Throughout my final semester of nursing school, I have taken many practice exams to further my preparedness for taking the NCLEX examination. Each exam I took provided me with an individual performance profile that would show me various information about how I took the test. These include how long it took me to take the test, the average length of time it takes me to answer one question, and which content areas I am scoring high on and vice versa. I used these performance profiles to establish a time I should be taking to answer questions as well as identify knowledge deficits that I need to improve. I noticed as the semester progressed that I did better when I made sure I was taking at least a minute on every question and given myself a quiet testing environment with distractions like my phone put away.

I noticed in my performance profiles and question remediations that pharmacological content is an area that I struggle with. This is where I focused much of my attention when trying to gain mastery of content. I feel that this went well because by the time it was time to take the proctored pharmacology exam, I scored fairly well.

Another aspect that I found is important to focus on is self-care. There were days that if I had done too much other work before taking an exam, I wouldn’t perform as well. For example, there was a time I took a pediatric course exam and then came home and took a comprehensive practice exam that was 150 questions. I feel that this comprehensive exam didn’t go as well because I was out of energy and had pushed myself too hard that day. I think it is important to incorporate my self care needs into my test taking needs so I can perform better. Now that I know this more, I try to schedule things in such a way that my work load is balanced.

Following graduation, I need to take all of the skills and strategies discussed in this post and put them towards studying for the NCLEX examination. I will do this by using a study schedule with enforced breaks to address my content deficits. I will also continue to take practice exams in order to improve my test taking ability. Once the NCLEX is complete, these self care strategies will be important to take into my career practice as well. I want to provide the best patient care possible and in order to do that I need to take care of myself first. I am thankful for the skills I have gained this semester and will continue to build upon them as I move forward into my future.