I got my 5 year old a cornsnake about 4 months ago. It was a good choice for us. They are so easy to take care of he is actually able to do a lot of it with my supervision. It still takes just as much of my time as if I did it myself but it is pretty awesome that he is learning what goes into taking care of an animal.

As other people have said cornsnakes are quick snakes. They move around a lot sometimes when you are handling them. Nothing like a ball python. My son is not allowed to ever handle an animal when we aren't around though so it has been OK for us. Usually my wife takes the snake out from the enclosure and gets it a little calmed down and then hands it over to my son. She stays right next to him in case slithery gets away from him. He hasn't so far. In fact he has calmed down a lot while being handled.

At any rate, we really love our corn snake. He doesn't hide much at night when people are around, he is super docile and a great feeder.