12yr old bought a bb gun on school trip!

Are BB guns illegal now? My dc had them, they are late teens now. Used them for shooting tin cans in the garden.

Fond memories. DS went on a school ski trip aged 7. (I know - they went by coach as well!) He brought me back a lovely bottle of wine. Apparently he was too short to reach for a less expensive bottle as these were on higher shelves.

Cross-cultural experiences...perhaps an opportunity to discuss with your DS why you think it is wrong, and why the French may not.

DD was asked by her family on her French exchange whether she preferred cider doux or sec. Doux obviously, if you are 14. Their much younger son agreed.

A BB gun is not a 'firearm'.

Our list for the year 7 French trip has just gone home. The list was reallly long and comprehensive, firearms, knives, alcohol, tobacco are at the top, (and includes flour filled balloons.) Punishment for infringement is made very clear.

And why is it that 12yo needs supervising in a market?
At that age, they shouldn't need an adult behind them all the way. They should be trusted to behave appropriately.

And what we are talking about us being a TOY. One they shouldn't have bought, but just a toy.
It's not the end of the world.

MoonfaceAndSilky

"So the teacher 'supervising' is not to blame, at all, for not supervising?"

How do you know that the teacher wasn't supervising?

Do you know what the teacher to child ratio was on the trip?

more to the point why should the teacher take the blame for what someone else did?

Ah, now I'm with you.
Basically they are toys and look like toys?
I'm afraid I can get annoyed about it.
If, before leaving, the children were told they weren't allowed to buy some, then they should have followed the rule.
For the rest, they've bought a toy. I wouldn't go and see the school because of that, nor would I grumble about children been left on their own in the market.

HappyNevertheless - I doubt they were those ones.
They are far more expensive. Though who knows....

The ones usually sold and bought for kids are generally made of plastic and spring loaded, not with gas cartidges, so far weaker firing, the pellets don't go as far. And the ones sold here don't look like 'real guns' so much, either. Like this or this. They sell targets with a sticky surface that the plastic pellets stick to. Like this

I am not advocating for BB guns as a suitable toy, far from it, but I don't think that 12 year old boys being driven to buy one when they saw one on sale, is the worst thing that can happen. Presumably they saw it as a legal, exciting offer, and may have felt resentful to have a teacher confiscate it if they had not been specifically told in advance.

You can't complain to anyone in France, OP - there is no 'underage'. They are sold as toys, not weapons. DS won one in France on a fairground stall when he was 5!

In France you can buy BB guns in all toy shops. They sell a large range especially for children with no age restriction. You can bring them through French customs without an issue.

My ds bought 2 last time we went and we brought them home on the Eurostar without a problem. French customs were lovely and jokingly offered to swop his real gun for the Bb gun and put it in his holster.

My ds uses his responsibly at staged events though and he has a large section of guns ranging from handguns to machine guns. They are transported only in appropriate holdalls and not in plain sight in public.

When DD went to France they were told they couldn't buy weapons and not even flick combs (like flick knives). Anyone who did would be excluded.

Most schools send kids into the market in groups and I bet they were all told what not to buy and it sounds like the staff asked them all afterwards too.

Your son broke the rules and then didn't hand it over when asked.

Bugger link again
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BB_gun

Are we talking about those kind of guns?
[[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BB_gun thete]

Have you seen one those guns?
Because I have never ever seen a gun like this in a market in France. (Had to google what it was too)
Knifes yes you will find them. The type that you use in a kitchen or in a garden. But NOT a weapon gun iyswim.

So I'm puzzled as to what really happened.

DS just turned 14 which is a bit older, I know, but he's in Taiwan right now on an exchange trip. Before he went, he was explicitly told to stay away from guns, knives, fireworks (and mopeds!) and any other dangerous items. It's up to him to act responsibly and not up to the school/host parents to keep a constant watch over him.

I'm sorry, but I think your son is fully to blame. Having said that, as a parent, if my son had bought a weapon and the school had (rightly) confiscated it from him, I would hope that the school would tell me.

He's 12. If he bought it behind the teacher's back, knowing perfectly well that he shouldn't have, then all the blame lies with him.
Save your "fuming" for him; if you spread any round the school there's a distinct possibility that he'll be banned from all future trips because he can't be trusted to follow the rules. That'll be his fault too...

When it's an item that can cause significant harm? Yes that's a parenting issue.

DD's school explicitly states that items such as BB guns are not to be bought on trips abroad. This is on a behaviour agreement that parents and child both have to sign upfront. If your school doesn't currently do this I would suggest it as an improvement for future.

He's 12 - he knows what is and isn't allowed and like the others was trying it on.

I'm not sure how you were expecting a teacher to walk round the market with every child supervising what they bought.

I know my child has to shoulder alot of the blame

Try all of the blame.

So the teacher 'supervising' is not to blame, at all, for not supervising?

They are 12 year olds, they think BB guns are toys.
I think the school should have warned them, beforehand, that they were not allowed to buy anything like this. Also bags should have been searched once they knew a few of the children had bought them.

My son went on a school trip last year and I think something similar happened. I'm not sure if the child concerned was excluded when they came back, but I'm sure there would have been a reasonably serious sanction (not sure exclusion is the answer, they're not being disruptive in school, just need to understand they can't do that sort of thing, maybe a Friday night detention with the head is a better option).

Excluding from future trips is definitely too harsh - they're kids, they need to learn. What you do in year 7 has no bearing on how you'll behave in year 10! Although if they have a ballot system I suspect those kids find themselves out of the ballot before it even takes place...

a parenting issue, did your son really think this was ok?

not this AGAIN. Do MNers really expect kids to do what their parents say at all times?

We did this on a school trip we went on when I was 13. As a PP said, we didn't think of them as weapons, just as toys

No one was excluded over it, but the BB guns were all confiscated bar one that got missed and taken home.

I know my child has to shoulder alot of the blame

Try all of the blame.