New Nursing Student Must Haves and Advice From Current Nursing Students

hmh0324 · May 20, 2017

Hello

For nursing school I have about 3 five star flex ring binders; these come with pocket dividers and tabs. I love this binder because you can fold the cover over like a spiral notebook and it is very swift to take papers around in a certain order.

I have a storage clip board, many colored pens, and highlighter plus many more. I also stock up on clickable pens.

I would do a tote for clinicals and a rolling bad for lectures; this would help with the weight of the books.

Compression socks and dansko shoes are highly recommended to reduce the risk of foot problems in the present and future.

member123 · May 22, 2017

Congrats!!! That's so exciting!!

My advice to you that has helped me or that I wish I knew before..

- Use a planner; it has saved me and my sanity many times. It is difficult to keep up with all due dates and all you want to accomplish.

- Get a nice stethoscope from the beginning; I went through 3 before I actually found one I could hear through; I wish I had a nice one from the beginning because that's really when you will have the most time to actually hear all kinds of breath sounds and murmurs. I went cheap but none of those worked for me; I finally bought a Littmann Classic III and it is wonderful!!

- App that I enjoy is NCLEX Mastery RN; you purchase it once and have it forever; there are thousands of questions (and organized by topics); I would usually do some of these questions prior to an exam. Also use ATI (if your school uses it); there are many quizzes and mini sessions to practice!

- For studying, it EXTREMELY helpful to prep before a lecture; I didn't always do this, but when I did, I was most successful. I didn't really read chapters, it was just too challenging to focus. Instead, I would review the ppts ahead of time, and then skim through the book to get an idea of what's what. It is also very helpful to review right after lecture (same day at least); I found this to be helpful in really applying the content into my long memory.

- Cheat sheets; I am a visual learner; so with any condition or disease, I typically would look up mnemonics. I would just type in a condition and add "nursing mnemonic" after it and find images on Google. Here is a website that has many images: Nursing School: Medical Surgical Nursing Mnemonics

-- I would also print these out on 1/4 of paper and then make notes on the side.

- Tips:

- Throughout nursing school, I had a document where I would write random tips for the NCLEX about any condition or content, usually anything that professors would emphasize or other little quick hints to remember (ex: seeing floating dark spots of flashes of light = retinal detachment, decreased central vision = macular degeneration)

- One thing I wish I would have done is kept a journal and wrote down my experiences from EVERY clinical day. I had assignments throughout school where it was necessary to write down my experiences, and those are the ones I remember most. Now that I am done with school and am going through interviews, I wish I would remember most of my clinical experiences so I could use them as examples. Nothing extensive, just a few sentences to jot your memory of what patient you took care of or some event / memory that happened.

- Another tip is learn the HOW and WHY behind health conditions, diseases, or procedures. It will help you in the long run, to actually understand things and not be as stressed.

- Be somewhat involved in different events or opportunities while in school; it will look good on your resume. Also, make friends and study together (by doing questions or teaching each other). After an exam, I would meet up with my friends to remember what questions we had on the exams. We didn't share this info with anyone, but between each other, it really helped us to remember the questions and understand what we did wrong, and prep for cumulative finals.

- Also do as much as you can during clinicals. You are a student and it's perfect timing to gain experience, no matter how scared or nervous you are. Jump in!

Good luck!! :)

nurse2beomoola · Mar 22, 2018

Hi, can you please tell me the name of the comprehensive review books

midwifemae · Mar 22, 2018

Shoes - Depends on your feet. Mine are fairly flat and I like Sketchers and Alegria--great arch support
Nursing bag/Totes/Backpacks - Honestly, I found a great bag at walmart, not even sure of the brand, and it has held up great. I use tote bags for clinical from Old Navy.
Binders/Planners: 1" binders for each class with 4-5 dividers each. I found a couple apps on my phone for the planner part to keep all my assignments straight. Also set reminders in my phone and in the calendar.
Pens/pencils: Tones of colors! I have to write my notes with multiple colors. Whatever brand, colors, and shape (for holding: skinny or fat) works for you
Apps - 1) iStudiez Pro, but I use the free version and get everything I need from it
2) NCLEX RN Mastery App:worth the $30-40 for the full version!! 3) Blackboard app (if your school uses it) 4) CDC app 5) Spotify premium for best driving and studying music!
Study Guides/Cheat sheets/Videos - youtube has great resources of videos for explanations on certain topics, Saunders study guide
Stethoscopes - Littmann

PriPri · Mar 27, 2018

I'm definitely bookmarking this thread. I'm starting in the fall too!