There is a lot of sense in choosing a Encore. That way he'll already be intimately familiar with the action, trigger, operation, and the fact that when shooting a single shot makes people tend to make their absolute best shot as they KNOW they don't have any more and I've noticed it really does seem to make people better shots as opposed to simply spraying bullets when using a semi auto. I learned that way (single shot), taught my kids, and have taught scores upon scores that way-to treat each shot as if it's the only shot they're ever going to shoot.