Hey everyone,
I've taken the NREMT Paramedic exam twice now, and I just can't seem to pass this test. I review my textbook and notes, regularly. I've used a couple free test prep question sites, but it doesn't seem to be helping. These questions on the NREMT are just so tricky for me. I know, I know the information, but when I go to test, I just have trouble applying it... Does anyone have any suggestions to help me pass? I've looked into other test prep sites, but I'm not sure if it's worth the money. Has anyone used a test prep site? I've seen medictests.com, emtprep.com, jblearning.com, and emt-national-training.com. Does anyone have experience with these sites? Any suggestions would be awesome.
What I did for the NCLEX-RN (it tests in a similar manner) is that I would read the question, read the answers, then re-read the question while looking for any key words or phrases that might make a specific answer likely to be the "winner." Ask yourself "what is this question asking me or what does it want me to do?" Any answer that you say "Yes, that's the correct answer if... (pulls scenario that's not already part of the question)" is not going to be correct. The correct answer will be there, right in front of you. You must find the most correct answer, pulling from what you have learned in school, but stick within the "universe" of the question. Unless the exam explicitly tells you that a series of questions are related to each other, the only question that matters is the one in front of you. The previous one is gone so let it go bye-bye. The next one hasn't been chosen yet so don't worry about it.
There typically will be one or two obviously wrong choices, one will be correct in a "yeah, kind of" manner, and one will be the most correct answer where you don't have to "add" anything to the question to make it a "true" answer.
These exams are difficult by design and will challenge you. They will generally be straightforward and not require you to "add" anything to the info given to choose an answer. They will not try to trick you or mislead you but it will be possible to mis-read a question and come up with an incorrect answer and those "incorrect" answers given may be written for common mis-reads of that question. Sometimes there will be non-pertinent information in those questions. Look for what the question "wants" from you.
The next thing is that you've now see the exam twice. There are no surprises now for you. This isn't something that that can raise your anxiety level. It's old hat. You've been there, done that. You know the routine. Go check in, get settled, make sure you're following the rules, and when you're escorted to your station, settle in with your old friend, the computer. Breathe. Slowly, deeply, deliberately. You're relaxed and ready.
I have no experience with JB Learning but most of the folks here seem to swear by it. It's probably very, very similar in question design to the real thing.
Seriously, it could well be that it's not the knowledge of the material you lack but perhaps you're having difficulty parsing the questions. This kind of testing is unlike anything you've had in school. Yes, you eventually will reach a point where you're answering 50% of the questions incorrectly. Trust me, I felt like I'd failed the NCLEX-RN exam. If the exam is at your level of ability, you'll feel the same way. If you feel like you know it and it's easy, then the questions are too easy and are likely below passing standard. If you feel like "WTF, this exam couldn't get any harder, nobody could answer that..." then it's found your ability level and is challenging you. You might pass if you're at that point, but if your knowledge base is still below passing standard, you can still easily fail.
