My 9 yr old sights with her left eye shooting right handed. I was placing my hand over her left eye to force the right eye to open. She is right handed. How can I help her learn to shoot with the right eye?

Put tape on the left lens of her shooting glasses.  

OSA

ChaZ,
Her mother will not allow that. Thanks for the idea. Spfld. I will try your idea

Your kid, but I have to say I think you should probably think over what striker says -- she may have better vision or get a better sight picture with that eye. If she's more accurate that way, heck . .if it looks funny but shoots good, well, it shoots good.

She is shooting high consistently. I think she is not getting the right sight picture. I am a fair shot but a terrible teacher. Yes, she is my kid but I will take the help I can get with her.

She cannot close the left eye without alot of effort. I have her practicing that. The Herny 22 youth model I got her does not allow her to get "down" on the stock shooting  with the left eye open holding it with the right hand. After doing to shooting with the right eye open she started hitting much closer to the bulls eye.

Im right handed left eye dominant i shoot right handed left eye with pistol and right handed right eye with rifle/shotgun. i shoot great either way.

old#7
    I am also left eye dominant and right handed; however, when shooting rifles I shoot left handed. Maybe you should let her try left handed. BTW I still shoot handguns rigthanded
(sighting with my left eye of course). good luck

It's not possible to switch eye dominance.I'm left eyed and left handed.I have taught a lot of people to shoot.I also go by which eye is dominant.Both of my boys are left eyed and right handed.If she has not been shooting that long ,I would switch to the left side.She will pick it up pretty fast.Matter of fact I was going to start a thread about this latter tonight,before I read this.

Yep, if you take the advice of a previous poster and gouge the other eye out. Seriously, it is about as easy as being able to switch dominant hands.

I am just like burn, right handed and left eye dominant. Like him I shoot pistols with my left eye and rifles with my right eye and I cannot leave both eyes open while shooting a rifle.

I think the best way to do it is to just make her. Don't let here shoot with her left eye and make her close it. She is young and should learn it relatively fast once she gets the hang of it.

I have heard many people say that the best way is to shoot rifles left handed. I personally dont think this is a good solution. Not only because it is completely backwards when using the other hand to do certain things, but lefties seem to be at a severe disadvantage in our particular hobby. Most rifles are made for righties as you can tell by going to any gun shop and looking at all of their bolt rifles, then you have the problem of autos ejecting the brass down their shirt, in the face etc.

Im sure there will be some lefties dispute this opinion, but Im 100% sure if they started off fresh and had their choice they would surely pick to be able to shoot guns right handed naturally, to do otherwise would be ignorant since everything is made for righties.

The best advice I can give to you is practice, practice practice.

Michael

Striker thats true.I practice both sides.It would be easier to teach her through muscle memory than to tell her to go agianst her brain.It keeps telling her her left eye is dominant.This is what gives you depth perception.You lose more than the better eye sight if you close your dominant eye.Muscle memerory can be taught through repition.even though I'm a lefty,I couldn't use a pair of scissors left handed to save someones life.I also cannot draw a pistol without trying to take the 1911 saftey off.

Just for reference
here's how to determine
which is the dominant eye,
which should always be used.

Take a paper towel tube, extend it to your maximum reach, then raise it straight up to eye level and view a target across the room.

Close or cover one eye at a time. The eye covered when the target disappears from the tube is the dominate eye.

OR...

Extend both hands in front of your body, overlapping the thumbs and fingers, leaving a hole to look through.  Now, with both eyes open and looking through the hole, pick out a spot on the wall.  Keeping the spot centered in the hole, bring your hands back to your face.  The hole will end up in front of the dominant eye.

Guys
I hate the thoughts of switching her to a left hand shooting style in less I have to, becuse of the lack of left hand guns or the cost of them. We have done from 2 incomes to one. I am right eye/ right hand. I very much want her to enjoy shooting and do not want to take that away from her. For those of you who are left eye/ right hand how hard is it to learn to shoot righted with the rifle?

Not only that, but if you are having problems with getting her to close her left eye just imagine the problems you would have getting her to change hands. I cringe at the thought.

Anyways, I really didnt have to learn anything. It just came to me naturally. I can remember closing my left eye when I was aiming my plastic toy guns at age 4 or 5. I was out hunting by the age of 8 and never thought twice about closing the left eye.

She is still very young and I dont think she should have too many problems at all once she gets to where she can close her other eye. I have 20/15 vision in my left eye and 20/20 in my right, so not only is it my nondominant eye, it is my bad eye. Yet still I can hit pretty much everything I aim at.

Next time she goes out shooting just practice with her and make her close her left eye everytime. As soon as she gets used to the stock weld she gets every time she shoots then she won't have a choice but to close that eye.

Its not like you are trying to rewire her brain or anything, she will naturally compensate once the other eye is closed.

Everyone is really turning this into a much bigger deal than it really is.

Michael

I'm left-eye/right-hand.  I shoot usually right handed.  I practice left, and I'm about as good.  It doesn't seem as natural simply because of the amount of time I've spent shooting right.  

Go with whatever she shoots best with.  It may be easier for her to shoot right handed than left handed.  Whatever works for her.

If she has a problem closing one eye then the best thing to do, as Old Spfld Armory said, is to block the lens on her shooting glasses of here non-firing eye.  This makes it alot eaiser on a shooter.  They can keep both eyes open naturally and not have to mess with anything.  Having to close one eye uses muscles, and using muscles results in twitching, or just plain distractions.  She needs to be as relaxed as possible to concentrate on the important stuff.  Sounds like a small thing, but it's the small things in shooting that make it easier.

Ross

#7 try to teach her to shoot with two eyes open, she'll be better off in the long run. i shoot ipsc, its harder to learn to shoot with with two eyes open when you started off by using one eye.

I don't mean to insult you or your daughter, but have you taken her to an eye doctor?  

When I was about 5 years old, a friend of my mom's who was the wife of an eye doctor noticed that one of my eyes looked like is was slightly crossed.  Mom took me to the doctor and it turned out I have amblyopia just like my father.  My father is almost completely blind in one eye, but thanks to my mom getting me to the doctor early, I see fine with both eyes (although I do wear glasses/contacts for near sightedness, which is unrelated to amblyopia).  I don't have crossed eyes either.  For years as a kid growing up, I had to wear a patch over my good eye to force my bad eye to exercise.  The teasing wasn't cool, but being able to see out of 2 eyes without having surgery is.

I just wanted to make sure your daughter’s vision is healthy.  If there is a problem, it's best to get to it early.  I've heard that many vision problems don't usually have very noticeable symptoms until it's almost too late.

BTW, I too am right handed and left eye dominate.  Thankfully because I'm not blind in the right eye, I am able to shoot both rifle and pistol right handed/right eyed.