Happiness Is... (think Beatles, not Precious Moments)

We had an interesting discussion today at work among my colleagues who also teach kids with social/emotional/behavioral issues (most of them using Positive Discipline, the method I mentioned a few days ago). What do you when kids play guns at school?

I generally have a (outwardly) nonjudgmental, but firm "no guns at school" rule. Why? "Because they're not safe." "But it's just a pretend gun!" "Yeah, but guns scare me, so I don't even like pretending."

Not a terribly unique way of handling things, I admit. Basic Standard Liberal Hippie Teacher Procedure.

Another teacher said that he used to do the same thing, plus have rules about no toy weapons from home, etc., etc. He used to redirect kids during any sort of shoot-em-up play. But he eventually got tired of constantly monitoring these kids' play so that he can nip it in the bud. Plus, as others pointed out, it seems to be unending. Kids (and, for a myriad of reasons that can be debated, especially boy-type kids) play imaginary guns. You can limit their exposure, you can watch their playmates, you can monitor their TV time, and little boys will still point a stick at someone and say "blam." And the other guy falls down, then gets up and shoots you and you fall down. Then you all get up and go play something else. Probably something loud and possibly equally violent, maybe involving that apple juice that you've already had enough of today, mister. And the world goes on, no harm, no foul.

And that's the typical kids, kids from functional homes with parents who provide adequate supervision. Then you get our kids, the ones who already have such screwy ideas about how the world works, and whose parents have some ideas that are screwy in their own right. One of the kids in my class has been talking about zombies, blood, and shooting his friends at school. He's four. He told us all about this video game called Call of Duty (my assistant muttered that her 19-year-old son had nightmares after his first time playing it). I called the mom, who said that the kid wasn't playing it, but that he was sometime around as she and her brother-in-law played it. Then she said, wonderingly, that the kid seemed more anxious at night and was wanting the light on all the time...sigh. The next time he came to school, he was upset because he'd rather be at home, playing Halo on his Xbox. So for this kid, this four-year-old for whom violent video games are something he does for fun and something his mom and uncle do for fun...what does he think when I give him the message that he, his mom, and his uncle are wrong?

For all of these reasons, my colleague said that he's adopted a different philosophy about this lately. He still says no toy guns, no weapon toys from home, but if kids insist on playing shooting games, he insists that they engage in a conversation with him about how the games will be played. He then leads them through a discussion where they come up with rules (a big part of Positive Discipline is the idea that kids are more motivated to cooperate if they are involved in the process of making rules) like, "No shooting someone who's not playing the game." And, if they break the rules they've agreed to, then that's it for the game for the day.

I dunno. I have a pretty strong reaction to seeing little kids shoot each other. But is that just my own liberal hippiness making me a Judgy McJudgerton? Or am I just seeing it in the context of today's world? Would I be bothered by a film of kids from the 50s playing Cowboys and Indians? And while I do think it's different for my kids, kids who tend to be emotionally volatile to begin with, what right do I have to tell them they can't play a certain way?

Of course, all of our thinking and philosophizing has nothing on a kid's simple reasoning skills. Earlier this week, a kid was pointing his fingers like a gun and shooting at things. I gave him my "no guns at school" rap, but he wasn't convinced:

Kid: "But I want to play hide and shoot them."
Me: "I get that, but we don't allow guns at school. You could still hide and maybe use something else."
Kid: "Like what?"
Me: "A lasso? A laser?"
Kid (looks at his hand, still crooked into "gun" pose): "I don't have a laser."
Me: *facepalm*