I know this thread is a little dated, but I'll throw my experience in for future readers. I started my son at around 7, he brought his bow with but wasn't allowed to shoot. In my experience, they get bored and cold very fast relative to us (overweight old people). We could do ~2 hours at a max, and I was careful that when he was done, we went in. I pushed a little, but maybe 10-15 minutes longer, not much. We didn't use a blind, and I didn't want him in a tree that young, so we just ground hunted. He helped find a place to hide. He never saw me shoot one, but we shared some really cool experiences where does were within a few yards of us on the ground before getting busted, it was just a lot of fun even though we didn't shoot anything. Saw some really nice deer a long ways off that he still talks about. We never really needed snacks because we didn't hunt that long. 2 years later, he shot his first deer with a bow and he had a blast again. I also took him turkey hunting, and ground blinds are great for young kids. I definitely let him use the phone and play games. I could see doing longer periods in a blind, with snacks and drinks and a tablet, but that isn't the path we took. We did shorter trips in the woods without a blind. Good luck.