Why My Kid Keeps Asking “Does Anyone Know The Name Of This App?” (And What I Started Doing About It)
It’s 6:17 on a Tuesday, I’m folding soccer socks at the kitchen counter, my 4th grader Leo is slouched over the table gluing construction paper for his Hawaii state project, and he yells over his shoulder like he does at least once a week: “Mom, does anyone know the name of this app?” I pause, holding a sock with a hole in the toe, and sigh. I know what’s coming. He saw a 15-second TikTok of a teacher using it to make project posters, he closed the video before writing down the name, and now he’s got 12 open tabs in his browser full of ad-ridden app suggestions that aren’t the right one.
I’ve been here before. Last month it was the app that lets you design custom 3D fidget toys to print at the maker lab at school. Two months before that it was the quiz app that lets you make custom trivia for your friend group’s birthday party. I used to drop whatever I was doing, pull up a chair next to him, and spend 40 minutes scrolling through search results with him, getting frustrated by the end because half the “free” apps want a $12 monthly subscription just to remove a watermark. Half the time I’d end up snapping, “Why can’t you just use Canva? We already pay for Canva.”
That Tuesday, I was about to do that again. My back ached from helping set up for the book fair at school that day (I work part-time as a K-5 teacher’s aide), I was looking forward to my after-kids-bedtime chocolate chip cookie, and I just wanted the project to be done so we could clean up the kitchen. But when I walked over to look at his screen, I saw he’d already drawn the outline of the island by hand, written out all the facts about volcanoes and pineapples, and he just wanted those cutout images to look clean. He wasn’t procrastinating. He wasn’t even scrolling TikTok for fun—he’d followed that teacher’s account for project tips, like I’d encouraged him to do when he got stuck on his last presentation.
So I sat down, and instead of searching for him, I asked him to walk me through what he remembered. The first thing I asked was, “Where did you see it again? Can you pull up your watch history?” He blinked. He’d never thought of that. He just closed the video when he was done watching, and opened Google to search. It took two minutes to scroll through his last hour of TikTok watch history, and there was the video. But the teacher still didn’t name it in the caption, just mentioned it offhand. That’s when I realized: this is a skill no one’s teaching him. Schools teach him how to cite sources, how to spot a scam website, but no one’s taught him how to find a specific tool he only half-remembers seeing in a short-form clip. This isn’t just a kid being forgetful. It’s a gap in digital literacy that all these kids have, because their media consumption is totally different than what we learned how to research.
We worked through it together that night. I showed him how to add specific details to the search instead of just typing “app that cuts out pictures.” We typed “free app to remove white background from images no watermark for school projects” and the third result was Remove.bg, which was exactly what he wanted. It took 20 minutes total, which was still less than the 40 we’d wasted the month before, and after that I wrote down three simple steps I told him he could do next time before he called me.
First, always check your watch or browsing history first. It doesn’t matter if you saw it on TikTok, Instagram, or YouTube—almost every platform saves every video you’ve watched for at least 30 days, and 9 times out of 10, you can find the original clip to get the name. Second, if you can’t find the original, write down three specific details about what you need before you search: does it need to be free? Does it need to work on your phone? Do you not want a watermark? Put all those in your search bar, don’t just type a vague description. Third, if you’re asking friends or family in a group chat, include those three details too. No one can help you if you just send “does anyone know the name of this editing app?”
I didn’t make a big deal out of it, just stuck the note on the fridge next to his soccer practice schedule. Last week, I was washing dishes after dinner when I heard him muttering to himself at the table, looking for an app that turns hand-drawn drawings into animated gifs for his presentation on the water cycle. I waited, ready to help if he called, but he pulled up his TikTok history first, typed “free animated gif maker for hand drawings no watermark iphone” into Google, and found it in seven minutes. Didn’t even yell for me.
Of course, it doesn’t always work that smoothly. Two weeks ago, he was looking for an app that lets you walk through a 3D model of the Hawaii state capitol, and we never did find the exact one he saw in a clip. We ended up using Google Earth’s street view, which worked just fine, and that turned into another little lesson: if you can’t find the exact tool you half-remember, there’s almost always a free tool you already have that will get the job done.
A lot of parents I talk to get annoyed when their kids ask this question, like it’s just another excuse to get off task or waste time. I get it. Some nights I’m too tired to even think about another app search. But I’ve started seeing that little question, “does anyone know the name of this app,” as a tiny, low-stakes chance to practice a skill he’s going to use for the rest of his life. He’s not going to remember every worksheet on citations from 4th grade, but he’s going to remember how to find the thing he’s looking for when he only half-remembers what it is. Right now, that’s enough for me.
Please indicate: Thinking In Educating » Why My Kid Keeps Asking “Does Anyone Know The Name Of This App