AIBU to think ClassDojo and the rest do more harm than good?

[MostlyKeepingMyHeadDown]

My own kids are grown now, but I've spent years teaching and then training teachers, and I've watched these apps spread through primary schools without anyone really questioning them. AIBU to think they deserve a lot more scrutiny than they get?

Main things that keep coming up:

• The quiet, well-behaved kid sits on the same few points for weeks while a classmate having a rough patch gets showered with extras for "improving" — zero isn't neutral next to someone else's double figures.
• Some kids work out that being naughty one day and good the next wins more points than just being consistently fine.
• Points get docked for things like fidgeting or being distracted once — minor stuff that still follows a child round publicly for the rest of the week.
• It's visible to the whole class, sometimes to parents too, so one bad day becomes a bad day everyone can see.
• Kids with ADHD or autism can end up with negatives for things that are really about the disability — lost homework, poor organisation — not wilful misbehaviour.

I remember picking DD up from school in reception. Quite a few children were coming out with lots of stickers and she never seemed to have any. I asked her why not and she told me that stickers were just for the naughty children.

We don't have it at my DCs school - with the points are the rewards just individual or for the best class/house etc?

At my DCs school they get physical housepoints put into a jar and then the best house gets a treat - I like that way of doing things as its more collective.

My son has just started year 1 and his teacher uses this app. She suggested we all add it on the children’s devices (my son is five, he doesn’t have a device 🙄) so that the kids could message each other?? None of the parents were happy about this.

Omg, that's ridiculous! I would be flagging that up with the Headteacher if I were you.

Encouraging five year olds to basically begin using social media is such a bad message from their teacher.

Very irresponsible I would say.

I entirely agree.

I don't have an issue with ClassDojo if used well within school. Not with parents allowed or children themselves. Just teacher controlled and for positive points. It's very popular with the children themselves ime. I find it creates a healthy sense of competition whilst also encouraging more cohesion and teamwork due to whole class dojo points.

My kids are young adults now but I remember them coming home from primary school and asking why children in their class who swore at the teacher or refused to do their work were then playing football or whatever in the playground with an adult. It always looked like a nice reward for bad behaviour.

And they were both used to sit with "naughty" children to act as a role model which they hated.

But I get why teachers did that (& presumably still do). It's hard to manage the motivation and reward of children who struggle to behave against rewarding those who find that easy.
As adults we get it but young children have a heightened sense of fairness and don't necessarily have the maturity to understand the methodology behind the rewards being given for behaviour.

We have raised it with him along with the insane amount of tv time they were having. They were getting an episode of Peter Rabbit at 8.50 as soon as they were all in class. Then more screens after phonics. Then more again during ‘dough disco’.

Oh and then the kids have been given logins to a maths app which they expect them to do five minutes a day on. Again, on what device? 🤷🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

We have a lot of online homework too...we can do it from a desk top site though (I would have complained if it was app only - we don't have an ipad and I don't ŕeally want the DC doing homework on a phone).

Oh dear. That just sound lazy on the part of the teacher tbh.

Makes it hard to make other choices about screens, apps etc when school are doing this.

Yep. Head has dealt with some of it though and now they have quiet reading time when they come in in the morning.

My dd2 did a presentation today with another pupil. Did well. Zero points or praise.

Boy never doing any work nor today got points. They were both supposed to be prepared and able to answer questions. He messed around in the lesson spent for preparation and didn't study at home.

She was furious. Bad behaviour rewarded. All the time.