SILVER SPRING, Md. (WJZ) –  Debate is raging over whether a 6-year-old Maryland boy should have been suspended from school for pretending to shoot someone with his finger.

Mary Bubala reports school officials say the boy did it to three students at Roscoe Nix Elementary School in Silver Spring.

A gun shooting gesture by 6-year-old Rodney Lynch to fellow students — just days after the Connecticut school shootings — got him suspended.

“I went into my desk and then I got scissors and then I just pretended it was a gun,” Lynch said.

He was sent to the office and the school called his parents about the behavior.  The school warned he could face suspension if it happened again. It did…twice.

“Just pointing her fingers like this. She did the ’pow’ sound and I just went like that. And then I got sent to the office again,” said Lynch.

The last incident involved another first-grader, but both say they were just playing around.

Lynch’s family is appealing the school’s decision to suspend him. It’s on his permanent record.

“They are saying he threatened a student, threatened to shoot a student.  He was just playing,” said Rodney Lynch Sr., boy’s father.

Parents at Roscoe Nix Elementary are divided over the school’s action.

“I think that was a little too harsh to do to a 6-year-old,” said one.

“I wouldn’t expect someone to do that to my child, and if they did, I would expect some type of punishment,” said another.

“I know they feel they must do something, but I am just saying, that’s a bit much for a 6-year-old,” said another person.

In a letter to parents, the school called it a serious incident, that a first-grader had threatened to shoot a student just days after the Newtown school shootings.

Rodney Lynch’s parents are asking that he be reassigned to a different school.  He already served his one-day suspension.