Children no interest in shooting?

I have three daughters and they have zero interest in anything to do with shooting.

In his book "Bringing Up Girls", child psychologist Jim Dobson relays the story of a young lady who was a champion at shooting trap, but always felt that all her dad cared about was showing off how well his daughter could shoot, and that he really didn't know her or care about her much as a person.

I don't want to be "that dad" so I don't push it at all.

If they're interested, they can ask me about it. Otherwise, it's just one of daddy's hobby things.

I'm making each girl a hope chest for their 16th BD and offering to let them participate in whatever level they want. Each one is different and wants to be involved at a different level.

My little girl likes it for a few minutes and then wants to go play in the dirt.



Start by keeping it simple, quiet, minimal recoil and instant gratification. Like a pellet gun and empty cans.

No matter what it must be fun to them. You can never force anyone into having a good time.

fouled bore said:

You may not be able to do anything about it if her dad is around and involved with her. Girls at this age see their stepdad as competition to their dads and may stay very loyal to him. In this case if he has ever said anything negative about shooting or guns you may never have a chance to get her to try it. Your a stepdad, set back and give her the best love and support in what she likes to do. It will pay off when she is about 17~20.

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^^^This is probably the best advice given so far. Without knowing how close you and you new step-daughter are, whether or not she does other activities with you, what her history with firearms is and what other interests she has, anything else would just be a WAG. Many times step fathers are put in a position of being the disciplinarian. Many teenagers don't want a replacement dad and automatically resent moms new love interest. I say give it some time and develop a relationship with her. Once she enjoys spending time with you, and you develop other common interests, she may very well want to shoot with you. Many girls that do not like to shoot guns, love archery.

Twiki357 said:

At 12 years old, she has probably already been brainwashed by the socialists that seem to infest the educational system these days.

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This is so ridiculous, it does't deserve a reply other than .....

I was curious how you parents deal with children that hate anything to do with shooting.

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If I had children with no interest in shooting, I would treat them the same way that I did when they showed no interest in carpentry; just leave them alone and wait for the moment when they needed the skill and then offer to teach them.

Of course that moment of need with a gun may come as a 3:00 a.m. phone call when your wife wants you to talk her through assembling the Charter Arms AR-7 that was the only gun in the house at the time.

My son like myself just gravitated to shooting and now my 12 year old grandson enjoys our shooting time. My daughter never had much interest and to this day does not. However, her daughter, my 12 year old granddaughter really enjoys shooting and is actually becoming quite good at the range. I never let the fact that my daughter had no interest bother me and I never overly encouraged her to shoot when I realized she had no interest.

While I am pleased the grandchildren enjoy shooting I would not be disappointed if they didn't. All that ever matters to me is they are happy with what they choose to do. Lil' Michael also loves baseball and Alexis loves her soccer. Little Parker, the second grandson will be two soon and I can't tell if I have another shooter there or not.

Ron

My oldest, now 27, wanted a Remington 597 as his first rifle. He wanted to learn how to load the magazine, put it in, take it out, charge the rifle and aim it. Once he got proficient enough to be able to shoot quarter-size groups at 25 yards, he declared that he knew everything about guns he ever wanted to know and hasn't touched one since.

My youngest, now 17, wanted a Marlin bolt action for his first rifle. He spent a week after we got it learning every part of it; how to field strip it, how to adjust sights, how to should it and get a good sight picture, etc. When we went to the family farm to actually shoot, he took to it like a duck to water making a sizable dent in the 333 round box of ammunition we had with us. He can't wait to go back and see if he can reduce his quarter-size groups to dime size.

Some kids just don't like it. No need to force it on them.

I got my son his first gun at 4. He is nearly 11 now and can outshoot some of my friends.....with their own guns!! Lol. They've gotten mad and left before. Funny stuff!

Ed Ames said:

One thing to do is ask her about what she likes and doesn't like about shooting.

Hearing protection that doesn't work well enough, boredom at the type of targets, lack of interest from peers...you may or may not be able to solve the problems but it might give you insight into what they are.

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The type of targets / shooting can be key. My wife has absolutely no interest in shooting paper targets with a rifle or handgun. She does like busting clays with a shotgun and watching them turn into smoke!

It's an individual thing, you can't force it. Give them the opportunities, it's great if they take advantage of it, no big deal if they don't.

My 12 year old granddaughter loves to shoot. Her favorite activity seems to be blowing cans 30 or 40 yards in the air. An AR-15 shorty and a 460XVR shooting 45 Colts in it are her tools of choice. The 460XVR is too heavy for her to hold up so she shoots it off a tripod.

On the other hand, my daughter (her mother) has had very little interest in shooting, and has been shooting maybe twice in her life. She did love to reload though, and we spent a lot of time at the reloading press together.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Twiki357 View Post
At 12 years old, she has probably already been brainwashed by the socialists that seem to infest the educational system these days.

This is so ridiculous, it does't deserve a reply other than .....

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Don't underestimate the amount of propaganda public school kids are subjected to.

After watching Food Inc. and Supersize Me in school, my 11 y.o. daughter declared herself to be a vegetarian. And she has stuck with it for over a year.

My daughter kind of liked it for a while.
She has a Cricket .22 that she shot a little.
She killed a deer when she was 10 and even loaded the bullet that she killed it with.

Now at 13 she couldn't possibly care less about shooting. She would much rather be doing makeup tutorials for her Youtube channel.

I don't really 'deal with it' at all. I like my things and she likes hers. Of course I would love it if she were more interested, but I'm not going to try to force it on her. That would likely have the opposite effect I wanted.

She has expressed an interest in archery, so I will certainly encourage her and we will see where that goes.

Start by keeping it simple, quiet, minimal recoil and instant gratification. Like a pellet gun and empty cans.

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When I was teaching my sons how to shoot, I added an element of "delayed gratification" because once I told them that once they got to where they could reliably get five shots into a quarter-size group at 25 yards, they got a case of generic soda pop to shoot at. Each group that was at least as good as the last earned them a full, sealed can.

There's something about a .22 hollow point meeting a full can of soda to get a young man's (or old man's for that matter) blood flowing and their attention focused. Even my 92 year old father, who makes sure I know he does not condone the waste (and makes his saw horses sticky), gets excited about watching his grandson blow up the cans.

Is she is adamant about the no gun/shooting thing ...........................move on! By that I mean, drop the matter all together.

Now at 13 she couldn't possibly care less about shooting. She would much rather be doing makeup tutorials for her Youtube channel.

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I'd say that's good because it means she has interests that are normal for her age.

If she takes up with a boyfriend that is into shooting, she might gravitate back to it. You might even be able to interest the boyfriend in shooting (or shooting more) and that will give you a chance to find out whether or not he's the man you want for your daughter.

Of course, you do have to watch out if she turns out to be the better shot. He'll either get embarrassed or else decide he's got to have her forever. My grandfather was a marksmanship instructor at Ft. Benning during World War II and used to take his dates skeet shooting so that he could impress them. The woman would become my grandmother consistently out-shot him, so he decided she was the one for him.

Of my two sons thr youngest always enjoyed shooting, the oldest would shoot a little, but no real interest, until I got them competing against each other. I us d fun targets to keep them interested, I used drink cans filled with water and CCI stingers to get a bigger explosion when they hit the target. When I thinned the pears on my trees to keep the limbs from breaking I let them shoot the not yet ripe pears. Same with hunting, thee youngest killed his first deer at 8 and the oldest was 12. If you don't have two to work with, talk about fun times shooting, make it sound like a lot of fun, get some exploding targets. Good luck.

Be a good husband to her mother. Treat her mother with overwhelming love and respect. Be a better example of a husband than her father was. She may get the message and marry a guy like you instead of a guy like him.

Then her husband can teach her to shoot.

She's 12 with a new step dad, you sure she doesn't like it just because you do?

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Renton83 said:

I was curious how you parents deal with children that hate anything to do with shooting. My step dad got me involved in shooting from young as I remember. I loved it and have been into shooting ever since. However I recently got married and my 12 year old step daughter refuses to have anything to do with it. I guess it's different with girls but my wife enjoys shooting. What are your experiences? I would like to share the experience with her as target shooting is something I feel we both could enjoy.

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Public school indoctrination.

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As a shooter and those of us that enjoy shooting can do is expose our children or grandchildren to the art form. Some will like it and some won't. You can't make them take to something they really have no interest in. Be they natural or step children. What is it they say? You can lead a horse to water but... My son took to it and my daughter never did but ironically my granddaughter from my daughter really seems to enjoy it and more important excels at it.

The worst thing anyone can do, in my humble opinion. is try to make a child take interest in something they have no interest in. What you can do is take interest in and support them in the things that interest them. They call it nurturing.

Ron

Make it fun. Balloon targets on a target board. If shes likes art, have her hand paint some targets. Buy her the supplies (that shes gets to keep out of the deal) to make them and then give her a challenge with a reward. Hit the bullseye at x distance with 10 rounds and you'll buy her that shirt/phone case/pair of jeans she's been wanting.

We know shooting is fun, give her a little incentive to get out the door and out to the range. She'll probably end up liking it, the trick is to get some motivation for her to try something new.

yellowfang said:

Public school indoctrination.

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Again, a prime example of when someone does not have a clue. My local School District just created Sporting Clays teams at both Middle School and High School levels. In two years they both already have more participation than even Football. Does that tell me my school is indoctrinating kids against playing football?

For the most part, Kid's morals, ideals, self motivation, hobbies and specific interests are developed at home and away from school, from parents, role models and peers. It's when one expects the education system to do it, there most likely to be failure. There's also failure when a parent attempts to force a child to spend their recreational time doing something they really don't want to. The OP's step daughter is 12 years old. She has been indoctrinated and influenced by her mother, her birth father, her friends and other family all that time. The OP cannot step in and immediately think that the girl is going to jump at the opportunity to do something she may have no desire to do, or may be intimidated doing. He cannot realistically expect her to love all the things he does and want to spend her free time with him, while he is still a relative stranger to her. He can only offer her the opportunity and go from there. While he needs to leave the door open for her even tho she has originally declined and showed little interest, he can not take it personally that she does not automatically want to give up her free time. I coached Hockey for many years at levels from beginner thru High School Varsity. I watched many parents lament the fact their kid did not love the same sport they did, and still insisted the child play. The kids were not on the ice for themselves. The motivation to succeed was not their own.

It's easy for folks on a gun forum to claim every 12 year old girl should love to shoot firearms. Not realistic tho. Just because someone else brags about their 12 year old loving to shoot, should not make another parent/step parent feel guilty or shame. There should be no disappointment because one's child/step child has different interests, only when those interests are none or poor choices.

If my kids had no interest in shooting, the first step would be a paternity test.