🔴 TEST TAKING ANXIETY (TOP 3 TIPS)

Hello, hello, hello. My friend Christina here with NurseSchoolOfSuccess.com today in this video, we are going to talk about how to reduce test taking anxiety in nursing school. So I'm going to give you my top three tips for kind of bringing down your anxiety as you go into your nursing school exams or especially now we're coming up onto nursing school finals. So I know this week a ton of us, you guys are having your nursing school finals. So yay, congratulations for making it this far in your term. And now we're kind of coming to the point where we need to figure out how are we going to kind of curb that anxiety. So I have my top three tips that I'll share with you today in this video for doing that. So tip number one, this is probably the one that helped me the most personally was showing up early to the exam so I could just make sure that I was there on time. I didn't have to stress about, you know, being late or anything. But here's the huge but to this. So show up early to the campus. So show up early to school. However, do not, and I repeat, do not go into the testing room or the testing center or even, even in the building where everybody is, do not go into where everybody is kind of collecting, everybody's kind of there crowding around the testing center or in the testing center building. Do not go over there where the test is happening until the test is just about to start, like right on time. Show up right on time for that exam. And here's why. So, you know, in nursing school, everyone gets super stressed and super anxious, especially before exams. So I found that, that kind of space, that area, that building, everyone was all super stressed, super anxious. And I did not want that energy around me before I went and took the exam. It would really, it would really kind of clog up my mind and put me in not a very good mental space before taking that exam because you don't want everybody else's stressed to kind of seep into you, you know what I'm saying? So I really, really recommend that you show up early to campus just so you get there. You can kind of calm your nerves a little bit. But stay away from the testing center or the building where you're taking your exam, or the classroom or wherever the testing center where the exam is actually going down. So stay away from everybody else just to make sure that you can be in a very clear, calm, stress free, no anxiety kind of headspace in mind before you go in and take your exam. So that is my major tip number one. This helped me so much just because I would really kind of take on other people's emotions and other people's feelings about the exam and hearing how stressed everybody else is or how much someone studied or how little someone studied, it would just really mess with my mind before the exam. So I needed to make sure that I was calm and collected so that when I was more mentally prepared to take the test. So that is my number one tip for you is to show up to campus, of course, early so you, you know, don't get stuck in traffic or you're not showing up late to the exam. So just get to campus early, but don't go into the testing center or the building or kind of go, you know, join the other students until right on time, right before the test is going to start. You see what I'm saying? So that'll just kind of help you not get stressed or anxious or like take on other people's kind of emotions or get stressed and caught up in all of that before the exam. Now my second tip for you is to normally during nursing school exams, and the same thing for when you take the nclex, you will get a whiteboard, or at least this was true when I took the NCLEX a couple years ago. So you, you do get a whiteboard during the NCLEX exam. And you should also for nursing school, it's kind of a practice round. So I would always, always, always for my nursing exams write out a scripture verse on top of my whiteboard or scratch paper or whatever they give you. So this is my number two tip for kind of bringing down your test taking anxiety when you go in to take your nursing school exam is to write out a scripture verse on your whiteboard or on the scratch piece of paper that they give you. That way, as you're going through and you come across a question that's hard, you don't know the answer or is really kind of tripping you up. That way you can just kind of remind yourself of a nice scripture verse what God says about you, and it can kind of really help you calm your anxiety and curb your stress, you know what I'm saying? So I would actually always write J2911 for Jeremiah 29:11. That was always my favorite to write down. It's that for I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, but plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. So that was always my favorite to write down. I would just, I wouldn't actually write down the whole thing. I didn't need to. I would just write J 29 11. And that was just kind of my reminder for me that, okay, take a step back, Rosina. God's got this. It's no big deal. I'm just going to do my best and he's going to take care of the rest. So that is definitely, definitely something I recommend you do because it really will just help you calm down and curb that test taking anxiety during your nursing school exam. So you're not all, you know, frazzled in your mind. Because I am definitely someone that gets frazzled very easily. So I need to be very, very cautious with that. So that's why I think these tips are so helpful. Now, tip number three that I always had to do was bring water and a snack. So this kind of seems pretty simple. I mean, you've probably heard this a ton, but I was always surprised at how many nursing students would forget to bring water or forget to bring a snack. So you definitely do not want to walk into a nursing school exam hungry or thirsty or dehydrated or, you know, lack of sleep, lack of energy. You want to make sure that you're taking care of yourself. So that is a huge deal. Because when you go into nursing school exams, when, what are they going to test you on? They're going to test you on critical thinking, on your critical thinking skills. And in order to actually think critically and succeed on your nursing school exam, you have got to make sure that you're taking care of yourself and taking care of your mind, making sure that you're eating, you're sleeping, and you're staying hydrated. That way you can actually think critically during the exam. Does that make sense? So this is, this is huge. And I was always so surprised at how many students actually didn't take this seriously or make that happen. They didn't bring water, didn't bring a snack, and they would always be hungry or dehydrated during their test. And also for me personally, just having water with me greatly decreases my anxiety. So just having the ability to drink water during the test, even if you have to go, you know, away from your testing, what do they call it? Away from your computer or if you're taking a paper test, if they still do that at your school, if you're taking your, you know, step away from your desk to go drink water, if they don't, like, allow it at your computer or at your desk where you're taking the test, you know, even just having water there with you that you can access can definitely decrease your stress and decrease your test taking anxiety. So definitely recommend bringing that. Keep it in your backpack. Keep healthy snacks like granola bars or nuts or, you know, something, a small sandwich, you know, a bagel or something. Bring something small you can just maybe even snack on periodically during the exam. If it's a really long exam, you just want to make sure that you're really taking care of yourself. Because if you're not taking care of yourself, if you're not in that proper headspace, then you're just not setting yourself up for success and things could go, you know, pretty sour pretty quickly. I've had so many times nursing students have emailed me saying that they knew the answers, they had studied so hard and they knew it, but they were not taking care of themselves. They just missed something or they just forgot something and they had no idea how they forgot. They forgot what because they knew it. They knew it. So that's where these tips really, really, really come in handy to decrease your test taking anxiety will help you be so much more successful on your exam. So I hope these tips helps. I know this was a little bit of a shorter video today, which I'm glad about because I really just wanted to rapid fire these at you to help you as much and I really hope they help. So the first one is to make sure that you show up on campus early just so you're there, you know, you don't get stuck in traffic, you're not going to be late for your test. However, this is a huge caveat. Do not walk into the testing center or the room that you take the test until right on time before the test. So like when the test is starting, right before the test is starting, then walk in there. This is just going to make sure that you're not going to be in that whole crowd of nursing students going in to take their exam. Because as you probably know, everyone gets so nervous before taking nursing school exams. So that is just going to increase your test taking anxiety if you are part of that crowd of kind of stress and anxiety over there. So I definitely recommend not even going in the building, not even going near that testing center before it's right on time to take your test. So that way you're not late to your exam, but you're also not part of that whole group of, you know, stuff. So you're not getting that energy or, or you know, kind of, that, that's clogging up your mental space before you go and take the test. So that's my first tip. Now my second tip is to write out a scripture verse on your whiteboard or on the piece of paper that they give you. So that way when you come to a question that is tripping you up or you you're not sure of the answer on, you can definitely just take a step back and read that scripture verse or have it remind you of God's plan for you and that, you know, just do your best and it's gonna be okay no matter what. So my favorite that I would always write down was Jeremiah 29:11. So J 29:11. So maybe that would be a good one for you to write down as well. Now the third tip that I have for you about reducing test taking anxiety is to bring water and snacks. So definitely just make sure that you're taking care of yourself, friend. Make sure that you're staying hydrated and that you're not hungry going into your exam. So really just make sure you're taking care of yourself and that is greatly, greatly going to help set you up for success and greatly decrease your test taking anxiety. Now if you need more help studying for nursing school exams, I do have a free med surg study checklist you can download. There is a link down below for that. Definitely snag it. It's awesome. It literally walks you through step by step how to study for med surg nursing exams. And I've got actually a whole bunch of other test taking tips on that checklist as well for you to check out. So definitely click that link down below, download it. You're going to love it. It's going to change everything for you. It's the things to focus on in med surg so it's going to help you out so, so much. Now I saw a comment come through here. I know I am okay. Ahmed said hi. So thank you so much guys for hanging out with me today. I'm so excited to be here. I'm so excited to do these face these YouTube lives. Almost love Facebook live YouTube lives with you here and thank you so much for joining me. I hope you have a great finals week. I hope they go well. I know we have so many members inside of our nursing SOS membership community that I've been in communication with constantly over the past couple weeks, kind of past couple weeks kind of preparing them for their final exam. So that's been a lot of fun. So I hope that your finals get go well for you and we will chat soon. Take care you guys. Bye.