While math is the justification for its use in the classroom, it’s the cool gear and fun pets that the kids enjoy, not math. As a parent, I want to trust that materials used in school are of good quality and not money-making products targeting my child.
One parent called it an addiction: “I am so sick of hearing about Prodigy!” Not about math, of course, but about all the things members can buy in the virtual store: pets, houses to furnish, “awesome gear.”Īs a child psychologist, I consider this focus on consumerism to be unhealthy and the compulsion for more screen time to be concerning. Others who also decided not to buy a membership were fighting similar pressure from their children. Some had purchased the premium membership, reasoning that it was “a math game, the teacher uses it, so why not?” Turns out that “used in your child’s classroom” is the shortest path to securing parents’ trust. Is It a MATH Game?Ĭurious to see how others viewed the game, I asked other parents about Prodigy. But, as she put it, “of course I still want to fly around on a cloud and evolve my pets!” She told me that she can’t just forget about a membership because ads like this pop up everywhere. She became mad at Prodigy for working so hard to separate her from her money. She was able to articulate the difference between everyday advertising and using tricks to sell something.
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We talked about how to spot these types of hard-sell, alluring tricks and how not to fall for them. After going through the game together and many discussions, Sabina recognized that the game was using manipulative marketing strategies and the unethical practice of targeting children by offering desirable incentives only to those who pay to play. She showed me that sometimes when you win a math battle, you earn a chest. She told me of all the important things that come with a membership: you get to go to more lands, get extra strength points in battles, extra prizes, and most importantly to her, without a membership, you can’t evolve your pets. When I asked her to explain the appeal, she told me that she needed a membership. Her persistence made me wonder what this “math” video game was really all about, especially since Sabina isn’t really interested in either math or video games. She even put it on her Christmas wish list. Week after week, my daughter asked for a Prodigy Membership. I thought that was the end of the conversation, but it turned out it was just the beginning. I told her that Prodigy could be something she enjoyed at school, but we wouldn’t be buying it to use at home. When my daughter first started asking for a Prodigy membership to play at home, I decided against it because I like to limit time on screens. The kids loved playing every day after finishing their required math work. He introduced a fun math game called Prodigy. He was creative, funny, attuned, and an excellent teacher. My daughter Sabina had her favorite teacher when she was in third grade.