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The best AI literacy apps and resources for teachers in 2026
Most "AI apps for teachers" lists are about AI that writes your lesson plans. This one is about teaching students to use AI well, and the free curricula that already do it.
Editorial note: Iro AI is our app. Where it appears below we say so, and it has to earn its spot by the same criteria as everything else.
In this postThe short answerThe resources, comparedHow we choseWhich to pickBuilding your own skills first
The short answer
The best AI literacy resource for your class depends on grade level and how much setup you can take on. For middle and high school, Code.org's How AI Works and Day of AI give you full, free units. For ages 8 to 16, Experience AI from the Raspberry Pi Foundation and Google DeepMind is free and well structured. For a printable high school unit that needs no student accounts, Iro's free AI literacy classroom kit (ours) runs in five lessons with a two-minute check before and after.
One distinction saves a lot of time: tools that help you plan, like Khanmigo, are not AI literacy curricula. They are useful, but they do not teach students how AI works, where it fails, or how to check it.
AI literacy resources for teachers, compared
| Resource | Who it's for | Format | Student accounts | Cost (US) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Iro AI literacy classroom kit (ours) | High school, ages 13+ | 5 lessons, 5 no-software activities, a 2-minute pre and post check, printable | None | Free |
| Code.org: How AI Works | Grades 6–12 | 9 videos with 7 core lessons, or a one-day version | Not stated (lessons run on Code.org) | Free |
| Common Sense Education: AI literacy lessons | K–12 (grade bands K–5, 6–8, 9–12) | 32 short lessons: videos, games, dilemma discussions | Not stated | Not verified by us |
| Day of AI (MIT RAISE) | Pre-K–12, grade by grade | Open curriculum: lesson plans, slides, activities, assessments; some unplugged | Not stated | Free |
| Experience AI (Raspberry Pi Foundation and Google DeepMind) | Ages 8–16 | Lesson plans, slides, worksheets, videos | Not stated | Free |
| aiEDU curriculum | Grades 3–12 | Discussion activities, multi-day sequences, projects | Teachers need a free account to download | Free |
| Stanford CRAFT | High school, all subjects | Adaptable activities, from 15 minutes to full lessons | Not stated | Free |
| Khanmigo for teachers (Khan Academy) | Teachers | An AI teaching assistant for planning, not an AI literacy curriculum | Not applicable | Free for teachers |
| Google AI Educator Series | Teachers, K–12 and higher ed | 15 to 45-minute sessions on using Gemini, with a badge | Not applicable (teacher training) | Free |
| Synapse | Teachers building their own AI skills | iPhone and iPad app with short lessons; its own site says it is not a lesson-builder | Not applicable (no classroom mode stated) | $2.99/week after a 14-day trial |
Details come from each provider's own website, checked November 6, 2026. "Not stated" means the provider's site does not say; "not verified by us" means we could not confirm it there. Check before you plan a unit around any of them, ours included.
Sources: code.org/ai, commonsense.org/education, dayofai.org, experience-ai.org, curriculum.aiedu.org, craft.stanford.edu, khanacademy.org/teachers, edu.google.com, learnsynapse.app, and our own classroom kit.
Practice this, don't just read it.
Iro AI turns ideas like the ones in this post into 5-minute exercises with feedback. Free tier, Pro from $4.17 a month ($49.99 a year, 7-day free trial).
How we chose
We included resources that a teacher can use this term without a district contract, and judged them on four things:
- Does it teach students AI literacy (how models work, where they fail, how to check output), or does it help the teacher plan?
- Grade range, as the provider states it.
- Setup: whether students need accounts, devices or a specific platform.
- Cost, from the provider's own site.
Iro's kit is ours. We list it because it fills a specific gap (a short, printable, no-account high school unit), and we hold it to the same four tests.
Which one to pick
- You teach middle or high school and want a full unit → Code.org's How AI Works or Day of AI.
- You teach ages 8 to 16 and want structured lessons with slides → Experience AI.
- You want short, discussion-led lessons you can drop into any subject → Common Sense Education or Stanford CRAFT.
- You teach high school, have a week, and can't set up student accounts → the Iro classroom kit, with the teaching sequence in how to teach AI literacy in high school.
- You want help writing lesson plans → Khanmigo is free for teachers, but pair it with one of the curricula above.
Building your own AI skills first
Teaching AI literacy is easier once you use the tools well yourself. Apps for adults fit that job better than the classroom. Iro AI (ours) is free to start, with five-minute lessons on ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini on iPhone and the web, and every path open on the free tier. Synapse is another option for teachers learning on iPhone or iPad, at $2.99 a week after a 14-day trial.
Iro is a self-paced app for individual learners aged 13 and up. It has no class management or student roster, which is why the kit exists as a separate, account-free resource. For more on using AI in your own teaching, see AI for teachers.
Practice this, don't just read it.
Iro AI turns ideas like the ones in this post into 5-minute exercises with feedback. Free tier, Pro from $4.17 a month ($49.99 a year, 7-day free trial).