[TLyttle]

I'm not convinced that the kid would get much other than a 15-minute diversion from flying the Cub (my opinion). You may be better off spending 30bucks on a Airhog F18, just to see how interested he really is. The Airhog DOES fly, it just takes some coordination; the principles are the same, regardless of how many channels one uses.

More than once, I have had a kid show interest, take over the box and deliberately try to crash it, "just to see what it would look like". Typically, a 9-year-old has yet to develop any sense of "end result" (see Mr. Bean), and taking responsibility for repairing the model afterwards is highly unlikely. The Airhogs is virtually indestructible; besides, it leaves you with an interesting power/control package for other experiments after the kid wanders off...

[Flypaper]

If he want's something that flies, get him a rubber powered kit and let him go at it. He'll learn a bit in the process.