Study Habbits

Is there anyone that can give me some good advice on good study habbits. I have to study for the rn pre-entrance exam. That is the least I can do since I had to drop my classes for the summer. I need advice on what to do. I hate reading and I know I have to. Please Help!!!!

REPEAT AFTER ME...Reading is my new best friend, Reading is my new best friend, reading is....

I never had to take a pre-entrance exam for my nursing program, but I did have to take placement tests before taking my pre-reqs. Honestly, there was no way to prepare for that.

There's no way around it- you are going to have to read. There are some other study aids out there that can help you. I like to find online tutorials that I can just watch and listen. Alot of the major universities have links to flash animation tutorials. My textbooks also have online resources with study aids. If you have alot of free time you can find some pretty interesting podcasts! Ah - don't forget flash cards!

Good luck and stick with it. It's only a little suffering for the great reward you get at the end!

Thank You srkastc!!!

I can tell you right now that if you don't like to read then you are going to be in trouble with NS because if you don't do anything else....YOU READ, READ, READ and READ! I like to read but only when it interest me. It becomes difficult for me when it gets to lab values and laws and things like that. But you gotta do it. There is a website where you can make crossword puzzles for free, this may help with some terms and things. Sometimes if I had to remember something like Diagnostic Reasoning, I shortened the words and made sure I had a word bank so I could remember how I spelled them for the crossword. Also there is a website where you can make printable flashcards for free and you can play a memory game with your flashcards online. You can track the ones you miss so that you can review them and do the memory game over and over until you get them right. For me, I have to make learning fun or I become bored. These helped alot.

Also, for the pre-entrance exam, I went to Barnes and Nobles and sat down with the pre-entrance book and some cheesecake and studied for a couple of weeks and did well.

Website for crossword puzzle:

http://galahad.armoredpenguin.com/crossword/

Website for flashcards:

http://www.flashcardexchange.com/

That is it dorselm... If it interests me, I will read it!!! Makes perfect sense. Thanks for the website.

You might want to brush up on your spelling too!! ( :

That is it dorselm... If it interests me, I will read it!!! Makes perfect sense. Thanks for the website.

Wow those are great websites, I really like the idea of printing up flashcards, I am SO tired of writing them out, but I am finding they really help.

Thanks!

Know what you're talking about before you post!!!

what about math? Don't they have some math? I can't remember!

Get the NLN pre-entrance exam study guide - take notes in each section, type up the notes and then start pouring through the practice test questions - over and over and test for time, too! I did this and a friend of mine did as well. We both got 98th percentile with high composite scores. You really need to put your nose to the grind stone and study, study, study. I wish you the best!

jaylynn67--You threw me regarding your suggestion to check spelling. Your response contained a quote and I thought a spelling error was hidden within it. I back-tracked and noticed "habbits' misspelled by the original poster.

Depending on your learning style, listing related items collectively may ease learning, like arrhythmias. For me, it was it easier to learn some things by listing on flip charts or drawing tablets. Arrhythmias went down the left side in a column. Across the top, left to right, also going down in columns, I listed in blocks things that differentiated each arrhythmia—symptoms, drugs used, appearance on EKGs, heart rates, treatable by shocking, etc. Note cards listing discriminators can all look the same and rely solely on rote memory for learning/recall. When set up in a graph fashion, the brain may better remember some things because of their positions on the graph. A fine subtlety perhaps, but a key difference for some folks likes me.

Within the graph, you can further accentuate some things. For example, some arrhythmias may be treated by the same drugs. However, if only one or two of those seemingly related arrhythmias (in that column) is treated with amiodarone, you may highlight that discriminator with color. You don’t want to overdo highlighting or excessively use one color as it could become a “blur” to the brain decreasing effectiveness. If you have a “block” on learning, say, ventricular tachycardia (v tach), perhaps it’ll help by highlighting v tach’s entry in the far left column, just something to make it standout from entries above and below it.

Flip charts and drawing tablets typically are bigger than regular paper. Don't be cheap with pen or pencil. Write big enough so as to easily read info blocks. Can’t get all items on one sheet of paper? Tape several together and make a “mega sheet” where everything is gathered in one location. Some folk can easily assimilate info from several pages of text in a book; not me. It is sometimes easier to extract pertinent tidbits from those pages and place in a “central, consolidated” location.

I made bold lines separating each entry into blocks. Some blocks may be empty further aiding learning because the brain will remember “holes” among other text-filled blocks.

This stuff may seem juvenile, but not everyone learns best in the same fashion. I learned this painfully late in life and nearly washed out of nursing school. This method was recommended by a doctorate of education specialist at our university. She was on tap for med, pharm, nursing, radiology tech, dental lab, etc. students. This method was key to me passing a class on the second go. In a subsequent class, it aided learning the different anemias and passing.

Food for thought…

Is there anyone that can give me some good advice on good study habbits. I have to study for the rn pre-entrance exam. That is the least I can do since I had to drop my classes for the summer. I need advice on what to do. I hate reading and I know I have to. Please Help!!!!

I THINK you might spend some time on your spelling, unless habbits is a typo for hobbits. If you don't like to read, you won't like college. Maybe you'd be really terrific at something else.

There have been some great suggestions. I have a few things to add.

If you want to be a nurse, studying is the way to get there. Further, nursing as a career means a career of studying (spend any time at all with a nurse and ask how often they go for "training" or "continuing ed").

So, as was said above, tell yourself that you are GOOD at studying, and that making good grades is FUN. Trust me, failing is NOT FUN.

I like to create a happy environment to study in so I have several "modes". To take in new material, I kick back in the recliner with a diet coke, reading it all slowly like a novel. When reviewing material that I've seen (in lecture, in clinical, or in readings) I sit at a table and make the EXACT SAME CHARTS as recommended above (this requires that you organize your thoughts). I also make "covers" for the squares using sticky notes so that I can quiz myself.

Early on (in A&P and micro) I used flashcards exclusively, but in nursing school I needed something that I could create faster, so the color coded charts do it for me. I use many different colors of ink to write in the squares.

When in doubt, use the review books, and do each section over and over. Test day jitters will hinder your recall, so make sure you know it so well that you can remember amidst distractions and stress.

Best wishes.