These are my son's special interests:

* Youtube - mainly videos that look like they have been made by kids about his age. The ones he really likes are the videos that pop up when you search on "Thomas the tank engine accidents happen". He also gets into really bad videos made by kids involving ridiculous adventures with their toys - like battles between action figures and toy dinosaurs, complete with voices and sound effects.
* Cars - has been an obsession since he was a baby. I think "Mercedes Benz" was one of his first words.
* Crashes - anything and everything to do with car crashes, train crashes, airplane crashes. His favourite TV shows are Air Crash Investigations.... Seconds to Disaster.... Mythbusters. He draws really elaborate and detailed pictures of crashes. His toys don't generally last long because he plays crashes with them endlessly. He borrows my wife's handphone and makes videos of his cars crashing.

My thoughts are that I might buy him some kind of cheap video camera and get him started making his own youtube videos. I'd also like to get him interested in some field of science - he is bright enough to look things up on the internet. I could buy him some books on astronomy to get him started, then maybe a telescope. Maybe get him into some computer programming - maybe not just yet (he is 6), but in a year or 2.

Is it worthwhile trying to direct an aspie kid's special interests towards something constructive? Or is he best left to his own devices in that regard?

Well I think his interests need to be harnessed so he can benefit from them: ranging from integrating them into school projects to professional employment.  Just reading this post I got thinking . . . maybe he can be an insurance appraiser when he grows up.  Aside from being fascinated with crashes, I'm sure he has the mathematical aptitude.

I bet your sun would like astronomy; especially anything having to do with collisions.  Asteroids and comets would probably be of interest.  Are you able to obtain some footage of Comet Shoemaker-Levy breaking up and crashing into Jupiter?  I bet your son would love that.  Saturn's rings also might fascinate him.  I beleive there is a theory that collision of two or more moons account for Saturn's rings; of which there are septillions of those little rocks (a.k.a. moonlets).

I have taken my son fishing twice now, and he loves it. Of course he wants to let every fish go, but he loves his mummy enough to agree to keep a couple for her. I can see him becoming an expert fisherman in a couple of years.

Last night he wanted to know everything about Red Rattlers, the original Sydney electric trains that ran for more than 60 years and were retired about 20 years ago. I might be able to find one in a train museum for him to see.

Also I need to find him a good book about spiders, which have been a strong interest since a giant huntsman spider crawled into his bedroom.

This post was last modified: 01-26-2012 10:01 PM by 142857.

I think your ideas for encouraging your sons special interests are good ones. The Aspie passion for their special interest could lead him to a lot of success, if properly directed.

It also makes sense for him to branch out beyond his interest. Growing up, my parents had a rule where I needed to be involved in one physical activity and one mental/artistic/creative activity outside of school. So a sports team and a theater camp, or swimming lessons and chess club. I didn't like that too much at the time, but looking back it really helped me branch out. So it's good to strike the balance between encouraging his special interest, as well as exposing him to new experiences.

If he's into Mythbusters (I love that programme too!) he might conceivably become one of those engineers who sets up film disasters and crashes, making sure car engines explode when a car goes over a cliff and crashes, etc.  Or he could become a film director, since he seems to be into filming.  

I think it's great that you're encouraging him.  Although be aware that your children can surprise you - I know my daughter was always fascinated by sculpture when she was younger and it's still an active interest, she'll sit for hours focusing with a pin sculpting tiny features onto modelling clay, then once it's dried, hand paint it.  So her father and I thought for sure she'd be wanting to do some job like graphic design.  But no.  Biological science is what she settled on, with the sculpting as a hobby.  

Alison

I'm going to have to wait and see

Team sports are not always a good idea for an aspie kid who, no matter how hard he/she tries, is unlikely to be able to match the agility and coordination of the other kids - resulting in battered self-esteem. I know that this is not always the case, but it is very often true. It would be a good idea to help an aspie kid choose his/her physical activities accordingly.

you could try not encouraging him so much. Nothing's than a stressed out parent breathing down your neck... even if they are a spectrumite.

Possibly

Actually, that's completely true what Kapkao says.

Thank you for clarifying that....

You seem to have an objection. Do you have a reason for one?

There are different forms of encouragement.

If I went fishing with my son and didn't take him he would be absolutely heartbroken. "Encouraging" this interest is as simple as allowing him to tag along with me and letting him get involved at some level (such as reeling the fish in), and showing him how things are done (such as tying knots, putting bait on the hook). He is fascinated by the whole process, but still walks in circles when the fishing gets a bit slow.

If I buy him a book all he wants to do is read it together with me. Then anything interesting he wants me to expand on... we end up googling photos and stories and videos together on my laptop. Same if I mention something about trains, he wants to know everything. "Encouraging" a thirst for knowledge in aspie kids isn't a matter of strapping them into a chair and forcing them to learn things. It can just be a case of planting a seed of interest, the thirst for knowledge tends to be innate.

Encouraging physical activity might be a case of going on a bushwalk together. He is actually the one who twists my arm to do things like that.

I've been a kid who was forced to do things that my father wished he had done but lacked the aptitude. It wasn't fun, and I won't put my son through the same thing.

My son's latest interest is rocks. It really kicked off when we stopped at a lookout on the way to Canberra a few weeks ago, and there was a rocky outcrop of interesting-looking sedimentary rock that had been forced up so that the layers of rock were at almost right angles to the ground. My son collected a couple of specimens and since then he always wants to collect rocks... ask me questions about rocks... go looking for fossils in rocks... make new friends at the beach and try to get them involved with his imaginary palaeontological expeditions.

I think it is a great interest. Something that could open up a real interest in science and nature. I told my wife that geologists and mining engineers make a lot of money, so she is fine with it as well.

I saw a documentary a while back that featured an aspie kid who used his obsession with rocks to become a geologist.  You can purchase kits of different kinds of rocks and label them.  A natural history museum usually has some kind of exhibit on rock formations.  It is a great obsession because there is so much you can do with it!

My kids are all about computers these days.  I don't want to discourage it, but I am having a hard time finding any way to turn it into a learning opportunity.  They love these elaborate games, but I'd like them to learn some programming, or at least some basic computer anatomy and know-how.  I can't seem to find anything of the sort that is age appropriate.