Study Tips for Nursing School

[ashtenmorse]

I am in my 2nd semester in nursing school. I made it through the prerequisites with a 4.0 GPA. Now that I am in actual nursing school I am starting to struggle. I understand the information and I study as much as I possibly can, but I struggle a lot with the application portion of nursing school. Is there any website or study guide I could use to practice that can help me with understanding how to answer the questions. I have failed my first two exams and only have two more to go and need to make them count to pass. I have downloaded the NCLEX-RN app on my phone that has practice questions that I use daily but it doesn't seem to be enough. Thank you for your suggestions in advance!

[NotAllThoseWhoWander]

The best advice I can give you is to scour the older forums here... There's a search bar at the top of the webpage. I learned a lot (and still do) by looking for a question similar to mine, and reading the replies. Also, when I learn a new concept, I try to imagine how I would use it in real life. There were also several patient scenarios in my textbook - I highly recommending checking yours to see if there are is any mental practice for applying what you learn. Best wishes to you!

[pmabraham, BSN, RN]

First and foremost, did you meet with your professor(s) over the failed exams? If not, that should be a priority. One of the keys to success in nursing school is promptly meeting with your professor(s) (in person is best) after any exam where you didn't do well. Personally, if I'm off my goal by a few points (even if I'm passing), I meet with my professor(s) to go over exams so I understand the rationale of what makes a right answer right, and why a wrong answer is wrong.

In my graduating class, every single student who came in with a 4.0, lost it in the 1st semester. While it is possible to get 100% on nursing exams as well as get A's even if they are low A's, you get used to the mindset, "C's get degrees."

Now, what I've found that helps is in addition to the NCLEX Mastery app is to find sources of NCLEX questions that are as close to the topics being covered in class. I.e. In med surg when we were going over GI disorders, I focused on NCLEX questions for GI disorders. In OB, the same. Sometimes it will be hard to find any (our oncology covered extremely specific areas so finding NCLEX questions specific to certain topics was hard). Try to do NCLEX questions 5 to 7 days per week. KEY: Always review the rationales as to why a given answer is right, and why other answers are wrong. If you are just doing NCLEX questions without looking at the rationales, you are doing yourself a disservice.

For applications with great rationales (in order of how well they are written): UWorld (whose interface is also like the NCLEX itself), PrepU, (not sure about Kaplan as I've not used Kaplan much), and NCLEX Mastery App.

For books, Lippincott NCLEX Q&A (very helpful for Medsurg and some portions of oncology), Saunders (mainly if you need content review), ATI (you can get used - current edition - versions at amazon.com for under $10 per book -- this is mainly for a cliffnotes version of the content with some questions, and the Davis success series.

While I've not used Kaplan much for NCLEX questions, check out their "basic" (vs complete) decision tree => i.e. acute vs. chronic, stable vs. unstable, etc. I found that thought process helpful especially in oncology. Kaplan does have some good youtube videos as well that go over test strategies.