Thread: Teaching Kids - Open sights or scope?

I'm teaching my son (7yo) to shoot, he's using my CZ .22, scoped with a 2-7 weaver. He's doing quite well and really enjoys it.However, even with the weaver scope being quite forgiving, he does struggle sometimes in getting his head in the right spot with the right eye relief to get a good sight picture - the length of the stock doesn't help either. In order to make things simpler for him , I was considering ditching the scope and going to open sights for this early learning stage.

Those of you who have taught your kids to shoot, what path did you take?

Use the scope, getting open sights aligned is a lot harder. Perhaps try taping some foam on the stock to help the cheek alignment. You could even consider cutting a bit off the stock. As he gets older put a slip on recoil pad to extend the length of pull, then eventually put back the bit you cut off.

My recent effort for my 7 yr old

https://www.nzhuntingandshooting.co....fit-boy-42757/

For me, always a scope. Used a scope for both my kids, the hundreds of school kids and dozens of first-timers who have shot my .22's.

The lad will pick it up once he gets the hang of it but at that age I always let them take prone shots. Typically they don't have enough strength to coordinate standing shots until around 11 or 12. Also encourage him to use the scope on 4x as that will be easier and slightly more forgiving than 7x zoom. If you want to get really carried away get a youth stock for him, he'll find that a lot easier to use.

All my kids use a scope ages 6,8,10 and 11 doesn't take long to figure out the eye relief find a height that works for them like a seat or bench with a decent rest.
Something that keeps the rifle pretty stable, I use a pack which works well soft enough for the rifke to sit in but not move about too much.
My other advise is use a gong type target, it really helps as it makes a sound when they hit it giving them instant gratification.
I also found that my younger children got too caught up if there grouping wasnt as good as dads so the gong works a treat.
I just use an old landcruiser front brake disk does the job

Try your guy with the scope and without, and see if there's a clear improvement either way.
You might think about finding an old beater cz stock to cut down to a size that suits him and also tape on a foam cheek pad as Stug suggested.

My daughter got a Rascal for her 4th b day. She shot it OK with the open sights, but really has enjoyed shooting it since the scope. She's now 5.

If I started again, I'd go scope from the beginning. Reason is it's easier to explain - put X on where you want hole.... etc.... can't see X move head.....

Yeah, my 4.5 year old struggles to line up the iron sights on the air rifle.
I'm going to out a scope on for him.

Open sights seem to be easier in my experience with kids especially with a full size rifle. Apeture is better than tangent, "look through the hole and make the birdie sit on the post".

I find iron sights more fun. Try both, maybe make a cardboard fore sight and rear sight so you can show them proper and improper alignment.
Also start with large targets not too far away!

I learned to shoot using blade and notch iron sights on an air rifle. I got pretty good, and absolutely hated them. I remember watching Crocodile Dundee 2, seeing Mick's rifle with ghost rings, and wishing I had a sighting method that good. A scope is so much more intuitive, especially if your iron sights are set up with the traditional target shooting zero (6 o'clock hold). Even today, that seems so task-specific and dumb.

Id stick with the scope. My 7yr old grandson is now comfortable shooting my .222, provided hes lying down with the bipod or a rest. Just not strong enough to hold the rifle standing, and to short in the arms to shoot off his knees. He started off with open sights for a while but started to shoot reasonably well with a wee 4 x 20 scope. Once he started to use the 222 with a 3 - 9 scope he really excelled; mainly due to the clarity of the scope and the larger field of view., The simple instruction of "put the crosshairs on the bullseye / shoulder" is straightforward for a wee fella / felless.

My young one used iron sights on his CZ scout for about 1.5 years before he would let me buy him a scope.
Now he likes the scope... (11yo), he started shooting when he was 7yo.

Some good points, I think for now I'll get him to stick with the scope.

scope or red dot till they understand how the sights are meant to line up. Just put a red dot on they kids (4 and 7) air rifle but they havn't had a go yet. If using irons its to easy for them to just look over top of them and think they have them lined up.