🔴 NURSING TEST TAKING STRATEGIES (PART 1)

Hello. Hello. My name is Christina Rafano with nursingschoolofsuccess.com and today is a very exciting day because we are kicking off a whole five part video series on test taking tips for nursing students. So in this video today I'm going to be diving into really four of my main kind of general test taking students strategies or test taking tips for nursing students. And then in the next four videos. So starting on Thursday, in the next four videos I am going to walk you through one nursing school exam hack as well as an example or sample question. So in each of the next four videos I'm going to give you a test taking tip that's going to help you out so much in your exam. So in each video you'll get one of those, you'll get a total of four. And then in each one of those videos I'm going to walk through an example question for you to kind of bring it all together. So when you see kind of questions like that pop up on your exams that are, that follow one of those test taking tips that we're going to talk about, you'll know how to answer them because we'll have walked through it in those videos. So definitely stay tuned for that. You're going to love, love, love it. So thank you so much for being here. So today we're going to walk through really my four kind of more general test taking tips for you and then we're going to dive deeper into the next four videos like I said, with kind of those individual test taking hacks for nursing students. So the first main general test taking tip that I've got for you is to come up with a routine. And this is kind of a two parter. So I want you to take care of yourself and I want you to come up with kind of a test routine. So you kind of always do the same thing before you go in to take a nursing school exam. This kind of does a couple things. It gets you more prepared, you know what to plan for, you know what's coming, it's always the same. And then you're just more relaxed, you're more confident because there's, it's not like any distractions. So here's what I mean by this. So the night before, make sure that you get everything set out that you need the next day before you take your test. So if you want to run through your lecture notes or something in the morning, make sure that you lay out your lecture notes. If you, I had a friend who actually always wore the same things for Exams. So, you know, lay out the clothes that you want to wear. If it's always the same thing, you know, kind of your. I don't know, your lucky shirt or your lucky, you know, I don't know, your lucky jacket or whatever. If you have one of those, you know, lay it out, make sure you've got it there. I always ate. I always ate the same breakfast every single morning, actually. I think pretty much my whole way through nursing school clinicals. It wasn't just for exams. It was just always. I would always. I don't know. Super funny. I have one of those. I don't know what you want to call it. The only thing that's really coming to me is, like, the McDonald's egg. Someone help me out. Like, breakfast sandwiches. I don't know, but it's like a homemade one. So it has, like, an English muffin, right. An egg and cheese. And I think I would usually put, like, turkey. Like a slice of turkey in there. So I would always have the same thing. My brother actually got me a. One of those sandwich makers. Egg McMuffin. Thank you. So it's like. Yeah. So my brother actually got me one of those. It's not like a panini maker, but it's actually a breakfast sandwich maker. It's so cool. So he got that for me for nursing student, for nursing school. Because I would always have the same thing over and over. Thank you, brother. So I would always eat the same thing for before my exams. It was super easy, so it was healthy. And so I really recommend that just come up with a routine that you can kind of follow, kind of take the stress off. It's always the same. You don't have to think about it. You see what I'm saying? It's just. It's kind of. It's just your routine. It's your schedule. It's what you always do before your exams, just to kind of, you know, get in the flow, make sure you're ready for your test. And I. So I. I would also recommend that you. Like I did mention if you lay out your clothes, make sure you bring a water bottle. Get. I would. I would recommend going to bed early, obviously. I mean, I don't know how much sleep you need. Make sure you kind of maybe figure out exactly how much sleep you need. It's different for everybody. I had friends in nursing school that were okay with like, six and a half or seven hours. I need so much sleep. Oh, my gosh. I'm like. I don't even know how I function. Without like eight or nine hours of sleep each night. I. I really need a lot of sleep, and that's just kind of my jam. So all through nursing school, before exams, I made sure that I would get that, that, that solid. Okay, not exactly eight hours, you know, it's nursing school after all. But as much sleep as possible before your exams. Let's be real, eight hours might not be possible. So just try to get as much sleep as possible. Try not to stress. Make sure you're kind of in a routine, in a flow, in a jam, and then you'll be more mentally prepared, more mentally relaxed. So that's my first tip to kind of take a step back, get into a routine, find a routine that works good for you. Find a schedule that works good for you. And then also just make sure that you're taking care yourself. So like I said, eat breakfast, sleep well, stay hydrated, bring a water bottle to your exam. That's really important. So that is tip number one is to make sure that you are in a routine. It got a good schedule down, everything's kind of in flow, and that you're taking care of yourself. Now the next tip I have for you is not super intuitive. And I think some nursing instructors might just be shaking their heads at me right about now. I personally recommend that you arrive late to your nursing school exams. Not like super late, but just slightly late to the point where everyone's kind of already flowing into the exam already, or they're kind of already sat. Like, everyone's already sat in their seats. They're ready to go for the test. This makes sure that you are not going to psych yourself out by talking to anybody before the exam. Friends, friends, let's just have a moment here. One on one, do not talk to anybody before your nursing school exam. Don't do it. Don't do it. Do not talk to anybody. You will psych yourself out. You will hear people getting super stressed and talking about like, oh, did you study this? Do you study that? What about this? Did I miss this? Oh, my gosh, what if I forgot to? You know, all those thoughts going through your mind, that is not what you need five minutes before you take your exam. Let me just tell you, that is not what you need. That's the last thing you need. You don't want that stress on your shoulders. So what I always did, actually, I don't think anybody really knew this, but this was just kind of my thing. I would always show up like a minute or two late. Just a minute or two late. Not to where. Like, I would never get in trouble. Obviously, don't get in trouble. Don't hear me wrong. Based on your school policy, just. Just go with that. But just arrive is like kind of the last in line where everyone's flown through the door. You see what I'm saying? That just really makes sure that you're not gonna really psych yourself out or listen to everybody else stressing or, you know, get that. Get that verbiage in your head. Get that kind of, you know, that. Get in that mindset of that stress and everything. You really want that peaceful spirit as you walk into your exam to go and take your exam. So that's my second tips to arrive, like right on time or slightly late. So just don't talk to anybody before you take your test. Don't psych yourself out. Now, the next tip number three. You may have heard this. I do it a little bit differently, but it's rtfq. Read the full question so that F can be interpreted. I know some people use a little profanity there. I do not. So rtfq. Read the full question. So when you're taking your nursing exam, make sure that you are actually reading what the question says. Most nursing school exam questions are a case scenario. So what we call a case scenario or page patient scenario question or something like that. So it's a scenario question that gives you a patient situation. So it'll walk you through, like, here's everything that the patient's got going on, and then what are you gonna do about it? You see what I'm saying? So that's a case scenario question, or a patient situation question, or a case scenario question. So make sure that you read the full thing. You don't want to miss out on key words. Oftentimes there will be like, priority, like, what's your priority nursing intervention going to be? And this, they'll call it like your first action, your initial action. Like, what's your. What's your first. What's the first thing you're going to do? So make sure that you're actually reading the entire question, that you don't miss those key words, because those key words are going to drive the answer that you choose. All of the answers. You know this. All of the answers are good answers on your nursing exams. Most of them are correct, but there's going to be one that is the most correct. We've all heard this before. So you want to pick the one that is the most correct. And to do that, you have to make sure that you Read the full question first before you selected an answer that makes sense. So that is my third tip, is to read the full question. Rtfq Read the full, full question. Now. The last tip that I want to talk about today is to actually, after your exam, is to review it with your nursing instructor, your nursing professor. A lot of students don't do this, and I wish that they did because it's very, very, very helpful. I didn't do it as much as I would have liked in nursing school. I really should have. And it was on my mind a lot because it was always super helpful for me. But after your exams, make sure that even if you got, like all your answers right, just go into your instructor's office or make an appointment for them during office hours and go through your exam with them. So oftentimes your instructor will actually be able to sit down with you and go through the questions that you got wrong and the questions that you got right. Just make sure that you know why you got each question either right or wrong, especially the wrong ones. You do want to know why you got those wrong. So just make sure that you sit down with them, go through each individual question so that you know kind of what, what you need to know more about for the final. So this is the, kind of the key here. This is what we're thinking. This is what we're thinking future is for the final. So you want to go through each of your questions on each of your exams, because, friend, those are the ones that are most likely to show up on your final, because obviously if you're learning it through the, through the term, through the quarter, through the semester, those questions, or at least the topics are going to show up again on your final exam. And if you don't figure out what the problem was after your exam, when you took it. So say you got a question wrong on your exam. If you don't understand why you got that question wrong, and, and that question or a similar question or that topic again, shows up on your final, chances are you're gonna get it wrong. So make sure that after each of your exams or each of your tests, walk into your instructor's office or make an appointment with them during their office hours and then go through, ask them to go through with you each of the questions. Even if you got them right, just go through every single one of the questions to make sure that you actually understand what the question is asking and what the answer is so that you're more prepared as you go through your term and more prepared for your Final exam. So I hope that tip helps. That tip there for sure. Number four definitely will help you for your finals. It's what I always, always, always recommend. Even if you don't do anything else, do that one. Because when it comes to final exam time, that tip right there is going to really save your booty. So those are the four tips I've got for you today. So. So let's go through them one more time here. So tip number one is to make sure that you kind of develop a routine or a schedule and take care of yourself before you go into your nursing school exam. Make sure that you well hydrated, that you ate well, and that you've got a good night's sleep. All of that. Now, the second tip is to arrive late or on time. So not super late to where you get in trouble or break the rules and. But arrive late to where you're not talking to anybody. You're kind of putting blinders on and, you know, you're just kind of in your own world. You're not going to talk to anybody before the exam because, let's be honest, everyone else is freaking out and not nobody knows what's happening in nursing school. So you don't want that stress on your shoulders right before an exam. So don't talk to anybody before your nursing school exam. This is just so important because it really, it really will psych you out if you go in there five minutes before you take a test and everybody around you is freaking out. So just make sure that you kind of show up late or right on time for your nursing exam. That way you kind of zone out, zone everybody out. Don't pay attention to any of the stress going on around you and just focus on what you came to do, which was to take your nursing exam. And now tip number three is to RTFQ read the full question. So make sure that when you sit down for your nursing exam, that you take a deep breath and you read the entire question. Oftentimes, like we said, in nursing exam questions, they ask you to prioritize. It's called priority questions. So it will ask you what your initial response is or your first response, or, you know, what's your immediate action. And so really make sure that you're zoning in on those key words that it's asking for. In order to do this, you have to actually read the full question, read the question entirely to know what they're asking so that you can choose the most appropriate answer and the best answer. As we know, all of the answers on nursing School exams are correct. Those case scenario questions, most of those answers are all correct. But there is one answer that's going to be the most correct. And that is where this tip comes in into play really, really well, because you actually need to read the full question in order to pick out that best, best answer, the most correct answer out of all the answers that they give you that are correct. See what I'm saying? Now, the fourth tip that we talked about is to make sure that after you take your exams, regardless of if you did great on your exam or not, go into your professor's office or make time to see them during office hours and go through your exam with them. So go through each, have your instructor go through with you each of the questions on the exam and talk about what the question was asking, why you chose that answer, and what the correct answer is. I really just want you to make sure that for every question on all of your exams, you that you know what the answer is and the rationale behind it. So this is really, really helpful not only for your understanding as a nurse and at clinical, but also, here's the key is when it comes around to finals time more often, most likely, most, most often than not, you're tested on your finals on the same topics that you were tested on the whole term, the whole quarter, the whole semester. So if you don't understand those topics that you were tested on throughout the, throughout the term, and then when finals time comes around, you're not going to understand those topics. So that's why this is really important to make sure that you're meeting with your instructor after every single exam. I know it's a lot, but trust me, when finals comes around, you're going to really, really wish you did. So make sure that you understand every single one of the questions that your professors asked on those exams. That way you're more prepared for your finals when they come around. Because for sure, I mean, if not those specific actual questions that were on your test, even if those identical questions don't show up in your final, similar questions will, or at least you will be tested on the topics that you were tested on throughout the term. You can, you can write that home. You can definitely bank on that. Because the topics that you learn throughout the term, those are going to show up on your final. So make sure that you understand all of it. And that means that after each of your exams, make sure that you're actually going to meet with your instructor to go through all of the questions to make sure that you understand what that question was asking and why. The answer was correct. That was correct. Even. Even if you got them right or you didn't. So make sure that you make sure you understand it all. That way you're more prepared when finals comes around. So those are the four tips that I've got for you today. Those are just general nursing test taking tips for you for nursing school. Like I said, starting on Thursday. So this Thursday we're starting kind of the, I'm gonna call it a part two to this whole series. So there's four videos that I've got coming for you starting Thursday. So Thursday, Tuesday, Thursday and Tuesday. So it'll be the next couple of weeks. I have in each of those videos I will give you one nursing test taking hack. Gosh, you guys, these are so good. These are gonna save your booty on your nursing school exams. You're gonna love it. It's gonna help you out so much. Plus, in each of those videos we're gonna walk through an example nursing school question. So not only am I gonna give you an exam tip or an exam hack to help you out, but we're also gonna walk through a practice question question. And these practice questions will come from the NCLEX RN Mastery app, which I love. You guys know I love that app. So these questions will be from the app. So they are like, you know, really, really written very, very well to the standard of the NCLEX and nursing school. So you know that you are getting a really great example of a nursing school question. So that's why, that's why I'm using them. That's why I'm using that app. You guys know that I am affiliate for them. They're amazing. It's the app that I recommend in nursing school. So I will be using those questions for the next four videos because it's going to help you out so much. So I'm going to walk through an example question in each of the next four videos for you so that you'll be more prepared for your nursing school exams. So I hope this video helped and I'm super excited to bring the next four videos in this series to to you starting on Thursday. So until then, friends, I hope you have a wonderful week. Of course I'm always around. If you have questions, feel free to email me or leave a comment below. Below this video on the replay and I will get back to you. I tried to respond in the chat, just so you guys know, I got several messages on the last couple videos. The YouTube lives that I've done I I cannot figure out how to respond in the chat after the video is posted. I actually I found out that I actually can't reply to you, so definitely leave a comment below on the replay on this video because I can reply that way to you. I'm sorry that I can't reply to the chat on here on YouTube. I'm really sorry about that. That's a big bummer. So if you do want to chat with me, definitely leave a comment below on the replay and we can talk. I'm always here to answer your questions. So hope you guys had a had a great week so far and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week and we'll chat soon. Take care you guys. Bye.