My son has been using a marlin 44 mag since he was 6. He shot his first buck at 6 and he is a skinny little guy. I put a red dot scope on it for the eye relief and had him shoot it in my lead-sled so he couldn't feel the recoil. When he shot the buck, it rocked his world but he acted like it didn't bother him because his adrenaline and I started jumping up and down with excitement to take his mind off the recoil. He is 11 now and finally got rid of that dumb red dot scope and put on a 3x9x40 and its a little tack driver. Try the lead-sled, it works!!!!