School shouldn't use platforms that cost parents money

[deflatedbirthday]

DSS (8) school have just moved to Classdojo. They use it to provide announcements for the school which is fine. They also use the points system to reward kids at school so the parents can see what they have been rewarded for.

Here is my gripe:
They encourage parents to also give dojo points for good behaviour at home.

This is part of the premium aspect of the app. It costs £45 for the year or £6.99 if paid monthly.

They use dojo points to announce star of the week each week.

AIBU to think this is pretty tone deaf in the current financial cost of living crisis? £7 a month is a lot of money to some and those kids will miss out on home points simply because their family needs to spend that money on essentials.

The kids are always coming home and reminding parents to give them dojos so it's obviously discussed and encouraged in school.

Is this something I should bring to the attention of the school?

You are completely right. That's dreadful. Yes you should raise it.

What?! So richest kid wins star of the week?

That's terrible behaviour on behalf of the school. Is it even allowed in a state school?

It's a ridiculous idea, but it would still be ridiculous even if all the parents were rich. The problem with it isn't a COL thing.

That's beyond weird of the school. Do they make a profit from it?

Yes raise it with the school. We use class dojo at school and I had no idea how grabby it was until I signed up for my son

Are you sure they are including the paid for points In the total for stat of the week? Clearly that's ridiculous

That's awful and very unfair.

What? Do kids really want star of the week that much? I’d have told my kids they could have an extra chocolate bar instead and they’d have taken the chocolate. 🤣

Very weird. Our village school and nursery used this, I recognise it as daughter called it JOJO points. Never were we asked to pay or use at home. Ever.

That is not inline with poverty proofing.

We haven't paid for the premium, the only things that seems to get is the ability to add home points and get extra outfits for the characters the kids can pick.

Teachers are still able to allocate dojo points and that's what the school use for little prizes and incentives at our school not the home points.

Parents points don't count to the class teachers total it says on first use. You can give points on free version of app

That's appalling! I use Class Dojo as an individual teacher, so it's not even connected with the parents. I had no idea it was possible to use it like your child's school does. People should complain.

You're right I don't know if they definitely include the home points in the total. However that begs the questions why they encourage the home points. In DSS it's the same winner almost weekly and his points are almost double that of DSS.

You can give a small number of points and then it asks you to subscribe

I'd encourage as many people as possible to complain.

The don't count towards school ones and can't be seen by the teacher.
They are just encouraging parents to use them for behaviour management, which I still find a bit odd but the points don't transfer.

Get some pompoms in a jar and call them dojo points if your little one would enjoy it but paying for it is daft.

Yep we have dojo too and it's ridiculous that we are expected to pay to see if teachers have read our messages and to be able to give our children home points. I hate it

Do the school actually know that it costs parents to do this - they may be unaware and just thinking it's a nice thing to encourage.

I'd definitely send an email to ask for some clarity: are home points counted for the weekly winner and are they aware the parents have to pay to be able to do this.

Based on their answer to that I'd decide if I wanted to then complain about it, setting out my reasons why it's a terrible idea.

Or you could send you DC into school every day with a piece of paper with their 'home dojos' on 😂

Edit - just seen that other people have found they aren't included, so I'd probably just ignore and leave the school to get on with it.

You should raise it

Most teachers and SLT mean well, but they don't always have the professional or personal experience to recognise the issues with stuff like this.

Thank you

If they can't see them I don't know why they encourage it so much then. Unless they get a kick back from subscriptions!

The version we use in school is free. I never link it to home use and wouldn't want parents interrogating me over the number of dojos their child had. Incidentally the children who read and complete homework always have the most where I am. I had no idea the Spelling Shed has a small cost, although the browser version (which is just fine) is free. We encourage children to use Spelling Shed but have never suggested parents pay for the app.

Definitely contact the school as that sounds off

Our DC school use dojo and spellingshed and we have never paid for either.

You can just stick with the free bit on both. School allocates dojo points, I just ignore the section where you would have to allocate points at home (because it’s paid for). You don’t need to pay for the teacher to respond to messages on dojo either

In your situation OP I would mention to school that if parents pay and the school does it in the DC with the most dojo points (because their parent paid and gave them loads of home points) then those points should not be jncluded

i don’t know anyone who had paid for dojo or allocates points from home