COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (CBS4) – Two words and a hand gesture left a 6-year-old student suspended from school.

KRDO-TV reports that Colorado Springs first-grader Elijah ran into trouble after pointing his fingers in the shape of a gun at a fellow classmate and saying, “You’re dead.”

A Stratton Meadows Elementary School administrator spoke with the child after the incident explaining the meaning behind his words and the importance of separating “make-believe” and reality.

“I know they have zero tolerance, but more of a maybe no recess,” his dad, Austin Thurston told KRDO-TV. “Going as far as a one-day suspension is a little extreme for a six-year-old in a first-grade class.”

A spokesperson for Harrison School District 2 said they speak with parents prior to suspensions and that previous behavior is taken into account when assessing these situations.

The boy’s parents say they have spoken with him about guns but they don’t believe their son had any harmful intention.

“Of course I think he was playing,” Thurston told KRDO-TV. “What six-year-old doesn’t play cops and robbers, or cowboys and Indians? We just told him there’s a time and a place for everything, and we told him school is never a place for that. We let him know that the guns in the wrong hands will be very dangerous. He knows the difference between really doing that, and just putting your finger up and saying, ‘boom you’re dead.’ We made sure he understands the severity of what he said.”

Although not required by the school, the young boy is writing an apology letter acknowledging his understanding of the incident.