Teaching a young kid

C

Charlie Golf

New member
I've got a few questions and looking for some advice/input on some stuff as well.

My father started me with firearms safety and shooting at a relatively young age. According to him I first started plinking aluminum cans with a Daisy BB gun soon after my 5th birthday. I also tagged along on dove and waterfowl hunts and a few years later had "graduated" to a Ruger 10/22 shortly followed by a single-shot breakaction 20 ga. with a .410 tube insert. I dropped my first dove, teal, and Canada goose with that gun in the good old lead shot days. I have been an avid bird hunter ever since and just spent two wonderful days shooting doves with my old man and family friends in Texas.

I have a nephew who recently turned 5 years old...same month as my own birthday ironically. His father (my bro-in-law) was not a hunter or firearm owner until I married his sister and I introduced them both to it. In fact, I bought him his first shotgun for Christmas a few years back -- dad bought my wife a shotgun as a wedding gift :D

Anyhow, we have been loosely discussing taking my nephew on a dove or teal hunt this season to start getting him introduced. He would be watching only...not shooting anything of course. My concern though is that I really want the kid to learn "right."

My wife and I have purchased with his parent's permission an Airsoft spring BB gun. We have decided to give it to him as part of an overall "training" program that encompasses firearm safety as its central premise -- as it always should be.

We want him to learn that "pow-pows" are serious things and safety is of utmost importance. I have started investigating the NRA's Eddie Eagle programs but was wondering if anyone knows of any child education programs that have a "hunting" slant to them as the NRA stuff appears more along the lines of "if you see a gun, leave it alone and find an adult." Good advice certainly and something I think will be incorporated to round out everything we show him.

Lastly, he's not my kid...and I don't wanna take away an important thing between him and my bro-in-law...so I'm trying not to step on toes. But the reality of it is that his dad just doesn't know where to look or start so I am kind of taking the lead on this. Furthermore, his dad himself is still very "new" to firearms and hunting safety and had a few "eyeopeners" early on. I definitely don't intend to exclude him in any way but was hoping for some advice on how to best coordinate with him so my nephew becomes a safe and confident firearms operator and hunting companion.

Any advice is greatly appreciated on training materials (DVD cartoons would be great) and the familial aspects.

Also, if you can recommend any "kid-friendly" dove or teal recipes that would be great too. We wanna round out his training with the "eat what you harvest" mentality.

TIA
 
I have taught Hunter Safety in a three state area and curretnly active with my eight year old Grandson. Your call but feel that for a five year old, you might be overloading him. That is not to say that there are not ways to trian or time. I feel that the time to start, is when "they" show the interest and start asking questions. I find that the younger they are the shorter the attention span. I only promote four safe gun handling rules as too many are forgotten and cloud up the important ones. My older Grandsons can recite them and understand the application. All our activities are in support of these four basic rules. By the time I get them into a Hunter Safety Course, they are ready and knowledgeable. There is a never ending learning curve and I'm still working on mine. One very young activity is the rubber band gun and it's use. We set up shoot and no-shoot scenarios and game identification. There many resources for older kids but not that aware of what is out there for the younger ones. Perhaps it's time for someone to put something together. My eight year old and three year old Grandsons, have already singled out the M/L they want to shoot. Heck, haven't even had them out to the range yet.

Be Safe !!!
 
On young kids just don't push them. I have a friend who has two sons that he introduced to shooting. His oldest boy is now 14 and has been shooting since he was 5 and could stay focused on shooting for a couple of hours before he would loose interest. His youngest is 6 and wants to shoot very badly but looses interest after about 15 minuets so he teaches him about shooting and firearm safety 15 minuets at a time.
 
I have been around guns all my life. I was not given the privileged of a tutor. My father hunted once in a while. I was given a BB gun early on by Grandpa. After not shooting things I wasn't suppose to, I was given a .22. I use to tie it to my bicycle and go to the country to shoot targets.

Since this neglected period in my firearms life, I do not raise my kids that way. Although back then was a total different time.

I have 3 young-ens. I have had guns around all my adult life. So when each was big enough(4-5) would take them to the back 40, I would blow holes in cans. Then I would explain why they do not touch guns or ammo. They were taught if they see guns or ammo they were to get the nearest adult. Knock on wood, it stuck in there head. They would even explain it to the neighbor kids, guns are not toys. Unlike a few of my neighbors today(who don't allow there children to have toy guns) Mine had BB guns 5-6 years old. .22 rifles and shotguns not long after that.

Just teach them the dangers, and safe handling when they are able to comprehend. Then get them into hunting. I have taken several neighbor kids(with parental consent) under my hunting wing. Usually their folks were not into hunting or didn't have the time. I now have several hunting buddies.

As far as dove hunting. I took my middle daughter one year(before I would let her hunt) She had a blast. She called herself, my hunting dog. :] Did save me some leg work. But after that she was very interested in hunting. She has the biggest deer of the family at the moment. It is posted somewhere in the hunting forum. Anyways I love teaching the kids and introducing them to hunting and the sport of shooting. Thank you for taking the time to teach another child.

Good Luck and Be Safe
Lonny
 
Last edited:
I started my older kids with .22s at about 3 or 4. The younger ones started earlier (more like 18 months old) on the porch with a Red Ryder BB gun with them holding and pressing the trigger and me trying to make sure it was pointed well enough to hit a one gallon plastic bucket at 10 feet or so. One of the biggest problems was finding comfortable combinations of ear and eye protection. The all started early handling firearms sitting on my lap.

The first thing to teach them is to not touch firearms without you there with them. If they come and ask to see one then make the time to get one out and let them look at it and handle it - if they know they can look at one with you when they want to then they won't be so likely to try to look at one when you aren't there. That's my theory.

The second thing to teach them is the four rules.

For convincing the little ones that firearms are serious and possibly dangerous if misused I like to take them out and let them shoot things like full cans of soda or fruit and vegetables with .22LR hollowpoints. Let them see the massive damage to the cans, then explain that it will do the same thing to a person, like them, or their mother, father, or siblings. Hold one of the cans up next to their tummy and ask if they would like a hole that big through them. A graphic demonstration with a food item will often get their attention. Plus, it's fun. Mellons are fun, too, but they usually don't explode the way that sealed cans do (at least with a .22LR) and I'm going for making a big impression on a youngster.

Don't forget that safety doesn't just mean not pointing guns at things you don't want to shoot. Make sure that they are aware of the possibility of ricochets, and of the possibility of bullets bouncing off hard objects and parts of them coming back at you.

Make sure shooting is fun with big, easy to hit targets, and reactive targets. Metal spinners for .22s are pretty cheap. Soda cans work well, just clean up after yourselves. Make sure you take some targets home to put on the fridge or on the walls of their room. Be sure to fill them out with info like who shot it, what firearm and distance, and sign it as a witness to make it official.

If your range is set up for it ask the little ones if they want to look for bullets in the backstop. Let them take some empty cartridge cases home, too.

As a last safety issue, make sure they wash their hands thoroughly when they are done.

I never used any formal materials for safety training except for making them memorize and recite the four rules and be able to give at least a little explanation of what each means.

Having two adults is a big plus as long as you can agree on who is the instructor and who is the assistant. You can trade off and I often do with my dad when we are out with my kids - one of us is the teacher and the other sort of stands back and watches for safety issues and makes sure the kids understand what they are being told. Often I find that the assistant has a good vantage point that a kiddo isn't absorbing what he is being taught when the instructor may be too close to the action. The assistant can also take lots of pictures with the camera that you made sure to bring. Let his dad be the instructor at least part of the time. He will learn a lot being the instructor and you will learn a lot by watching. Just work out the details and don't get into a contest in front of the little student.

Hunter safety courses are great but here they can't take them until they are at least 12, although some instructors might let you sit in and audit the class.

As for a recipe for dove, my wife bakes it in a concoction of rice and cream of mushroom soup in a big pan. If the kiddo likes homemade chicken noodle soup I think you can make dove noodle soup.

Have fun and post pics.
 
"I started my older kids with .22s at about 3 or 4. The younger ones started earlier (more like 18 months old) on the porch with a Red Ryder BB gun with them holding and pressing the trigger and me trying to make sure it was pointed well enough to hit a one gallon plastic bucket at 10 feet or so. One of the biggest problems was finding comfortable combinations of ear and eye protection. The all started early handling firearms sitting on my lap."


Gees I started way to late:confused:
 
Well, I'm still probably considered one of the kids, only being 21; but just wanted to commend all the folks who are passing on the traditions to each successive generation. I was lucky enough to grow up completely surrounded by the outdoors on our family farm, which included growing up with firearms and with hunting. From what I've been told, pretty much as soon as I could physically hold my brothers' red rider BB gun I was plinking soda cans in the yard. I was fortunate enough to have parents who both were and still are avid hunters.

My parents enrolled me in a private elementary school, and it was there that I learned that :eek: not all kids went home after school to go exploring in the woods with their parents looking for deer beds and scrapes.....and even worse, not everyone took "sick days" in order to watch the sunrise on opening day of deer season.......what a sad world we live in :( Oh the shock when I'd open my lunchbox to pull out venison jerky, or the nasty letter sent home when my "show and tell" was pictures from my latest hunt.

Hook 'em young and teach 'em right.
 
The young kids (and 5 years old is really young) get tired and/or bored very quickly. Whatever you do, make sure he has fun, and keep shooting or hunting sessions limited to an hour or less.

I've seen people try to press 11 and 12 year old kids to go out for hours in the cold hunting, and they quickly become bored, loud, and irritated.

Just make sure he has fun, and keep it very simple and very short. JMHO, and that's the best opinion I can give you.

Personally, I'd probably wait a couple of years to do anything with him (like I said, 5 is really young, and I'm sure I'll receive responses of "well, my folks started me when I was three with a .22 LR and I had to hunt in snow up to my neck", LOL), but if you decide to do anything now, I'd just let him shoot some cans or some other reactive targets at close range. Man, 5 years old is really young.....There's practically no attention span....
 
I'll just say that I don't like the idea of using a toy gun to teach gun safety with. Guns aren't toys and toys aren't guns. You and I know the differance, but to a 5 year old it gets confusing. I taught my daughter at 5 with Crickett. I let her run around the house with toy guns and made sure she knew the differance. You do what you think is best, that is just my thoughts.
 
Theres a good point hinted at here- be aware that youngsters ears are far more susceptable to noise induced hearing loss than an adults- ear plugs AND ear muffs are a requirement as neither fit perfectly.

As an aside, i started pulling triggers when i was 5, shot my first rabbit at 6, first rifle (Ruger 10/22) at 12.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top