4 year old son told classmate he was going to 'shoot' parents.

My four year old son (4.1)has been in preschool for exactly one week now.  The teacher pulled me aside today and said another mother was concerned because my child told her son that he was "going to shoot my parents while they were  night-night".  Needless to say, the teacher was very concerned.  She told me if he were in Kindergarten he would be sent to the school psychologist for evaluation.  Of course, I am devastated.  Yes, he has toys guns he plays with (we don't have real ones).  And he does play shoot the bad-guy.  He is not a violent kid in any way.  Yes, he does need to work on socialization skills, that is why he goes to preschool (5 am's a week).  He is in a phase right now where he embellishes everything. Should I be rushing him off for some type of evaluation because of what he said?  Is embellishing things normal for a young 4 year old?

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

Dear Kare,

While four-year-olds do embellish things, and it's often difficult to take at face value anything a four-year-old says, it's also quite unusual for a child to make the sort of comment your son made. You would be doing him a service by having him evaluated by a child mental health professional. It absolutely will do him no harm, and it may be very helpful.