Speaking of boom sticks . . . . We had been recently married, my sister and niece and nephew lived with us for a while. At the time, I didnt have a safe and I had multiple firearms. I didnt want them to be afraid of them, but I wanted to provide boundaries for their interaction with them.
So . . . . Operating on the perspective that for a young child, curiosity and ignorance are a dangerous mixture, one day I laid out several long guns and a few pistols on the bed and brought my 4 year old niece and 3 year old nephew into the room. As their eyes turned into saucers and my nephew started drooling, I started laying out some ground rules.
- They could see and hold a gun any time they wanted, but they had to come get me (or one of their uncles) to do so.
- Anytime they asked, I would stop whatever I was doing and we'd go get out a gun and let them hold it for as long as they wanted to.
- Safety rules must be followed at all times. Finger off the trigger, muzzle control, and under no circumstances was a firearm to be pointed at a person . . . . . Ever!
For the first two weeks, at least once a day, I would have to stop what I was doing and go hold guns with one or both of them. After that, it went to about twice a week for another couple of weeks and then to about once every couple of months or so. They became so familiar with the guns that they got over their curiosity without being put in a dangerous situation. They would play right past a firearm without giving it a second look.
Another thing that we did was to get him some toy pistols. However, he was not allowed to point even the toy weapons at a person, and he was expected to exercise muzzle control.
When our own children came along, we taught them along the same lines. The only incident we ever had was when a friend of my son came over and tried to convince him that they should go check out a gun without the adults there.
My 8 year old son refused and let us know and the issue was dealt with.
All of my children were taught safe firearms handling rules and techniques from a young age and were shooting as well. I would start them with 22's but within a short time they were shooting various weapons. At this point, 3 of them have taken big game, all of them are familiar with multiple types of firearms and enjoy range day. My youngest just turned 10 and my oldest is 17.
The reason I trained this way was that the main cause of firearms accidents with children usually involved a child sneaking to satisfy their curiosity and then because of a lack of knowledge, disaster happens. This way, I satisfied the curiosity, encouraged interest, taught safety and respect, and ended up with young responsible adults that love firearms the way that I do.