First Online Class At Grand Canyon University

I am in the final week of my first class at GCU. I have so many thoughts on this experience so far. I can't wait to tell you all about it. So far so good!

The first class they have you do is University Success (UNV-108). This is an introduction to the online platform. It gives a taste of what life will be like through out all of your courses. It also is taylored to your specific degree program which is amazing! This means you get to jump into your major right away!

There is more than one teacher who teaches this class. The Professor that I have is fantastic. She is so responsive to private messages. She is super engaged through out all the elements of the class. She gets grades back fast. That last one is my favorite because Lord knows I am crazy when it comes to grades.

The support behind the scenes from my Student Services Counselor, Field Experience Counselor, Library Staff and Enrollment Counselor has been great. This is another fantastic aspect of GCU. You are not in this alone. You have an entire graduation team who has your back from start to finish.

So far, everything has been very accessible with my screen reader on both my computer and my phone. I am currently using JAWS and Voiceover on my iPhone.

I am able to navigate all of the different areas of the online classroom with no problems at all. I tend to bounce between using two different browzers, Firefox and Google Crome. I use Google most often.

I am able to get my textbooks so far in PDF format. I download them onto my phone using the Voice Stream Reader ap that I purchased from the ap store for $14.99. This has been a fairly plainless process. I admit that I would rather have a real person reading than a computerized voice though. In some of my classes this will be possible because I am an ENglish major. I can't speak for what is available for other programs.

I took one quiz in this class and it was also totally accessible. I was worried because tests on online platforms are sometimes glitchy with screen readers. How refreshing it was to realize that I had nothing to worry about.

The library section of the school website is accessible for the most part. I will say that it does sometimes take longer to find exactly what i am looking for when I am searching for journal articles. Once I have found the one I want, click on it, and try to read... It takes a while to find exactly where to go. I wish there was some more fine tuned key-commands to navigate this. Honestly, there could be and I am just not aware of them yet. This is all so new to me.

Last week, we had to do a video submission assignment about our disposition to teach. I was really nervous about this. I have to admit though, it makes me want to get back into my YouTube channel again. Want to see how I did?

Watch Disposition To Teach Here
Overall, I am really happy with this decision to start GCU. I am proud to be a Lope! Stay tuned to follow me on this journey. Comment down below and let me know what videos you would like to see on the channel.

Did You Miss Me? Me Too

So for the first time in ages, I am coming to you from my computer. Granted, at the moment I am on my old computer, but am on a computer nevertheless.


I have nursed this one for just about as long as I am going to be able to. I was able to get it to boot up today so that I could get all the word documents off and transfered to my newer one. I thought this mission was already accomplished. However, after looking through my email inside and out, frontwards and backwards... I realized I was wrong... unfortunately, dead wrong!

So, here I am...

I am getting very excited about getting back to work on an official capasity. It feels good to have a laptop on my... well... my lap. Okay, so that didn't sound as cool as I was hoping. You will forgive me right?

I know that in the past year I have really neglected this blog. I could spend countless sentences and endless words begging for your forgiveness, but I am not gonna do that. Do you want to know why??? Beacause it won't really matter!

What will matter is my promise and didcation that I still care about all of you. There has just been a lot going on with life that I can't disclose here. I am working hard to get back to the world of the living. As some of you may know, I have been trying to make myself seen again in the social media world. I am still hoping to get back to the land of Good Reads. That hasn't been difficult without a computer.

I also am well aware that I owe you some blog posts. I am in the middle of my series on my trip across the country to Florida. I am also going to be starting a series on blind traveling in general, blind dating, blindness in school and a blind technology section as well. As always I will be posting about my writing.

As mentioned before, I am going to be transferring the material from my other blog, over to this one. I think it will just be much easier for me to maintain one blog instead of two. Don't you agree? This will take a bit of time because I need to incoorporate the assistance of a seer. I will keep you posted on the development of this.

I will be slowly but surely uploading some of my more popular posts from there soon. Now that I can get to them that is. So, for those of you who have been loyal to bother blogs... sorry for the repeats, please bare with me.

I will be uploading some new videos to the You Tube channel soon too!

Are you as excited as I am? Okay, I know, you're probably not, but put on a brave face okay? Thanks.

Clandestine in audio book form is still in production. Yes, I know... you guys are ready and waiting. I am so sorry for the time it has taken to get it out to you. There has been some complications behind the scenes in the technical world, but I assure you it is coming very soon.

If any of you is good at creating wbsites... please send me a private message. I am looking for someone who can build me a spectacular, stupendous and out ragiously amazing web page. Of course, I should probably also mention that I am looking for someone that is willing to do this on either a volunteer or extremely cheap basis. If you are interested, or you know someone who is, get a hold of me via email or on Playing the Blind Card's Facebook page. The link to both can be found on this page.

Well, I have successfully rambled for long enough I think. I must get back to work transferring files. Thank you for allowing me to take a break with you.

PS... I noticed when I signed in that the blog is getting close to 60,000 page views!! Now all we gotta do is beaf up the ammount of people signed up to follow. Keep doing what you do and get the word out about the page. Remember, I couldn't do all this without you all. That being said, just know that you all rock and I love ya bunches.

As always... Look before you leap

Great Deal Alert!

Hey everyone:) I just wanted to drop you all a little not about a totally great deal I just learned about from a group on Good reads for audio books.

A great publisher named Tantor is offering audio books for as low as $6.95. This is for books that you download and also for books on CD! Please keep in mind however, the price listed above is if U.S. dollars, so prices may be different if you live outside of the United states.

All you have to do to take advantage of this great offer is visit Tantors website.

As I said, this is just a short little note. I just had to pass along this deal for all of you audio book lovers. Happy Reading :)

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo