The Clinical Floor

What it is

The Clinical Floor is a classroom duel game. Every student gets a square on the floor. Tap Spotlight to pick a challenger, who picks a neighbor to duel. A category comes up, and the challenger answers out loud while their clock runs. Correct flips the clock to the opponent, and a pass costs time.

First clock to zero loses the duel, and the winner takes all of the loser's squares and can keep going. The example class includes categories like rhythm strips, critical labs, med classes, antidotes, wound care, isolation, immunology, med side effects, and body systems.

Instructors can add their own categories with images or text cards, set seconds per player and the pass penalty, and run a clean class screen on the projector while controlling the game from a second window. Setup saves in the browser.

What you'll learn

• Rapid recall across body systems, pharm, and labs
• Rhythm strip recognition
• Antidotes and med side effects
• Pressure injury stages and wound drainage types
• Which isolation precautions go with which infection

How it helps you

NCLEX tests clinical judgment, using NCSBN's Clinical Judgment Measurement Model. Every NURSYN game is built on the nursing process. The Clinical Floor works these ADPIE steps: Assessment, Diagnosis.

• Covers Assessment and Diagnosis: see the cue and name it fast
• Answering out loud under a clock is retrieval practice with real stakes
• Every student plays, and everyone watches every duel, so the whole class reviews
• Custom categories let instructors match the game to this week's content

How to play

1. Open Setup, enter the number of players, and pick today's categories
2. Tap Build the floor and give every student a square
3. Tap Spotlight to pick a challenger, who picks a neighbor
4. Answer out loud: Correct flips the clock, Pass costs time
5. First clock to zero loses, and the winner takes the squares

Clinical topics covered

Sources

The clinical content and the teaching approach behind this game line up with these references.

1. Test-enhanced learning: Taking memory tests improves long-term retention (Roediger and Karpicke, 2006). Psychological Science, 17(3), 249-255Psychological Science. Practice testing beat restudying for retention 2 days and 1 week later.
2. Game-thinking: utilizing serious games and gamification in nursing education, a systematic review and meta-analysis (Nylén-Eriksen et al., 2025). BMC Medical EducationBMC Medical Education. Pooled studies show serious games and gamification work in nursing education, with the strongest benefit for knowledge and a more modest effect on skills.
3. Guideline for Isolation Precautions (2007): Executive SummaryCenters for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Standard Precautions plus Contact, Droplet, and Airborne Precautions.
4. Revised National Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel Pressure Injury Staging System (Edsberg et al., 2016). Journal of Wound, Ostomy, and Continence NursingJWOCN. The staging system for pressure injuries: stages 1 to 4, unstageable, and deep tissue pressure injury.