Apps in the Classroom

Agriculture and technology are becoming more important to each other everyday. Help your students connect the two concepts by integrating some of these apps into your lessons. The following apps are recommended by New York Agriculture in the Classroom for people of all ages, inside and outside of the classroom.

Agricultural Apps

Journey 2050

Journey 2050 takes students on a virtual simulation that explores world food sustainability. Using an inquiry based approach the program encourages students to make decisions and adjust them as they see their impact on society, the environment and the economy at a local and global scale. The students experience the lives of three farm families in Kenya, India, and Canada. As the student interacts with each family they learn the role of best management practices in feeding the world, reducing environmental impacts and in improving social performance through greater access to education, medical care and community infrastructure. This app is especially useful for classroom education.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Farmers 2050

Farmers 2050 is a virtual farm simulation that includes more commodities, exposure to careers, unique learning moments, videos of real farm practices and much more. Educational messages are incorporated to ensure that players understand the importance of feeding the world while balancing economic, social and environmental factors. This app helps children explore how science and best practices are used in agriculture to provide solutions that not only reduce hunger and poverty, but enhance environmental performance and communities. This app can be used as an extension of Journey 2050 so students can play and learn on their own outside of the classroom.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Gardening Apps

Toca Lab: Plants

Toca Lab: Plants is an app designed to peak children's interest in gardening. It features a digital botanical laboratory that helps kids discover scores of plants with differing personalities. It also enables them to create new species. This app is especially useful for elementary students.
Cost: $2.99
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Starting with Soil

Starting with Soil is an interactive app for kids, brought to you by Whole Kids Foundation and the Center for Ecoliteracy. It gives parents and educators an easy and fun way to help children discover the importance of healthy soil and see first-hand the harmonious roles that plants, animals, and people (even kids!) play in keeping soil balanced so that organic food can grow.Young users can plant seeds, build a compost pile, drag a microscope over organisms in soil to get a better look, and view the symbiosis at work when corn, beans and squash are planted together.
Cost: Free

BeeSmart Pollinator Gardener

With the Bee Smart Pollinator Gardener browse through a database of nearly 1,000 native plants, filter your plants by what pollinators you want to attract, light and soil requirements, bloom color, and plant type, create a shopping list of plants. This is an excellent plant reference to attract bees, butterflies, hummingbirds, beetles, bats, and other pollinators to the garden, farm, school and every landscape.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Seasonal Food Guide

The most comprehensive national database of seasonal food available in the U.S. is now at your fingertips! Discover what's in season at any time of year in each of the 50 states. Search by produce item or by state and season. And find recipes and in-depth information on local, seasonal fruits, vegetables, herbs, legumes and nuts. Find what produce is available in your state at any time of year. With info on 140+ fruits, veggies, legumes, nuts, and herbs, the Seasonal Food Guide is the most comprehensive digital almanac of seasonal food available.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

iNaturalist

iNaturalist helps you identify the plants and animals around you and allows you to connect with over 400,000 scientists and naturalists who can help you learn more about nature. With this app, you can also record and share your observations to share with the community, discover new species, and follow projects of other people about specific places or species.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Audubon Bird Guide: North America

The app includes 821 species; advanced gallery view for easy comparison and search; field mark call outs; a "Find Birds with eBird" feature powered by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology; and a social community of birders who observe, identify, and share their observations and photos in the mobile app and online. You can also browse species by different characteristics, listen to bird sounds, and keep lists of bird sightings with this app.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Insect Encyclopedia

Insect Encyclopedia is a vast collection of interesting insect facts from the most interesting and unique species out there. The facts include information to an insect's respective length, behavior, geographical habitats and more. This app is suited for all ages and features a fun game.
Cost: Free
Available on: Google Play

Rain Harvest

This app can be used to find out how much rain falls on your roof during a typical rainstorm. This information can then be used to calculate catchment surface area in square feet or square meters, rainfall in inches or millimeters, surface efficiency as a percentage, and number of collection points. The final result is then presented in total gallons or liters of collected runoff. Gallons or liters per collection point is also calculated when more than one collection point is entered into the calculator.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store

Garden Compass

Use this app to connect with more than 50 horticultural experts who can help to identify garden and house plants, help solve pest problems, and give you monthly reminders for garden maintenance.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Garden Answers Plant Identification

Garden Answers identifies over 20,000 plants and gives you accurate and detailed information about it.Just snap a picture, tap submit and instantly you will get the accurate identity of the plant and detailed information about it by garden and horticulture experts. The advanced image recognition technology can instantly identify over 20,000 plants.And if you're concerned about a plant disease or insect infestation, you can use the keyword search feature within Garden Answers. It contains answers to over 200,000 commonly asked plant questions.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Gardening Companion

Gardening Companion aims to be your assistant in the garden. Read information about the plants that interest you, set reminders to help you care for your garden, and track and share information about your garden. This app also allows you to save and share your gardening content vis email, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

GrowIt!

With GrowIt! you can see what people are growing around you, share photos of your favorite/least favorite plants, and get in-depth plant information. This app helps you figure out what you should be growing based on where you live and the space that you have. You can also get advice from others users with the Question and Answer feature.
Cost: Free
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Purdue Plant Doctor App Suite

The Purdue Plant Doctor App Suite consists of five apps designed to help people improve the health and appearance of their plants: Purdue Tree Doctor, Purdue Perennial Flower Doctor, Purdue Annual Flower Doctor, Purdue Tomato Doctor, and Purdue Turf Doctor. Each of these apps can help people identify and solve problems they are facing with their plants.
Cost: Range from $0.99- $1.99
Available on: App Store / Google Play

PlantSnap Plant Identification

PlantSnap is an app that allows people to identify unknown plants and flowers. With just a photo, the app can instantly identify plants and weeds from its large database that consists of over 315,000 plants. This is a good tool for gardeners, academics, and anyone else interested in plants.
Cost: $3.99
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Turf MD and Tomato MD

These apps provide identification keys, images, and management methods for turfgrass and tomato diseases. Turf MD was designed for golf course turf, sports turf, or any other turf areas. Tomato MD is for any tomato growers, whether you own a small hobby garden, or are a professional grower. There are over 30 critical insects and diseases to look up. There is both chemical and cultural control methods mentioned for treatment.
Turf MD
Cost: $0.99
Available on: App Store / Google Play
Tomato MD
Cost: $0.99
Available on: App Store / Google Play

Vegetable Tree

Vegetable Tree goes over the basics of gardening, including sowing seeds, germinating, watering and harvesting. It's helpful to any homeowner with a garden. One of the features of this app is that it explains important characteristics of different fruits and vegetables and how they survive in a garden. You will become well-acquainted with each plant and know exactly what it needs to grow properly, learn different indoor and outdoor requirements and the proper pH levels of the soil for each plant, and get helpful growing tips. There is a vast catalog that you can choose from and update on your own if you are growing something that isn't listed. This app can be customized to your garden's specifications in order to help your plants succeed. Not only will it tell you when the fruits and vegetables are ready for harvest, but you will also know the exact dates that you need to harvest your garden before your fruits and veggies are overdue.
Cost: $4.99
Available on: App Store

iScape

User friendly technology provides easy-to-use virtual design tools so you can portray your vision at ease. Having a landscape design app to portray your vision right on the spot will help eliminate the guesswork and confusion – which in return – will save you valuable time and money. Simply snap a picture and start dragging and dropping scapes into your yard. This app is good for professional landscape contractors and homeowners.
Cost: $9.99
Available on: App Store