Nurses are essential to society. When nursing students demonstrate the potential to become competent nurses but struggle with written tests, we believe we have an obligation to help them succeed academically.
It has been our experience that tests in nursing, as compared to tests in other courses, pose a greater challenge to students. Nursing tests are based on real clinical situations (OIIQ, 2018). These consist of a narrative description of a real patient situation followed by a series of related questions. To correctly answer the questions in a clinical situation, the student must:
- Read the situation and the first question.
- Analyze the data.
- Draw upon their theoretical knowledge.
- Apply that theoretical knowledge to information in the case.
- Use their problem-solving skills to formulate a case-specific answer.
- Move on to subsequent questions, consistently referring to the information in the situation.
Using PASS, we can help students learn the particular skills they need in order to pass nursing tests.