NCLEX Exam
NCLEX Exam: 3 Dangerous Myths That Can Cause You to Fail
The NCLEX exam is the single biggest hurdle an aspiring nurse will ever face. Nursing schools are quite a challenge, but that cumulative experience is not the same kind of challenge. A bad day at nursing school can be overcome; a poor score on the NCLEX is a devastating blow to a nursing career. Unfortunately, many aspiring nurses have fallen for some dangerous myths about the exam and have seriously damaged their chances for passing. You should be aware of these three dangerous myths about the NCLEX exam.
Dangerous Myth #1: "The NCLEX will not be a problem for me because I did well in nursing school." On the surface, this sounds quite reasonable. After all, you have just spent from one to four years studying to become a member of the nursing profession, and if something were going to be on the NCLEX, it was surely covered in the curriculum. Yet this is why this myth is so dangerous. Yes, it is true that every question you will face on the exam should have been covered at some point in class, but that does not mean you are going to remember every single thing you have ever learned about nursing. The sad truth is that every year, nearly one out of eight people fail the NCLEX on their first try, and most of these individuals are fresh out of nursing school.
Dangerous Myth #2: "If I fail the NCLEX exam it will not be that big of a deal. Sure, I'll be disappointed, but I can always retake the exam and pass it." Again, this myth sounds perfectly reasonable, but in reality, it does not hold up. We just mentioned that one out of eight applicants fail the NCLEX on their first attempt. Well, the news is even worse for people retaking the exam, far worse. For people taking the NCLEX for at least the second time, the failure rate skyrockets to nearly 50 percent. In other words, if you fail the NCLEX the first time, the odds are very good that you are going to fail it again and again.
Dangerous Myth #3: "There is really not much I can do to improve my chances of passing the NCLEX." This, too, is a wrong assumption. Survey after survey has shown that aspiring nurses who take advantage of a good NCLEX study guide to prep for the test do much better than those who do not. This is beyond dispute, and in light of the high failure rates for first time test takers and the astronomical failure rates for repeat takers, it is imperative that you use a study guide to make sure you pass the NCLEX exam the first time.
NCLEX Test: Overconfidence Can Lead to a Failing Score
If you are planning to take the NCLEX test in the near future, there are some facts you should be aware of. Did you know that nearly one in eight people who take the NCLEX does not pass the test? That statistic refers only to people taking the exam for the first time; for people taking the test a second or third time, the failure rate is nearly 50 percent. Here is another fact that many people are not aware of: the computer-based NCLEX is what is known as an adaptive test. That means that the computer software generates different questions based on the test taker's answers to previous questions. Get early questions right, and you will have to answer fewer questions; get some early questions wrong, and you will be forced to answer more questions than other students in order to achieve a passing score on the NCLEX test.
This is why overconfidence is such a disaster for aspiring nurses who take the NCLEX exam. It is far better to be unsure of your abilities and over-prepare to compensate than it is to be overconfident and fail to prepare adequately. Yet, every year, thousands of nurses fall right into this trap of complacency. Many of the one out of eight who failed thought he or she was fully capable of passing the NCLEX. Because of that confidence, he or she did not adequately prepare for the test and wound up failing. There is even a name for this phenomenon among experts in education and testing. It is called the Dunning-Kruger effect. It is widespread, and no one is immune to it.
The good news is that by avoiding overconfidence, a potential nurse can greatly improve his or her chances of making a passing score on the NCLEX test on their first try. By getting a good NCLEX study guide and spending a few hours in regular review, you can have a huge advantage on test day. Remember, because the exam is adaptive, the more questions you answer correctly, the fewer total questions you will face, which means less opportunity for making wrong answers. Meanwhile, other test takers who answer questions incorrectly will face even more questions, which they are liable to get wrong. Do not be overconfident and pay for it with a low score. Get a good study guide, and you will be in great shape to ace the NCLEX test.
An NCLEX Study Guide Can Be the Difference Between Passing and Failing the NCLEX
Do you need an NCLEX study guide? You may not think so. You may feel that you are ready for the test and are certain you are to going to do well on it. This attitude is understandable; it takes a lot of intelligence, discipline, and hard work to make it through an accredited nursing degree program, and doing so tends to instill a lot of self-confidence in nursing school grads, and rightly so. However, there is such a thing as being too confident, and taking the exam without a good NCLEX study guide is one symptom of overconfidence.
Every year, approximately one out of eight people fails the NCLEX. All of these individuals were sure they were going to do just fine when they walked into the testing center, only to have their dreams crushed when they realized they failed. One of the biggest factors leading to failure is not anticipating how thorough and rigorous the NCLEX is going to be. You will be tested on everything you have learned across the entire span of your nursing education, from theory to practice, and it is simply impossible for someone to remember all of the material he or she has covered over the years of schooling. Many questions that trip potential nurses up are on subject matter they were exposed to early on in their schooling and have since forgotten.
However, with a good study guide, you will not have that problem. Reputable study guides are written by experts on the NCLEX and can highlight some of the subject matter you have forgotten, as well as help you brush up on the material in general. There is a reason so many aspiring nurses use study guides to prep for the test: they work. Fortunately, you will not need to spend weeks or months at the grindstone because the way the NCLEX study guide is formatted, the organization of the material flows naturally and makes reviewing a lot easier than it sounds. On top of that, you do not have to spend a lot of money to get a good study guide; there are some very affordable options. Without a doubt, an NCLEX study guide can be the best investment you ever make toward your nursing career.
Use NCLEX Practice Questions for a High NCLEX Score
NCLEX practice questions are great tools to use for anyone who will be taking the national nursing exam in the upcoming weeks or months. If you are among these people, you should definitely make use of practice questions. The NCLEX is a test like no other and will be one of the biggest challenges you ever face. Every year, over ten percent of nursing hopefuls in America fail this test and see their dreams of a nursing career shattered, or at least put on hold. However, by using NCLEX practice questions, you can make sure you do not suffer the same fate.
The difficulty lies in finding good practice questions to help you prep for the NCLEX. Although there are websites that offer questions to help you review, these sites can present problems. One problem is that the number of questions is usually small, which means they can be of limited help. The NCLEX will cover all aspects of the nursing field, much of which you might forgotten. A small set of sample questions will not be of much use. The second problem is that many of these sites have not been updated in quite some time. The NCLEX is constantly being changed and revised in order to keep it challenging, and old, outdated questions will not have much relevance to the test you will actually face on the big day.
The best place to find effective NCLEX practice questions is in a reputable NCLEX study guide. These guides, some of which are fairly inexpensive, are researched and written by experts, and in order to remain competitive, they are regularly updated to reflect the latest changes to the NCLEX exam. These companies know that they will not be able to continue to sell their products if all they offer are virtually useless, outdated questions, so they tend to stay on top of things. Getting one of these guides and spending a little bit of time every day reviewing NCLEX practice questions is the best plan for passing the nursing exam.