NEW YORK — Waiting in line for the bus, a Pennsylvania kindergartner tells her pals she is going to shoot them with a Hello Kitty toy that makes soap bubbles. In Massachusetts, a 5-year-old boy attending an after-school program makes a gun out of Legos and points it at other students.
Are they children with active imaginations or potential threats to school safety?
Comments
liberal PC run amok.
Teachers and school administrators with more self-awareness of their power over little people than common sense. How would it be if, in the teacher's lounge, one of those control freaks responds to a remark with a raised hand, and a thumb pulled back and finger pointed at the other speaker? Cause for arrest, trial and 2 years in the county hoosegow?
I remember that as I kid my friends and I used to play "cops and robbers" type games on a not-infrequent basis. Some kids (my brother among them) would draw pictures of battle scenes; I probably drew some fairly dramatic illustrations of some of the more gruesome fairy tales myself. These days, had any of that conduct taken place on school grounds, it might have led to suspension, expulsion, or other disciplinary action. So far as I know, none of the participants has gone on to harm, much less kill, anyone. If a child is aggressive towards other children, or is disruptive in class it is one thing; but a child "shooting" her friends with a bubble gun does not seem to be a precurser to a mass killing. Can't a teacher simply say "We don't play with those toys in school; I will give it back to you after class" and leave it at that?