PAX Vocabulary

[Nursevibes, LPN]

Hey guys!

I made the decision to go to nursing school (ABSN) after seeing how nice and caring the nurses were to my mom when she was diagnosed with a serious illness a few months ago. I really appreciated that and I decided to pursue this career because it just seems so rewarding. I also have a few RNs in my family and they're like the only people I know that love what they do.

Anyway, as of right now, my number 1 choice is Hunter College which happens to require you to take the PAX exam. I purchased the NLN RN Pre-Entrance Exam book 3rd Edition from Barnes and Nobles the other day. I was wondering how I should go about studying for vocabulary. Should I just focus on prefixes and literally every word that's in the practice tests (including the ones in the answer choices) or should I study words from GREs? I used to think my lexicon was pretty decent until I took one of the practice tests and only got 17 right out of 30. If someone that has taken the exam can point me in the right direction, that would be great!

Oh! And btw. I have not even begun to take my prerequisites. I will be starting next month with Developmental Psych and I will start the science courses in the Fall. However, I briefly went over the Science questions on the practice test. I got most of the biology questions correct which is pretty weird because it's been 8 years since I've taken that class in high school. I didn't even bother looking at the Chem questions yet because it's also been about 7-8 years since I've taken that and I got a C+ and I'm pretty sure my teacher was doing me a favor by even giving me that. Granted, I was a senior at the time and was cutting that class like at least once a week. However, I still do remember some things about Chem. As far as physics is concerned, I've never taken it a day in my life so I'm a bit intimidated. The math and reading comprehension part is almost a joke to me. Those have always been my biggest strengths in school.

Before anyone tries to discourage me from taking the exam, I just want to throw it out there that I will not be taking it until November or December and I am already spending about 20-30 hours a week preparing for my prerequisites in August and also teaching myself the basics of physics as I will not be taking that as a course. If it seems like I am overdoing it, I just know that Chem is not a big strength of mine, nor is it a course that I ever enjoyed taking..but I know it's something that HAS to be done and done well and I just want to make sure I do everything in my power to stay ahead or, at the very least, keep up.

TL,DR I just want to know if the book I bought is enough as far as vocabulary is concerned. Also, any other general tips about what to spend more time studying is definitely appreciated! Thank you guys so much!