The American Association of School Librarians (AASL) announced their picks for Best Apps for Teaching & Learning 2019. “Apps recognized foster the qualities of innovation, creativity, active participation, and collaboration and are user friendly to encourage a community of learners to explore and discover. “

If you are interested in the best apps for your library, media center, or classroom, you can read our 2019 series here or find all past apps discussed in our archives.

“PBS KIDS ScratchJr is a creative coding app where learners can create their own interactive stories, games, and animations by snapping together colorful programming blocks to make their favorite characters move, jump, dance, and sing. Learners are empowered to solve problems, design their own projects, demonstrate knowledge and develop computational thinking skills that are foundational for later academic success.”

Platform: iOS & Android 
Grades: K-2
Cost: FREE

The PBS website has this page of five lesson plans to use with the app. Coder Kids has this great article with more details about the pros and cons of using the app and includes several projects. Finally, this video shows you how to use the app to create a race and a maze game.

Watch this video to see the app in action: