December 7, 2023 • 14 mins
Imagine cruising through your nursing exams with the confidence of a seasoned professional - we're here to help you make that a reality! Join me, Lauren Chapnick, on this insightful episode of Nursing Student Coach where we delve into the art of early preparation and efficient studying. We discuss the significance of starting your revision at least two weeks in advance. We'll navigate the best ways to set up your own distraction-free study haven, whether you're at home or searching for that perfect spot in the library.
We can't wait to hear about your success on your exams, and see you on the other side! Until then, keep studying, keep sharing, and keep being amazing.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Nursing school is a wild ride, but that doesn't mean
you have to run and hide whenthe going gets tough.
Don't leave your stressundiagnosed.
You gotta call the nursingstudent coach.
Real-life tips from aregistered nurse, in school and
(00:21):
out.
She's seen the worst.
Now, without further ado, yeah,here is your host.
It's the nursing student coach.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Hello everybody and welcome on in to Nursing Student
Coach.
My name is Lauren Chapnick andI am your host, and I want to
talk today about studying.
I want to cover the where tostudy and the how to study,
because you guys are all eitherin the midst of finals or about
(00:57):
to be.
Maybe finals are coming up in aweek and you're feeling the
intense pressure, and I justwant to review some of the
basics on the art of studyingReally, because sometimes we all
just need a little extra boost,an extra dose of motivation to
(01:20):
get us through and just tap intothat deep well In our souls to
just get us through.
I know you're tired, I know youjust want this semester to be
over.
Maybe some of you are on theverge of meeting a certain grade
to pass a certain class, and Iam just rooting for each and
every one of you Because you canabsolutely do this, it is so
(01:43):
worth it, and I hope thattoday's show can just give you a
quick little boost of what youneed.
So I want to start off bysaying that when I speak to each
of you individually, whether incoaching or in person, when I
come and speak to your classes,a lot of you say.
(02:04):
I've heard this a lot.
You know I do so much better onexams.
I've noticed, when I startstudying at least two weeks
before, when I save it until thevery end, when I save it and I
only have a week to study or,god forbid, a few days Then it
doesn't go my way.
I don't do as well.
(02:24):
But this one exam where Ireally started preparing two
weeks before, three weeks before, I did so much better and I say
yes exactly Because it doesn'tjust start a few days before.
This is nursing school, so youknow that you are going to do
better when you start preparingin advance.
So that's number one.
(02:46):
That's just the overall theme.
It starts the preparation forthe upcoming exam starts the
first day that that topic iscovered in class.
So start with a plan foryourself of how you're going to
break down.
How are you going to study forthis class?
Is it textbook heavy?
Is it PowerPoint heavy?
Is it really just notes thatyou take in class?
(03:07):
Is it really just all over theplace and you're better off just
drilling a bunch of practicequestions?
What is it?
How can you be the mostsuccessful on this exam and
start doing it as early as youpossibly can, minimum of two
weeks before the exam.
Okay, I want to first get intowhere to study, because where
(03:29):
you study has a huge impact onhow that session is going to go
and what your results are goingto be.
So, in my opinion, there arethree places you can study your
home, your school or out in theworld.
So let's break those down alittle bit.
If you're going to study athome, wherever you live let's
(03:49):
say you live in a dorm room, sowe're gonna talk about your dorm
study space.
Or if you live in an apartmentor a house, or wherever an RV, a
tree house, wherever you live,the place that you study at home
needs to be a place with zerointerruptions.
So if that's not possible inyour situation, if you have a
(04:13):
roommate and they just won'tgive you the space to study,
whatever it may be, if you don'thave a place in your home where
you can be interruption-free,then that's not your study space
.
If you can have a place whereyou're interruption-free, great.
So let's break it down evenfurther.
Your home study space shouldreally be your sanctuary.
(04:36):
So, whether it's your own roomor just a little area that's
carved out where you study.
That should be a place that youlove to go.
So that means you can decorateit any way that you want, like
put a nice little candle that'sthere that you can light when
you're studying, or freshflowers, or pictures of people
(04:58):
that you love just a place thatyou love to go.
And the workspace itself shouldbe cleaned off.
If you're working on a desk,get rid of the piles of mail,
the textbooks, whatever.
The only thing that should beon your workspace is what you
need to study, what thematerials that you need that day
(05:21):
.
So, before you study, take fiveminutes, set a timer, put on a
nice song that you like and justclean it off.
Clean off your area and itclears out the clutter in your
brain so that you can focus onlyon what you need to be doing in
that moment.
Okay, no interruptions, neat,and it needs to be well lit.
(05:42):
So if there's not good lightingwhere you are, go out and get
yourself a nice little lamp,because it should be a very well
lit place and just a placewhere you enjoy spending time.
So that's home.
Then you've got school.
I personally loved studying atschool and for me it was so much
(06:05):
fun to discover new placeswhere I could study.
So if you have a campus, let'ssay if your school is 100%
online unfortunately thisdoesn't apply to you but if you
have an actual campus that yougo to, where you go to classes
at least part of the time, thereare so many places that you
(06:26):
haven't even discovered yetwhere you could sit and study
and it is quiet and you will getso much done.
The first place to start is theobvious place the library.
But within the library thereare so many little nooks and
crannies, little spots where youcan find an interruption-free
zone.
Personally, I'm not a fan ofthe big open spaces with all the
(06:50):
tables, because somebody willalways find you and start
talking to you or you'll bedistracted by the other people.
My favorite spots in a libraryare where I can sit by myself.
I'm a one-man show when itcomes to studying.
I like being alone.
I like total quiet.
That's me.
So this is what I am suggestingto you.
(07:10):
If it works better for you tobe in a noisy environment,
that's fine.
That works for you.
But in your library, just walkup and down all the levels, go
in between all the shelves.
There are little desks andlittle tables tucked in places
that you may have not discoveredbefore Empty classrooms.
Go into buildings where you'venever taken a class before.
(07:32):
Maybe there's an art buildingor a dance building.
There's a student center on mycampus where there was a dance
studio and there's a couch rightoutside and nobody was ever
there.
So I would go there early inthe morning before class started
and sit on that couch and study.
That was a big plus for me.
(07:54):
But if you wander around and atdifferent times and you kind of
make note, well, lecture Hall400 is open on Thursdays before
fundamentals, whatever.
I have spent so much timestudying in an empty huge
lecture hall and it's so quietand it's great Early in the
(08:19):
morning before anybody is.
There is a wonderful time tofind those spots.
There will always be emptyclassrooms and they're just
waiting for a nursing student tojust come in and Do what you
got to do.
And what's the worst thing thatcould happen?
People start coming in, fine,so you leave and you find
someplace else.
But just explore.
There's so many places you cango and if the weather is nice,
(08:41):
if you have athletic fields,find some empty benches to sit
on.
Maybe pack a blanket you couldsit like on a nice open fields
in the grass, find the spots onyour campus when it's quiet and
you can go and do the studyingthat you need to do.
Now let's talk about just out inthe world, out in public.
(09:02):
Well, you got public libraries,which I personally love.
I love going to differentlibraries and seeing what the
energy is like there and findingmy quiet spots to study.
So that's always an option.
But you can also always findlike a cafe, a coffee shop,
where there's lots of differentcharacters that go to coffee
(09:24):
shops.
So these old men love to go tocoffee shops and play chess and
talk to you and it's kind of fun.
But Coffee shops are a greatplace to go.
But I have one Really bigrecommendation when it comes to
going to cafes and coffee shops,and that's headphones.
Bring your headphones, becauseit can drown out noise.
First of all, you can put onsome nice Meditation, focus
(09:46):
music or something.
But it also, even if you're notplaying anything in the
headphones, it tells otherpeople to leave you alone.
So it's sort of a social cue,especially like the big
headphones that you can wear.
I Always, always.
If I'm working at a coffee shop, I always have those suckers on
because, as much as I lovetalking to people and sometimes
(10:07):
I'll take them off you know, ofcourse, if I'm taking a break or
I'm doing something thatdoesn't require as much focus.
I do love talking to strangersit's one of my quirks but when
you got to study, when you havean exam, pop those headphones on
.
Nobody's gonna bother you.
So, okay, let's talk about howto study.
Once you sit down for yourstudy session, how should you
(10:29):
study?
How should you spend that time?
So, first of all, you shouldhave everything that you need
for that session when you sitdown, so you don't have to get
up to get anything.
So we're talking water, snacks,coffee and, of course,
everything that you need tostudy.
Whatever books you need, yourlaptop, whatever you're using,
(10:51):
have everything you need forthat session so that you are
prepared.
Have a plan.
Number two is to have a plan.
Don't just sit down and say,well, I guess I'll maybe study
Fundamentals today, maybe I'llread a chapter, I don't know.
No, and I have a whole podcaston this and a whole YouTube
series on how to use yourplanner so you can go back and
(11:15):
listen to that.
But have a plan when you sitdown to study.
If you have two hours thatyou're spending at the library,
that is valuable, precious time.
Know how you're going to spendthat time.
So you could say, alright, from10 to 10 30.
I'm going to drill practicequestions in ATI or Hesse or
(11:35):
Coursepoint, whatever yourschool uses.
I'm going to drill questionsfrom 10 to 10 30 to kind of warm
up my brain.
Then from 10 30 to 11 30, I amgoing to review the PowerPoints
from Lectures 1, 2 and 3, andthen from 11 30 to 12, I'm going
to close my session with morepractice questions.
(11:57):
So that's just one example.
Maybe you want to spend theentire two hours Reading the
textbook, outlining Chapter oneand two, let's say.
But whatever it is, have a planfor yourself, know how much time
you are working with and howyou are spending that time.
Okay, you want to eliminate alldistractions.
(12:19):
So if you are sitting down tostudy, even if you have 20
minutes, you take your cellphone, put it on silent, put it
far away from you, face down, sothat it is not even an option
for you to look at that thing.
So that is number three.
Number four is get up and moveyour body every 30 to 60 minutes
(12:43):
.
So we've all heard my 27 threerule, where you study for 27
minutes, you're focused on thatone thing and then for three
minutes you get up and you justdo something.
You move your body, maybe in acoffee shop or a public library.
You're not going to get up anddo a crazy dance or run around
in circles, but at least get upand move your body for a minute
(13:07):
or two and then sit back downagain.
Don't spend more than an hoursitting in one spot, so you want
to just break that focus for alittle bit so that you can come
back refreshed.
So those are the top four on howto study.
We've got have everything youneed when you sit down, have a
(13:27):
plan, eliminate distractions andget up and move every 30 to 60
minutes.
So that's all I got for youtoday, guys, I hope that this
helped you with kind of yourmindset of how to study, because
you cannot approach it withanything other than complete
(13:49):
clarity and specificity and youcannot study while you're trying
to do other things.
It's not a good idea to sitthere and have Netflix on and
maybe coast through some flashcards.
You've got to just getprioritized, get focused and
know exactly what you'retackling that day, have a plan,
(14:11):
know where you're going and whatyou are going to do.
So until next time, guys, it ismy personal mission to help put
more great nurses into the world.
Thank you for sharing episodesthat you love with a friend who
could also benefit, and thankyou also for your ratings and
reviews.
It takes just a minute and itreally helps put the show in
(14:34):
front of more people who may nothave found us otherwise.
So have an awesome day, guys.
I love you.
I wish you the best of luck onthese finals and I will see you
next Thursday.
Bye-bye.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Thanks for tuning in to the Nursing Student Coach
podcast.
Nursing school is a wild ride, but that doesn't mean
you have to run and hide whenthe going gets tough.
Don't leave your stressundiagnosed.
You gotta call the nursingstudent coach.
Real-life tips from aregistered nurse, in school and
(00:21):
out.
She's seen the worst.
Now, without further ado, yeah,here is your host.
It's the nursing student coach.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Hello everybody and welcome on in to Nursing Student
Coach.
My name is Lauren Chapnick andI am your host, and I want to
talk today about studying.
I want to cover the where tostudy and the how to study,
because you guys are all eitherin the midst of finals or about
(00:57):
to be.
Maybe finals are coming up in aweek and you're feeling the
intense pressure, and I justwant to review some of the
basics on the art of studyingReally, because sometimes we all
just need a little extra boost,an extra dose of motivation to
(01:20):
get us through and just tap intothat deep well In our souls to
just get us through.
I know you're tired, I know youjust want this semester to be
over.
Maybe some of you are on theverge of meeting a certain grade
to pass a certain class, and Iam just rooting for each and
every one of you Because you canabsolutely do this, it is so
(01:43):
worth it, and I hope thattoday's show can just give you a
quick little boost of what youneed.
So I want to start off bysaying that when I speak to each
of you individually, whether incoaching or in person, when I
come and speak to your classes,a lot of you say.
(02:04):
I've heard this a lot.
You know I do so much better onexams.
I've noticed, when I startstudying at least two weeks
before, when I save it until thevery end, when I save it and I
only have a week to study or,god forbid, a few days Then it
doesn't go my way.
I don't do as well.
(02:24):
But this one exam where Ireally started preparing two
weeks before, three weeks before, I did so much better and I say
yes exactly Because it doesn'tjust start a few days before.
This is nursing school, so youknow that you are going to do
better when you start preparingin advance.
So that's number one.
(02:46):
That's just the overall theme.
It starts the preparation forthe upcoming exam starts the
first day that that topic iscovered in class.
So start with a plan foryourself of how you're going to
break down.
How are you going to study forthis class?
Is it textbook heavy?
Is it PowerPoint heavy?
Is it really just notes thatyou take in class?
(03:07):
Is it really just all over theplace and you're better off just
drilling a bunch of practicequestions?
What is it?
How can you be the mostsuccessful on this exam and
start doing it as early as youpossibly can, minimum of two
weeks before the exam.
Okay, I want to first get intowhere to study, because where
(03:29):
you study has a huge impact onhow that session is going to go
and what your results are goingto be.
So, in my opinion, there arethree places you can study your
home, your school or out in theworld.
So let's break those down alittle bit.
If you're going to study athome, wherever you live let's
(03:49):
say you live in a dorm room, sowe're gonna talk about your dorm
study space.
Or if you live in an apartmentor a house, or wherever an RV, a
tree house, wherever you live,the place that you study at home
needs to be a place with zerointerruptions.
So if that's not possible inyour situation, if you have a
(04:13):
roommate and they just won'tgive you the space to study,
whatever it may be, if you don'thave a place in your home where
you can be interruption-free,then that's not your study space
.
If you can have a place whereyou're interruption-free, great.
So let's break it down evenfurther.
Your home study space shouldreally be your sanctuary.
(04:36):
So, whether it's your own roomor just a little area that's
carved out where you study.
That should be a place that youlove to go.
So that means you can decorateit any way that you want, like
put a nice little candle that'sthere that you can light when
you're studying, or freshflowers, or pictures of people
(04:58):
that you love just a place thatyou love to go.
And the workspace itself shouldbe cleaned off.
If you're working on a desk,get rid of the piles of mail,
the textbooks, whatever.
The only thing that should beon your workspace is what you
need to study, what thematerials that you need that day
(05:21):
.
So, before you study, take fiveminutes, set a timer, put on a
nice song that you like and justclean it off.
Clean off your area and itclears out the clutter in your
brain so that you can focus onlyon what you need to be doing in
that moment.
Okay, no interruptions, neat,and it needs to be well lit.
(05:42):
So if there's not good lightingwhere you are, go out and get
yourself a nice little lamp,because it should be a very well
lit place and just a placewhere you enjoy spending time.
So that's home.
Then you've got school.
I personally loved studying atschool and for me it was so much
(06:05):
fun to discover new placeswhere I could study.
So if you have a campus, let'ssay if your school is 100%
online unfortunately thisdoesn't apply to you but if you
have an actual campus that yougo to, where you go to classes
at least part of the time, thereare so many places that you
(06:26):
haven't even discovered yetwhere you could sit and study
and it is quiet and you will getso much done.
The first place to start is theobvious place the library.
But within the library thereare so many little nooks and
crannies, little spots where youcan find an interruption-free
zone.
Personally, I'm not a fan ofthe big open spaces with all the
(06:50):
tables, because somebody willalways find you and start
talking to you or you'll bedistracted by the other people.
My favorite spots in a libraryare where I can sit by myself.
I'm a one-man show when itcomes to studying.
I like being alone.
I like total quiet.
That's me.
So this is what I am suggestingto you.
(07:10):
If it works better for you tobe in a noisy environment,
that's fine.
That works for you.
But in your library, just walkup and down all the levels, go
in between all the shelves.
There are little desks andlittle tables tucked in places
that you may have not discoveredbefore Empty classrooms.
Go into buildings where you'venever taken a class before.
(07:32):
Maybe there's an art buildingor a dance building.
There's a student center on mycampus where there was a dance
studio and there's a couch rightoutside and nobody was ever
there.
So I would go there early inthe morning before class started
and sit on that couch and study.
That was a big plus for me.
(07:54):
But if you wander around and atdifferent times and you kind of
make note, well, lecture Hall400 is open on Thursdays before
fundamentals, whatever.
I have spent so much timestudying in an empty huge
lecture hall and it's so quietand it's great Early in the
(08:19):
morning before anybody is.
There is a wonderful time tofind those spots.
There will always be emptyclassrooms and they're just
waiting for a nursing student tojust come in and Do what you
got to do.
And what's the worst thing thatcould happen?
People start coming in, fine,so you leave and you find
someplace else.
But just explore.
There's so many places you cango and if the weather is nice,
(08:41):
if you have athletic fields,find some empty benches to sit
on.
Maybe pack a blanket you couldsit like on a nice open fields
in the grass, find the spots onyour campus when it's quiet and
you can go and do the studyingthat you need to do.
Now let's talk about just out inthe world, out in public.
(09:02):
Well, you got public libraries,which I personally love.
I love going to differentlibraries and seeing what the
energy is like there and findingmy quiet spots to study.
So that's always an option.
But you can also always findlike a cafe, a coffee shop,
where there's lots of differentcharacters that go to coffee
(09:24):
shops.
So these old men love to go tocoffee shops and play chess and
talk to you and it's kind of fun.
But Coffee shops are a greatplace to go.
But I have one Really bigrecommendation when it comes to
going to cafes and coffee shops,and that's headphones.
Bring your headphones, becauseit can drown out noise.
First of all, you can put onsome nice Meditation, focus
(09:46):
music or something.
But it also, even if you're notplaying anything in the
headphones, it tells otherpeople to leave you alone.
So it's sort of a social cue,especially like the big
headphones that you can wear.
I Always, always.
If I'm working at a coffee shop, I always have those suckers on
because, as much as I lovetalking to people and sometimes
(10:07):
I'll take them off you know, ofcourse, if I'm taking a break or
I'm doing something thatdoesn't require as much focus.
I do love talking to strangersit's one of my quirks but when
you got to study, when you havean exam, pop those headphones on
.
Nobody's gonna bother you.
So, okay, let's talk about howto study.
Once you sit down for yourstudy session, how should you
(10:29):
study?
How should you spend that time?
So, first of all, you shouldhave everything that you need
for that session when you sitdown, so you don't have to get
up to get anything.
So we're talking water, snacks,coffee and, of course,
everything that you need tostudy.
Whatever books you need, yourlaptop, whatever you're using,
(10:51):
have everything you need forthat session so that you are
prepared.
Have a plan.
Number two is to have a plan.
Don't just sit down and say,well, I guess I'll maybe study
Fundamentals today, maybe I'llread a chapter, I don't know.
No, and I have a whole podcaston this and a whole YouTube
series on how to use yourplanner so you can go back and
(11:15):
listen to that.
But have a plan when you sitdown to study.
If you have two hours thatyou're spending at the library,
that is valuable, precious time.
Know how you're going to spendthat time.
So you could say, alright, from10 to 10 30.
I'm going to drill practicequestions in ATI or Hesse or
(11:35):
Coursepoint, whatever yourschool uses.
I'm going to drill questionsfrom 10 to 10 30 to kind of warm
up my brain.
Then from 10 30 to 11 30, I amgoing to review the PowerPoints
from Lectures 1, 2 and 3, andthen from 11 30 to 12, I'm going
to close my session with morepractice questions.
(11:57):
So that's just one example.
Maybe you want to spend theentire two hours Reading the
textbook, outlining Chapter oneand two, let's say.
But whatever it is, have a planfor yourself, know how much time
you are working with and howyou are spending that time.
Okay, you want to eliminate alldistractions.
(12:19):
So if you are sitting down tostudy, even if you have 20
minutes, you take your cellphone, put it on silent, put it
far away from you, face down, sothat it is not even an option
for you to look at that thing.
So that is number three.
Number four is get up and moveyour body every 30 to 60 minutes
(12:43):
.
So we've all heard my 27 threerule, where you study for 27
minutes, you're focused on thatone thing and then for three
minutes you get up and you justdo something.
You move your body, maybe in acoffee shop or a public library.
You're not going to get up anddo a crazy dance or run around
in circles, but at least get upand move your body for a minute
(13:07):
or two and then sit back downagain.
Don't spend more than an hoursitting in one spot, so you want
to just break that focus for alittle bit so that you can come
back refreshed.
So those are the top four on howto study.
We've got have everything youneed when you sit down, have a
(13:27):
plan, eliminate distractions andget up and move every 30 to 60
minutes.
So that's all I got for youtoday, guys, I hope that this
helped you with kind of yourmindset of how to study, because
you cannot approach it withanything other than complete
(13:49):
clarity and specificity and youcannot study while you're trying
to do other things.
It's not a good idea to sitthere and have Netflix on and
maybe coast through some flashcards.
You've got to just getprioritized, get focused and
know exactly what you'retackling that day, have a plan,
(14:11):
know where you're going and whatyou are going to do.
So until next time, guys, it ismy personal mission to help put
more great nurses into the world.
Thank you for sharing episodesthat you love with a friend who
could also benefit, and thankyou also for your ratings and
reviews.
It takes just a minute and itreally helps put the show in
(14:34):
front of more people who may nothave found us otherwise.
So have an awesome day, guys.
I love you.
I wish you the best of luck onthese finals and I will see you
next Thursday.
Bye-bye.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Thanks for tuning in to the Nursing Student Coach
podcast.
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