Colorado Student Reprimanded for Drawing Picture of a Gun

Kody Smith, a second grader at Talbott Elementary School in Colorado Springs got in trouble recently for drawing a picture of a gun at school.

Second grader Kody Smith was assigned to go outside, look at the clouds, and then use his imagination to draw what he saw.

"Draw a picture of what you see in the clouds from your imagination and that picture is a gun,” explained 8-year-old Kody.

Because it was a gun, the teacher at Talbott Elementary in Widefield called him into the office, and then filed a behavior report. His parents say that's too much.

While it's certainly possible there may be more to the story, filing a "behavior report" on the picture of an inanimate object strikes me as a bit absurd. There's nothing inherently disturbing or troubling about a picture of a gun--heck, there's more than 10 gun clubs in the area.

Now, if a picture was depicting him actually using the gun on other people, or if the picture showed some other form of violence, I would understand the alarm. But it's not--it's just a picture of a gun. Children need to be taught when it's actually appropriate to be scared or alarmed. Actual guns in school are quite scary. A picture of one? Not so much.