I'm In, Now What?!?!

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Hello Everyone,

I got accepted to nursing school and I am super excited!!! I've attended new student orientation, I have my financial aid, I'm ready to pay my out-of-pocket fee, my background check/drug screen are complete, I have my class schedule and I have a school shirt.

What's next??? I need advice and tips on how to hit the ground running on my first day of nursing school. How did you prepare for your first day??? Did you read ahead in your text? Were you nervous? Did you visit your local office supply store the weekend before? Let me know.

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Specializes in SICU, trauma, neuro.

Congratulations! I did nothing beforehand; instructors don't necessarily plan topics in the same order as the book does.

Do plan on reviewing the material daily; I was one who could cram and get A's, but that method is NOT conducive to long-term retention. I found that out the hard way - I had to relearn a lot of info as it came up again.

During the first week I'd look at all of my syllabi and note due dates on one master schedule. Seeing everything together made it easier to pace myself. So say I had two papers due; seeing that written down reminded me that I would need to start working on them earlier.

Remember to prioritize self-care. Your physical and mental health will thank you!

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If you have your syllabi already, you could start skimming the first day's reading to have a general idea of what will be covered. Other than that, I would focus on relaxing, really enjoy the last few weeks before the program starts and get yourself refreshed so you're ready to immerse yourself when it starts. You can start looking at resource books if you want and order them ahead of time so you can start studying with them on day 1 (Saunders NCLEX review and the Success series for Fundamentals are both great). And if you feel like your A&P is fuzzy in any areas maybe briefly review those topics. But overall spend more time relaxing than studying early, it will be much easier to create a study plan once you have your syllabi and go to your first classes!

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I start in January, too. I did my clinical orientation on Friday. New student orientation is the 4th/5th of January - I'll be getting all my school supplies that weekend (school starts on the 8th). I'm this really intense combination of excited and anxious.

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hang out with friends, make some money and get things done that you may have been putting to the side because when school starts you will not have time for anything extra

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Some things that you could start working on ahead of time are dosage calculations and reviewing your A&P. If your school doesn't require a dosage calculations book, I would recommend picking up a copy of Calculate with Confidence. It was reasonably priced on Amazon and was super helpful to me before starting school. Reviewing A&P is pretty much always a good idea, especially if it's been a while since you had the class. I watched a lot of Khan Academy videos in the weeks before my orientation.

Most importantly though, RELAX! Your life is about to become incredibly chaotic, and you should enjoy your free time while you have it.

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Congratulations on being accepted!

Try to relax!

It's your first day!:happy:

If anything you need to focus on is being friendly with your class/batch mates. Try getting to know everyone and building good relationships.

Also, I'd also recommend making a group email or WhatsApp group at the start to making studying together and sharing of notes easier.

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Know your dosage calculations, know your pharmacology (at least the drugs you are expected to know the first semester), know your fluid and electrolytes. We used Potter/Perry Fundamentals of Nursing, and I highly recommend this book to go with it. "Fundamentals: Davis Essential Nursing Content + Practice Questions 2nd Edition"

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I am in the same boat as you, I begin The LpN Program January 16, I am so unsure of what I need to do. Any tips are great.

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Brush up on your calculations.

You'll need to learn how to do dosage calculations. So you might want to brush up on fractions and conversions (like how many mg in a g). This will give you a little head start for that. We started learning dosage calculations right in the first class in the first semester, and then we had to pass a test the first month with a 90% to go on in the class or we would fail. The next semester we had to take an even harder dosage calculation test the first week of class that we had to get 100% on or we would fail. So, it helps if you already brushed up on your mathematics!!

For solving dosage calculations, I prefer dimensional analysis. I like that you follow the path, cancelling out what you don't need, until you finally get to the units you want. Some instructor's prefer you to use a certain method. My school taught us all the different methods - formula, ratio proportion, dimensional analysis - and you used what you were most comfortable with.

The book I used for dosage calculations was Clinical Calculations Made Easy Solving Problems Using Dimensional Analysis. I CANNOT RECOMMEND IT ENOUGH!! It lays out things in such an easy to understand way!! You can even do a search online of clinical calculations made easy solving problems using dimensional analysis pdf and find it!

Here's some good things for dosage calculations:

Dosage calculations the easy way! - Straight A Nursing

Med Math for Nurses Master Post (dosage calculations and dimensional analysis . . . with practice)

http://wps.prenhall.com/wps/media/objects/395/405072/dosagecalculations.pdf

https://du1ux2871uqvu.cloudfront.net/sites/default/files/file/karol_V5.pdf

http://www.germanna.edu/documents/HowtoSolveDrugDosageProblemsAugust2012.pdf

You shoudl review pathophysiology. That is REALLY important figuring out disease processes and why patients experience the signs and symptoms associated with their diseases.

Some Stuff for Pathophysiology:

What is Pathophysiology

How to Pass Pathophysiology in Nursing School | What is Pathophysiology?

The book pathophysiology made incredibly easy will help too.

You can also look up youtube videos about different pathophysiology (like do a search youtube nursing pathophysiology - a lot comes up)

You also might want to try fluid and electrolytes. That is a big thing, and for some it's hard to learn and understand how signs and symptoms relate. But, it might be easier to just wait for school for that. However, having a little into won't hurt. You can find youtube videos on this and a lot online if you do a search like nursing fluid and electrolytes.

Good luck!

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