When my younger son was in 3rd grade we got a call from the school principle. She spoke in deeply measured, grave, and concerned tones. "Everything's fine" she said. "Nothing to worry about".
She proceeded to tell me that my son was threatened with violence by another student in his class.
What could the nature of this "violence" possibly be, coming from a 3rd grader, I wondered? Apparently, he told my boy, "I'm gonna shoot you in the butt."
For that, the boy was sent home until he could be properly evaluated and cleared by the district social worker. The principle offered to send MY son home for the remainder of the day to deal with the trauma of the event (of course I refused). We were offered counseling for Pete's sake.
They made a big hairy deal out of it, when pretty much all that was needed was "Now David, we don't talk like that to our friends".
The funny/tragic thing is, the very day the kid was allowed back into school, I got another call. Same damn thing, only a few days later. the kid says to my boy, "I'm gonna shoot you in the butt!!!"
They actually took him out of the class after that, and I have no idea what happened to the kid. He never came back into the class. Probably put on Ritalin and zombified. OR, his parents may have wised up and recognized that if they didn't get their kid out of there, he was going to be stigmatized by the school system forever.