If you’re an avid gun collector, there’s a good chance your son or daughter has taken notice. Maybe they’ve even started asking about shooting themselves. This is great, because it means that now is the time to start teaching them about something that you love. It’s a wonderful feeling, when you can relate to your child over a shared hobby.
More importantly, though, anyone who lives in a home with a gun needs to know about it. Kids, expecially young kids, need to know as soon as possible that a gun is not a toy. The best way to do this is to educate them about firearms.
If you’re ready to teach your child to shoot, here are some things to keep in mind.
A lot of teenagers might be interested in learning to hunt. This is great, but the woods is not the place to learn shooting safety and aim. Neither is your back yard, unless you’ve got a lot of acreage and some understanding neighbors. There is no better way to keep safe when learning the basics than a shooting range. And especially with teenage shooters, it’s important to re-enforce the importance of safety at every turn.
A lot of you might not bother as much with safety gear as you once did. You’re used to shooting without ear protection, or goggles. This are things that simply cannot be ignored with younger shooters. Kids ears are far more sensitive, and they run the risk of lifelong hearing loss if they don’t use proper gear.
When handled safely, shooting is a really fun sport. And, like all sports, kids learn great lessons from it. When you teach a child that they have to practice aiming and techniques to hit the target, you’re teaching them to work for the things that they want in life. When you teach a child about the proper care and maintenance that firearms require, you show them the value of maintaining equipment. Not to mention the responsibility of cleaning up after themselves. And when you teach a child the importance of safe firearm storage, you show them that while this is a great sport, guns can be dangerous.
These days, it’s hard to find time for fun activities with your child. You might spend all day with your kids running errands, helping them with their homework or keeping the house in order, but more often than not, days go by without doing anything really fun. Then, there’s the fact that what you call fun, and what your child calls fun might be two very different versions of the word.
Target shooting is fun. For a lot of people, hunting is fun, but there are some people that don’t find that an enjoyable activity. Most people would agree, though, that target shooting is a lot of fun.
There are a lot of reasons to start teaching kids to shoot. Make that one of your new years resolutions, and start a hobby that you can share with your kids for the rest of their lives.
