TAKING THE EXAM
You have a maximum of 5 hours to complete the exam, which includes the beginning tutorial, a break reminder after the first two hours of
... [Show More] testing, a break reminder after an additional 90 minutes of testing, and any additional breaks you
may take.
There is no time limit for each question. The NCLEX-PN® examination is a
variable-length adaptive test, which means that your test will be anywhere from
85 questions to 205 questions. Of the first 85 questions, 25 are experimental items
that are not scored. Your test will end when the computer has determined your
ability and you have taken at least 85 questions, or when you have reached the
maximum testing time of 5 hours, or when you have answered 205 questions.
THE NCLEX-PN® EXAMINATION Unit 1
3
▶ WHAT BEHAVIORS DOES THE NCLEX- WHAT BEHAVIORS DOES THE NCLEX-PN® EXAMINATION
TEST?
The NCLEX-PN® exam does not want to test your body of nursing knowledge; it
assumes you have a body of knowledge because you have graduated from nursing school. Likewise, it does not want to test your understanding of the material;
it assumes you understand the nursing knowledge you learned in nursing school.
So what does this exam test?
The NCLEX-PN® exam primarily tests your nursing judgment and discretion.
It tests your ability to think critically and solve problems. The test writers recognize that as a beginning practitioner, you will be managing nursing assistants
to provide care to a group of clients. As a member of the nursing team, you are
expected to make safe and competent judgments about client care.
▶ CRITICAL THINKING AND CLINICAL JUDGMENT
What does the term critical thinking mean? Critical thinking is problem solving
that involves thinking creatively.
Using clinical judgment, you successfully solve problems every day in the clinical
area. You are probably comfortable with this concept when actually caring for
clients. Although you’ve had lots of practice critically thinking in the clinical area,
you may have had less practice thinking critically and using clinical judgment on
test questions. Why is that?
During nursing school, you take exams developed by nursing faculty to test a specific body of content. Many of these questions are at the knowledge level, which
involves recognition and recall of ideas or material that you read in your nursing
textbooks and discussed in class. This is the most basic level of testing.
In nursing school, you are also given test questions written at the comprehension
level. These questions require you to understand the meaning of the material. If
you are answering minimum competency questions on the NCLEX-PN® exam,
you will not see many comprehension-level questions. The test writers assume
you know and understand the facts you learned in nursing school.
Minimum competency questions on the NCLEX-PN® exam are written at the
application and/or analysis level. Remember, the exam tests your ability to make
safe judgments about client care. Your ability to solve problems is not tested with
knowledge- or comprehension-level questions. Application involves taking the
facts that you know and using them to make a nursing judgment. You must be
able to answer questions at the application level to prove your competence on the
NCLEX-PN® exam.
Chapter 1
THE NCLEX-PN® EXAMINATION
4
▶ STRATEGIES THAT DON'T WORK ON THE NCLEX- STRATEGIES THAT DON'T WORK ON THE NCLEX-PN®
EXAMINATION
Whether you realize it or not, you developed a set of strategies in nursing school
to answer teacher-generated test questions that are written at the knowledge/comprehension level. These strategies include:
• “Cramming” hundreds of facts about disease processes and nursing care
• Recognizing and recalling facts rather than understanding the
pathophysiology and the needs of a client with an illness
• Knowing who wrote the question and what is important to that faculty
• Predicting answers based on what you remember
• Selecting the response that is a different length compared with the other
choices
• Selecting the answer choice that is grammatically correct
• When in doubt, choosing answer choice C
▶ CRITICAL THINKING AND CLINCIAL JUDGMENT ON THE
NCLEX-PN® EXAMINATION
• The NCLEX-PN® exam is not a test about recognizing facts.
• You must be able to correctly identify what the question is asking.
• Only focus on background information that is necessary to answer the
question.
Remember, the NCLEX-PN® exam is testing your ability to think critically. Critical
thinking for the nurse involves:
• Observation
• Deciding what is important
• Looking for patterns and relationships
• Identifying the problem
• Transferring knowledge from one situation to another
• Applying knowledge
• Discriminating between possible choices and/or courses of action
• Evaluating according to established criteria
▶ FACTS ABOUT THE FACTS ABOUT THE NCLEX-PNNCLEX-PN® EXAMINATION
The Purpose of the Exam
• To determine if you are a safe and competent practical/vocational nurse
• To safeguard the public
• To test for minimum competency to practice practical/vocational nursing
THE NCLEX-PN® EXAMINATION
Unit 1
5
The Test Content
• Based on the knowledge and activities of an entry-level practical/
vocational nurse
• Written by nursing faculty and clinical specialists
• Majority of questions are self-contained, multiple-choice questions with 4
possible answer choices
• Some questions may ask you to select all answers that apply, fill-in-theblank, select hot spots, use charts/exhibits, listen to sounds, and/or
identify pictures.
• Some questions may ask you to use the mouse to identify a location on a
graphic or drag and drop answers from an unordered answer column to an
ordered answer column.
• Based on integrated nursing content, not on the medical model of medical,
surgical, obstetrics, pediatrics, and psychiatric nursing
• Includes 25 experimental questions being tested for future exams; these
questions do not count
Administration of the CAT
• The CAT (Computer Adaptive Test) adapts to your knowledge, skills, and
ability level.
• The question sequence is determined interactively.
• The computer selects questions based on the item difficulty (level of
critical thinking) and the test plan.
• You individually schedule a date and time to take the exam at a testing
center.
• You sit at an individual computer station.
Taking the Exam
• Computer knowledge is not required to take this exam.
• You use a mouse to highlight and lock in your answer.
• You receive instructions and a practice exercise before beginning the
exam.
• Any necessary background information appears on the screen with the
question.
• The computer selects the initial question near the level of passing.
• The computer selects the next question on the basis of your response to
the first question.
• If your answer is correct, the next question is slightly higher in critical
thinking.
• If your answer is incorrect, the next question is slightly lower.
• Questions are [Show Less]