just before the test.

4) Do any other practice test questions you can get your hands on. Our textbooks are from Elsevier, so there are extra review questions on the Elsevier Evolve website and they also explain the rationales for the answers to the chapter questions.

5) I bought 2 books to go along with my Fundamentals textbook: one called Test Success and one called Fundamentals Success. Both of these books have practice test questions that correlate with chapters in our textbook.

6) Join a study group with some other people who like to study the way you do. If you like to talk about things (or listen) to understand them, find some other folks who would like to discuss the material with you. If you learn by doing, practice skills/scenarios with them. If you are a visual learner, draw pictures, diagrams, or watch films or videos. Lots of people in my class make flashcards to use to review information like definitions, vocabulary, procedures. Keep some flashcards in your purse at all times so you can look them over any time you have to wait in line, etc.

Okay - that list is looking pretty long. I hope some of those suggestions are helpful for you.

So far, my experience has been that I have to do some reading every day (about 2 hours) to keep up with the readings we are assigned. Also, it is VERY helpful to do practice questions, as reading the info is not the same as reading a bunch of choices and having to choose the best one.

I hope this is helpful! Don't give up - if you are determined to succeed, you may just have to make some changes to accomplish this.

If you want to talk about this more, tell me what kinds of things you have done to study in the past, what has worked and what hasn't.

Thank you. I did some of the things that you suggested and it really did help. Thank you again.

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Sorry I have not been back lately, but I was busy with nursing school lol. Anyways I have completed my first semester of nursing schoool with a B yay!!!!!

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Specializes in Skilled Nursing/Rehab.

So glad to hear things went well for you!! I have a test tomorrow and a final Monday... and then I will be done with my first semester of nursing classes! Wish me luck!!

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So glad to hear things went well for you!! I have a test tomorrow and a final Monday... and then I will be done with my first semester of nursing classes! Wish me luck!!

So how did everything go?

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