When it comes to the part of Technology in the early childhood education years, it can be a bit of a controversial topic. While some people may think that young children don’t need Technology, it can play a positive role in a child’s learning and development. Plus, in today’s technology-heavy world, learning how to use it is a necessary life skill. It’s not only the students who benefit from the use of Technology, though. It also provides early childhood educators with unlimited access to newer, more innovative teaching methods to facilitate an active learning environment for their young students.

Today’s preschoolers are “digital natives.” They grew up with and with technology to the extent that they knew it from an early age. Give a little kid a smartphone, and in no time, you’ll be navigating to your app or video and calling your last contact. It’s also not uncommon for children to teach the adults in their life how to use the latest technological wizardry.

However, parents’ common concern is: ” My child receives too much media exposure at home. Why would I want it at school? “While this can be the case when technology is used in specific and targeted ways, it can support and achieve early childhood and preschool learning goals  abilities more opportunities to participate, communicate, and explore.

Supports Social and Emotional Development

Using touchscreen devices are the easiest for preschool-age children, as their fine motor skills are still developing. When touchscreen devices are used correctly, they can encourage children to work together and improve their social skills by taking turns and sharing ideas as they complete online activities side by side and view educational content.

Encourages Students to Follow Multi-Step Directions

It’s not always an easy task to teach young children to listen and recall when it comes to following directions, but using digital devices in the classroom, such as tablets, computers, and smartboards, all require children to follow multi-step directions. Examples of this are turning the device on, swiping to left or right, and selecting items on a screen.

Helps Teach Basic Academic Skills

One of the main uses for Technology in the classroom is teaching and reinforcing core academic skills. One simple learning activity designed for a tablet or computer can help children learn counting, numbers, letters, colors, sounds, matching shapes, etc. Activities can be improved to fit the student’s individual needs much more comfortable than traditional printed worksheets and packets. For example, students who breeze through an online activity could be switched to a more advanced level. In contrast, students struggling to answer questions correctly can review the material they answered incorrectly or be forwarded to another activity that’s more on their level.

How to Use Digital Technologies to Improve your Child’s Reading, Writing, and Mathematical skills.

Educational research has revealed that Thinking Skills such as Planning, Working Memory, Time Management, and  Organization are crucial to academic success.

Reading skills are a core factor of success in today’s world. However, reading is not a natural activity. If it was, children would automatically acquire this skill just as they do spoken language. Instead, reading must be trained, practiced, and applied.

Writing is a complex skill that needs the capacity to express one’s thoughts and ideas in some type of written form. Effective writing needs many language-based and thinking skills.

Mathematical skills are crucial in today’s technological society. To be successful, children need to comprehend much more than humble mathematic computations. They must learn to put on their mathematical knowledge to the demands of a complex world.

Makes Learning an Enjoyable Process

Not all students logically love school and learning, but many students do enjoy using Technology. This is somewhat that early childhood educators can use to their advantage when it comes to getting all children to enjoy the learning process. Technology offers lots of fun and advanced activities that appeal to children of all ages.

Expand Imaginations

Preschool and early learning are all about discovery, exploration, and imaginative play. Interactive classrooms bring the ends of the world – the galaxy indeed – to life with crisp sounds, colorful images and real-time video. For example, they can go on a “jungle safari” during break and continue in high definition in the classroom by visiting live webcam websites. Screen media can show children animals, objects, people, landscapes, activities, and places that they cannot personally experience. Kids can improve more control over their learning and expand their own horizons rather than depending on the teacher to do so from a laptop connected to a projector.

How to Use Technology to your Benefit as an Early Childhood Educator:

• Early childhood educators can purposefully use Technology, much like they do with other learning materials, such as books, as seen on coolthingschicago.com.
• Technology allows teachers to record, save, and share what they learned in class that day, or more specifically during a particular lesson.
• Assistive Technology can also be a most helpful tool in communicating with or promoting children with special needs or disabilities.

Hosting is the method by which your website is stored and made available for viewing on the internet. For this to happen, a hosting provider needs to allocate space on a web server for your site’s files.

Your website’s bandwidth, speed, and reliability depend on the type of hosting you choose. Therefore, the price you pay for web hosting will depend on which hosting type you select.

Web Hosting Options

Shared Hosting

Out of all the hosting types, shared hosting is the most affordable option. With shared hosting, several websites use one web server. Consequently, shared hosting costs are relatively low, with many plans starting at around $2.49 per month and capping off at around $15 per month.

Virtual Private Server (VPS) Hosting

If you like the idea of sharing a server but want to keep your website separate from other sites, VPS hosting is a practical choice. Developers, system administrators, and designers all enjoy using VPS hosting because it provides full root access, dedicated server resources, processing power, and memory storage. Therefore, VPS users can expect to spend between $20 to $100 per month.

Dedicated Hosting

A dedicated hosting service allows a client to lease a server independently. As a result, your business or organization will have complete control over its server(s) and will be able to choose its operating system and hardware. For these reasons, dedicated hosting is best for running a high-traffic website. If you are interested in purchasing dedicated hosting, expect to spend between $80 and $300 per month.

Cloud Hosting

Cloud hosting uses a network of virtual and physical cloud servers. As a result of this network, hardware failures won’t result in site downtime. Additionally, cloud hosting provides its users with flexibility and the ability to scale resources based on your business’ needs quickly. In general, it can cost between $4.50 and $240 per month.

WordPress Hosting

If you are running your website using WordPress, you will benefit from the WordPress-specific services and resources that this hosting option offers. Furthermore, WordPress hosting provides users with speed and optimization, enabling sites to run smoother than when operating on a shared hosting server. If you select this option, you can expect to pay between $4.99 and $830 per month.

Additional Costs to Consider

In addition to the expense of web hosting, there are other costs to consider when you launch a website. For instance, you will need to purchase a domain, automated site backup and restoration services, SiteLock, and SSL.

Domain Name

If you are running a website, you will need a domain name. A domain allows people to find you online.

While it is common for many web hosting packages to include a free domain, some do not, so you’ll have to purchase one separately. Typically, domains cost between $10 and $15 per year. In addition, you will also have the option of buying privacy protection, which will keep your personal information from being shared on WHOIS listings.

Automated Site Backup and Restoration Services

There’s no greater catastrophe than your website crashing or a security invasion causing you to lose your data. Therefore, it only makes sense to have your website data saved in a location other than your server so you can restore your website quickly if tragedy strikes. It’s like if you were to make two copies of your house key in case you lost one. The cost for these services begins at around $2 per month.

SiteLock

SiteLock offers daily malware scans, DDoS attack protection, and web application firewalls to protect your site against hackers. While some web hosts provide this program as part of their package, not all do. Therefore, if you need to purchase SiteLock separately, the cost is around $2 per month.

Last Thoughts

The cost associated with purchasing your web hosting will vary based on the needs of your business. For example, if you do not have a high-traffic website, shared hosting will be sufficient. However, if you want the protection and resources associated with a dedicated server, your expenses will be greater. Therefore, when choosing your hosting option, always consider the needs of your business.

Cybersecurity is now a big issue for any business. With how cybercrimes are significantly on the rise in recent years, all organizations—big and small—are at more risk of data breaches, DDoS attacks, and various other cybersecurity attack vectors.

One concerning thing, however, is the fact that human error remains the biggest cause of successful data breaches and cybersecurity attacks: one employee might fall into a social engineering/phishing attack and ends up compromising the company’s database. Cybercriminals can gain access to an employee’s account using a weak password, compromising the network’s admin account, and so on.

This is why elevating IT security in the workplace and building a comprehensive cybersecurity culture is very important, and here are some tips on how employers can help elevate IT security in your company.

1. Establishing Culture and Policies

It’s very important to establish a company-wide policy and cybersecurity culture as a foundation and central resource of knowledge for your employees. Make sure to set clear policies regarding how to handle sensitive data.

Sensitive data here refers to any information that can be used by perpetrators to hurt your business, whether it’s users’ financial information or information about vulnerabilities in your system. Make sure that sensitive information is only available for authorized users. Information Security is not only about securing information from unauthorized access. Information Security is basically the practice of preventing unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, inspection, recording or destruction of information.

Create comprehensive policies regarding file sharing, email forwarding, and usage of public Wi-Fi, among others. At the same time, block incoming emails and files from unknown senders, and block emails and files containing sensitive information from reaching unauthorized employees.

2. Investing In Security Infrastructure

A proper cybersecurity culture can’t start unless you already have a functional IT security infrastructure in place. So, start by investing in the right security solutions so you can train your employees to make the most of them.

Since most cybersecurity threats today are performed by bots and automated software, having an advanced bot management solution is a must today. Malicious bots are getting more advanced at mimicking legitimate human users, utilizing A.I. technologies to bypass traditional defensive measures. An A.I.-driven bot management solution is also preferred.

The earlier you invest in your long-term cybersecurity infrastructure, the more time you’ll have to familiarize your team and build your cybersecurity culture around this infrastructure.

3. Strong and Unique Passwords For All

Make the practice of using a strong password mandatory for all employees, especially for their office-related accounts. A strong password should include a combination of uppercase and lowercase characters, numbers, and symbols. Also, make sure the password is at least 10 to 15 characters long to prevent brute force attacks.

Also, require users to use unique passwords for each account, and change their passwords regularly. Of course, longer passwords are harder to remember, and if they have to use different passwords for each account, this may discourage them. To tackle this issue you can encourage them to use a password manager, many of them are free and reliable.

4. 2-Factor Authentication

2-factor authentication (2FA), or also called multi-factor authentication (MFA) is essentially asking users to provide additional information besides the username-password pairing to access their account. This information can be:

• Something they are, like the fingerprint, iris/retina scan, face ID, and so on.
• Something they have, a USB dongle, etc.
• Something they know, a confirmation code sent over SMS/email, PIN, etc.

With 2FA in place, even when their credentials are compromised, the attacker won’t be able to access the account.

When implementing 2FA, make sure that the ‘factors’ you use for verification are easily accessible for your users and stakeholders, while being unique enough for each employee.

5. Regular Cybersecurity Training

If you really want to elevate your employees’ awareness and knowledge in defending against cyberattacks, then effective education and training are a must.

All employees at every level should ideally receive basic cybersecurity training that covers common cybersecurity threats that are the most threatening for your organization. Regularly refresh and update the training to include the latest trends and changes.

Your security awareness training should include:

• Educating employees on common cybersecurity threats
• Raise awareness of the importance of sensitive data in the organization
• Training all employees about cybersecurity best practices
• Provide comprehensive information on how to detect and defend against common cybersecurity attack vectors like social engineering attacks, phishing, and so on

6. VPN over Public Network

Data coming in and out of the organization’s network is often the most vulnerable, making it a common target for cybercriminals.

Many employees have the habit of accessing the organization’s network (i.e. corporate email) through unsecured public Wi-Fi, especially during business travel. This is actually a very dangerous practice and can compromise the company’s network and server in the event of account takeover and other attack vectors.

Using a VPN can be an easy and affordable solution for this issue. VPN (Virtual Private Network) can encrypt all data coming in and out of the network, so hackers won’t be able to access it.

7. Secure Browsing Practice

Browsing habit plays a very significant role in any network security, so make sure to educate your employees at your organization on secure browsing best practices, including:

• Ensuring browsers are always up-to-date, and make sure all employees are using reputable browsers
• Always run anti-virus software before downloading anything
• Turn on pop-up/ad blocker
• Check email senders thoroughly before clicking any links or downloading attachments
• Never share any sensitive information and personally identifiable information (i.e. credit card number) over email and phone call
• Verify URL when entering sensitive information in forms

End Words

Regularly training and educating your employees regarding cybersecurity best practices and knowledge are very important. After all, just like the old saying goes, your organization’s security is just as strong as the least knowledgeable employee. Building a cybersecurity culture takes time, so if you haven’t already, it’s time to start building your culture.

Also, remember that cybersecurity threats are always evolving, and so your organization’s IT security must also evolve and be constantly updated to stay on top of the persistent cybercriminals that are always on the lookout for your organization’s vulnerabilities.

Often, we hear how businesses were ripped off by a digital marketing firm in the news. After paying hundreds of dollars, they never received substandard services or worse. This doesn’t mean that all agencies are fraudulent.

In a world filled with individuals with ill intent, you need to exercise caution while selecting an agency. Each year, hundreds of Hong-Kong based brands spend billions of dollars on marketing their products and services. 

Numerous Hong Kong SEO agencies continue to pave the way for local businesses, aiding them to gain global attention, thereby increasing profitability. They offer them a means of getting their brand noticed, both locally and internationally.

By combining different internet marketing tactics, these agencies help businesses generate leads, boost their brand awareness, and procure a loyal customer base. There are numerous benefits linked to using digital marketing agencies. But how do you go about separating authentic players from the con artists?

Reputation

Trust and reputation are everything in life, including the business world. While shopping for a reputable marketing firm in Hong-Kong, or another part of the globe, take a keen look at a firm’s reputation.

The good thing with these firms is that they have an online platform. This makes the process of verifying their reputation simple and straightforward. You need to understand who you are about to get in bed with. Confirming what past clients have to say about them is crucial to this.

 A quick Google search of the company’s name will reveal lots of information regarding them. Social media platforms are also great tools in the search for reviews and customer feedback.

Customer Support 

Your ideal partner needs to have incredible support. They don’t have to be perfect- let’s face it, no one is- but they need to be responsive and helpful most of the time. The agency needs to be available to you whenever you reach out, even if it’s not instantaneously.

To gauge them on this, try and reach out to them via instant chat as most businesses have enabled this feature. How long does it take for them to respond? Is it an automated response, or is there someone behind the chat? 

You are about to spend money on an agency; they need to prove to you beyond a reasonable doubt that in-case you need urgent assistance, they have you covered.

Match Your Needs With The Agency

As much as businesses may be similar in their niche, they are never similar. A digital marketing strategy may have worked for one enterprise but failed another. Therefore, before you take the step of seeking the services of a Hong Kong SEO agency, ensure you have your basics covered.

As an entrepreneur, you need first to understand what you need. This means having clearly defined goals and expectations. Similarly, when you meet for consultation, make a point of asking as many questions as possible. This way, the marketing associate can best understand your needs and provide you with accurate answers/options.

Experience

Experience in digital marketing is invaluable. While comparing several marketing firms, you could use this criterion to serve as a determining factor on which firm you go with. It’s essential for you to have a seasoned company working with you instead of one that recently opened.

Drawing from years of experience, such a firm is better positioned to advise you regarding which strategy will work best for your case. On the other hand, just because a firm has existed for a while doesn’t necessarily mean they are the best. So, dig a little bit further to learn more.

Cost

Unless you are running a charity, chances are you are in business to make a profit. Therefore, while thinking of recruiting a digital marketing firm’s services, you need to have a set budget. This ensures that you don’t stray too far from your initial estimate.

Ultimately, cheap may at times end up costing more. Consequently, don’t solely focus on the cost. Try and find a balance between quality service and price.

Their Ranking

It’s only logical that a firm that majors in improving your online presence to dominate search engine results or any other channels involved. What use is hiring a firm that ranks poorly or doesn’t have a fair amount of engagement or followers on social media?

So, as we wrap things up, the top contender for the task needs to indicate via their own business that they indeed are the best. This will leave you without a speck of doubt concerning their capabilities.

Hopefully, at this juncture, you are more than comfortable and confident enough to select the best Hong Kong SEO firm or any other agency for your business. Sticking to these fundamentals ensures you make an informed decision.

Digitize your Business

QR Code with the global economic crisis, one of the biggest lessons learned is the importance of digitizing businesses.
Therefore, taking advantage of information technologies and learning about new business opportunities is the objective of the National Business Summit, organized by SMEs from Costa Rica and TDR Digital.
From digital marketing strategies to e-commerce, the Summit offers content for entrepreneurs to successfully adapt to the new market dynamics, mastering the tools and techniques necessary to compete at this juncture and in the future.
“It is the way to provide the business sector with the knowledge and tools to adapt to the new competitive situation in the market, which consists of two parts: innovate and improve their commercial strategy,” said Andrés Chavarría, general director of SMEs de Costa Delicious.
By participating in this event, you will receive presentations from international speakers, downloadable business tools like digital menu QR, and learn global best practices for digitally innovating and transforming.
“This approach comes from the entrepreneurs themselves. Many times they are told what, but not necessarily how. With this event, we intend to provide the necessary tools so that anyone can go from rhetoric to action,” added Chavarría.

QR code

QR code is a two-dimensional four-sided barcode that can also store encoded data. Although, the data is a link to a website (URL).

Introduction

Today, QR codes can be seen on brochures, posters, magazines, etc. You can easily spot these two-dimensional barcodes around you. QR codes allow you to interact with the world through your smartphone.
Specifically, a QR Code extends the available data to any physical object and creates a digital measure for marketing operations. This technology enables and accelerates mobile web services: it is a very creative digital tool.

How to Create a Free QR code

a Free QR code generator – consider monitoring and analyzing its performance if it allows you to design a code that is unique to your brand and if it is compatible with the most common QR code readers.
Additionally, the rest of the tools

What are the different types of QR codes?

QR codes can trigger various actions on the smartphone on which they are read. Directing a user to a website is not the only possible action, and some of them are worth knowing (such as saving a business card or connecting to wireless networks).

Website

By exploring these QR codes, users will stay directed to a web page and discover the available content. It is the maximum common type of QR code.

Business card

A contact card with the details you have entered will not be automatically stored in your smart phone’s contact list with these business card QR codes. You can enter their names, addresses, phone numbers, emails, etc.

Wireless network

You can create QR codes that contain your wireless network credentials. After the scan, the smartphones will connect automatically!

Send an SMS

Save the content and the phone number of the recipient of an SMS message. After the scan, you have to confirm before sending it.

Send an email

It works the same as the QR Code type SMS. Only this time, the email content, subject, and recipients are entering to enable delivery after scanning.

Call a phone number

Enter a phone number when creating the QR code. When scanning, users will be prompting to call the phone number.

Add an event to the calendar

After scanning these QR codes, you will be asking if you want to save the event to your smartphone’s calendar. By adding the event to your calendar, you will be reminds of the correct date.

Geolocation

When creating these QR codes, you enter the latitude and longitude coordinates of a place. By exploring them, users will be able to find the location in their favorite geolocation app.

Plain text

It is the simplest type of QR Code. Plain text encoded and will remain display on the screen after scanning. You can write whatever you want.

Dynamic QR Code

This new type of QR code is available with the Vivo Live plan.
It sends users to a web page that is very similar to the type of website or visitor. It offers useful new features.

Chat applications will always need to use some form of the application program interface. This allows the back-end portion of the chat service you are providing, connecting with the other applications. It is a type of server infrastructure that is extremely broad in relationship to the features and is supposed to be very stable. You can easily incorporate a chat application, one that will send and receive in real-time, designed to imitate actual conversation that you would have if you are standing in a group. Here are some of the main benefits associated with using one of the better chat API options.

Is Chat API A Popular Option?

This is undoubtedly a popular option to consider. You don’t have to overthink what needs to be combined. Chat applications are fairly straightforward in the way they are designed, and if you have a good SDK, you can put everything together in a matter of hours. There is no need to be fancy if you are sharing this with co-workers that will communicate with each other at your place of business. However, if you are trying to build the next most popular chat app in the industry, you will need to put some time in and also use the best chat API that is out there.

How Do These APIs Improve Communication Possibilities?

A chat API is an exceptional piece of software that can work directly with cloud providers that act as third-party members of a group. The group itself will consist of multiple people. Still, the application itself will make that communication possible, allowing you to engage with workers, customers, or friends and family. An organization or two produces some of the best wines, and you can evaluate those based upon reviews received. Also, make a few considerations when it comes to chat APIs before spending any money.

Considerations That Need To Be Made

Some considerations that you should make will include will it work with websites or have authentication capabilities. This could be to-factor authentication, or you may even integrate this in some way with email. Web browsers that work with both android and Apple phones should be accessible through the API. Additionally, if this is specifically for a chat app, this API makes it possible for you to have public chats, group chats, private chats, and even those that are only between two people.

Is This Different Than Messaging APIs?

It is certainly different for a couple of different reasons. When you are doing a chat API, this is about life interactions. This could be for messaging between two people, or a group of people, that is happening right now. However, when you are using a API for real-time chat and messaging, it will use SMS to deliver what could be emails that you are using for promotions. Regardless of how you use the application you are building, and you need to have the right API to communicate it.

Why These Are Essential

Chat APIs are part of the essential components that you will need for any project that you are working on involving a chat app. It is this aspect that connects you with the other apps and allows communication to continue. You must evaluate the different companies that make them. Instead of just looking at reviews, you may want to consider getting them from several different businesses. You may need to evaluate them personally, but if you can trust the comments that other people are made, that will save you time and likely also save you money.

How To Acquire The Best Ones Available

Getting the best ones is a process that involves looking at the top companies in the industry initially. You will then look at reviews that have been left by people who have used these different APIs. Also, consider the SDKs that will work with the APIs specifically designed for chatting, videoconferencing, or some other purpose. By getting the right ones, you can save yourself what could be weeks of trial and error trying to make your app work. APIs are designed by experts that will likely understand what the problem is that you are facing. By bringing it to the companies’ attention that produces them, it will be very easy to figure out which ones are the best.

If you do want to create a chat app, you will need the right API for the job. Since there are so many different companies that make them, you may not realize how few there are that are exceptional. That’s why your research must be done to eliminate all of the potential contenders that will not help you complete your project. Eventually, the chat app that you create will be connected with the best API, giving you all of the benefits associated with using this technology.