Share your study techniques

Do they allow you to record class lectures? Our school did and I loved being able to just lay in bed or go do some yard work and listen to my lectures. It's great to listen to on the way to and from school in your car. If you get a voice recorder, have one for each class to help keep things separated. Also, buy one that allows you to slow down the recording so it will register in your mind better as teachers can talk fast sometimes.  Other than that, Lacharity's book is great to read and work on the side. Good Luck.

• Outlined my binders. Bought a bulk of durable loose leaf of paper. (I gave up a few months of trips to Starbucks.)
• Read the summary of each chapter.
• Printed my deadlines and place them on my desk and  binders. 
• Study regularly at the same time w/o distraction. I configured my phone ? to 'Do Not Disturb' with a few exceptions. Only important people can contact me anytime.
• Read the prescribed chapters. I use my printed slides as my notebook. Always have extra loose leaf in case I need it.
• Avoid people who are ambivalent about education or your ambition or dream. 

2 minutes ago, Honyebee said:

• Outlined my binders. Bought a bulk of durable loose leaf of paper. (I gave up a few months of trips to Starbucks.)
• Read the summary of each chapter.
• Printed my deadlines and place them on my desk and  binders. 
• Study regularly at the same time w/o distraction. I configured my phone ? to 'Do Not Disturb' with a few exceptions. Only important people can contact me anytime.
• Read the prescribed chapters. I use my printed slides as my notebook that coordinate with the class and have extra loose leaf in case I need it.
• Review. No more studying a day before exams. 
• Avoid people who are ambivalent about education.

Practice questions!! I remember information so much better when I get a question wrong and have to read the rationales. Sometimes, being able to recall a piece of information not only as it is written in the textbook but as you saw it in a question can solidify it in your memory just a bit more. So, what I do is read the assigned reading and underline/highlight whatever is important, and then I do literally about 50 practice questions within the publisher's online course. If you use Elsevier textbooks, the questions are called EAQs. Not sure about other publishers. If you don't have online resources provided by your school, Quizlet can be handy.

I found that I had to read through the entire book first w/out note taking to understand the general idea. if I go through it without understanding fully I find I end up hi-lighting wayyy too much stuff. So I hold off on note taking/underlying, etc. After this, I will then go through the book again. But this time I'll take notes while drawing my own diagrams/pictures to go along with it. While doing this, I take my time and coordinate the book with lecture slides/recorded lectures, finding that they pulled specific passages from the book. So I make sure to pay close attention to what they pulled from the text because that'll most likely be on exams later. I'll also pair all of this by looking up educational videos and taking some more notes from those to understand it in it's entirety. So, by the end of this process I don't just have certain topics "memorized" but I actually understand them enough to be able to teach them to other people, not just regurgitate information. Wether this study process be an all day thing or a quick review, I'll do this everyday. I get some test anxiety so I found if I'm "crunching" information in before an exam, it's just not going to be beneficial for me. I'll give myself a little mental health break and get my stress levels down before an exam rather than getting anxiety and cramming.

I am about to start my final quarter of nursing school. I have maintained a high GPA and have almost never "read" my textbooks. I have mostly used my textbooks to look up specific pieces of information or to do the practice questions at the end of each chapter. There are very few students (if any) in my program who read the assigned chapters from start to finish. It's way too boring, too much information to retain, and honestly a very inefficient way to study in my opinion. The only time that the textbooks were super useful to me was when I wrote up my care plans in clinicals.

For me, watching Youtube videos, recorded lectures, looking at care plans for the dx I'm studying, and doing tons and tons of NCLEX-style practice questions related to the material I'm studying (and reading the rationales!) has been the most helpful. The only class I made flash cards for was peds because there was so much information to memorize with all the different developmental stages, but you may find flash cards helpful as well. If your instructors have you do case studies in groups, use that time to learn the material also. Talking out a patient's signs and symptoms, interventions, and plan of care with classmates is really helpful. (And if your instructors don't give you case studies, you can always suggest it!)

On 7/14/2021 at 10:56 AM, Shan said:

Practice questions!! I remember information so much better when I get a question wrong and have to read the rationales. Sometimes, being able to recall a piece of information not only as it is written in the textbook but as you saw it in a question can solidify it in your memory just a bit more. So, what I do is read the assigned reading and underline/highlight whatever is important, and then I do literally about 50 practice questions within the publisher's online course. If you use Elsevier textbooks, the questions are called EAQs. Not sure about other publishers. If you don't have online resources provided by your school, Quizlet can be handy.

I turn the objectives at the start of a chapter in the book into questions and then try to find the answers to those questions and highlight that information in the book.

The week of the test I would start doing 20-100 NCLEX questions.

I try not to study and cram the night before the exam, this increases my anxiety.

Also, I was diagnosed with ADHD and I'm prescribed Adderall. Whereas I tended to procrastinate and wander around before getting on this medication, now I find myself to be a lot more productive and focused on the tasks at hand as well as studying. Something to consider for anyone out there.

On 7/14/2021 at 9:56 AM, Shan said:

Practice questions!! I remember information so much better when I get a question wrong and have to read the rationales. Sometimes, being able to recall a piece of information not only as it is written in the textbook but as you saw it in a question can solidify it in your memory just a bit more. So, what I do is read the assigned reading and underline/highlight whatever is important, and then I do literally about 50 practice questions within the publisher's online course. If you use Elsevier textbooks, the questions are called EAQs. Not sure about other publishers. If you don't have online resources provided by your school, Quizlet can be handy.

I used to spend so much time writing out beautiful notes, highlighting my textbook, etc. Practice questions with remediation have been an absolute game-changer for me. I take the PowerPoint my professor provides and will take notes during lectures for my course exam, but taking practice questions has cut down significantly on my non-active studying time and has helped me to score higher and higher on my exams. When you take practice exams or do practice questions, you're constantly challenging your active recall as well as your true comprehension of the subject matter. Seeing questions framed in a variety of ways focused on the same topics help you to truly grasp the information. 

Nurselabs.com is great for practice questions. I will simply search nurselabs "pediatrics" practice questions, or whatever my subject matter is, and they usually have 100s of practice questions available. If your school utilizes ATI, take every single practice question they offer too. 

My study time has decreased drastically since doing practice questions as my main form of studying, and my grades have never been higher. Hope this helps!