wrote:
Air weighs fourteen point seven pounds per square inch.

Grumble

That's air's mean pressure at sea level, not it's "weight". Weight is
measured in units of force or mass, depending on the context.

Air's mean density at sea level is roughly 1.2 kg/m^3, which is the relevant
measure for teaching the rudimentary facts of flight. A plane stays in flight
by pushing air downward. A balloon flies by making the mass within its volume
less dense than the surrounding air. In both lighter than air and heavier
than air flight, air pressure does not directly enter into the calculations -
but air density does. And that's a far smaller quantity - about 1 ounce per
cubic foot at sea level.

No harm done to the kid, though. You appear to have given him some insight
into how powerful small pressure differentials can be. Nice story, otherwise.