Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Hobbies that surprise people

So I taught my 4 1/2 year old to do sudoku. He isn't great at it, but he gets it and enjoys it. People seem AWFULLY surprised that he both likes and can do it. I don't even know it if has an age range! LOL He seemed interested so of course I showed him and then got him his own book.

Anyone else have a little one fascinated by something that people go "WHAT?" about?

DD10 loves fossils and has since about Kindergarten. She is the only person who checks out this huge encyclopedia on the topic in our local library. Our librarian seems to get a kick out of it and comments on how unusual this is.

Our library also hosts a local fossil club and DD has been the only child to attend the meetings (mostly retirees). They love to give DD fossils and tell her of their adventures.

Jen

DS was really into history, especially military history when he was in K. He read dozens of books on Civil War, the Revolutionary War, and World War II. Those books are for teenagers I think, quite lengthy and informative. People's jaws usually dropped when they saw DS pouring over those books.

DS8 was REALLY into NASCAR when he was 3 or 4yo. He cared not only about who drove what car, what the number of the car was and what color it was for every driver, but he also knew their sponsors and many stats about their performance. This was particularly odd because neither DH nor I could have named 3 drivers before DS got into it.

The funniest moment was when DS asked me what Viagra was because it was a sponsor for Mark Martin's car. I thought for a moment and said "A medicine for men," which seemed to be enough for him. (Thank goodness!)

He enjoyed many lengthy, serious conversations with adult NASCAR fans, who usually found that DS knew more than they did about the subject. Happily they usually seemed to appreciate him. We never had any bad experiences with these conversations. The adults sometimes seemed a little awestruck that such a little boy knew so much about the sport, but they were always kind to him and treated DS with respect, even as a peer.

I was always rather glad that his topic of choice then was one that was more or less readily accepted by society...

That is so funny!

That reminds me of an incident when my DS8 was around 3. He was really into spelling words with his magnetic letters. Our friends and family members were so surprised to see the little one spelling words like "California", "Sleeptrain" and "Wal-mart". One day, we had some guests at our house. My DS spelled "Viagra" with his plastic letters right in front of them!
My very embarrassed DH was quick to explained to them that DS got the word from the TV commercial!

During the school year we restrict TV. To entertain himself my son, then 6, taught himself origami. He got a book and learned all the folds. He now makes very complicated designs. This all came about from an everything Star Wars phase. He saw that there are all kinds of origami Star Wars ships and characters and wanted to make them.
He tried more than once to share with his 1st grade classmates and none were interested beyond learning how to fold a simple heart on Valentine's day. He even wrote an instruction booklet for them but still no interest. Of course his teacher did nothing to encourage the other kids and told us that ds needs to develop more normal interests like baseball. I guess serious origami is popular with older kids and artsy types (eye roll).

kcab--I have a good friend (now in his mid-40's) who was telling me that when he was in elementary school he was fascinated by the city bus system. He memorized routes and if a bus went by that didn't seem to be in the right place at the right time, he would call the transit office to ask about it

I don't know if this qualifies as a hobby, but when my DD was 6 she started a screw collection. I thought she had forgotten about it (I only see it when we are sifting through the wreckage to try and clean her room), but out of the blue the other day she turned to me and said, "I need some new screws for my collection"!

My DS focuses on more "conventional" interests, but he dives into them at a level that drives everyone crazy. If I never see or hear the words "Lego" or "Star Wars" again, it will be just fine with me....

My DS6 loves sudoku :-) His hobbies are rocket building, coin collecting (since age 4), Kcab...your child and my guy would get along great...he also collects maps (mostly train and subway line maps) and has routes memorized for the Acela, Empire Builder, Sunset Limited, TGV,....the list goes on.
When guests come over, they look at us a little strange when they see his room - the wall is covered with the periodic table, titanic artwork (loves the titanic), and all things storm/tornado chasing - including his coveted autograph from Reed Timmer from Storm Chasers ....not the typical 6 year old!

Harpo had a long-term fixation on typography (collected samples of fonts, liked learning about type designers like Eric Gill and Bruce Rogers, etc.); that passed, in favour of a Northwest Coast art obsession, during which he liked discussing the differences between Tlingit, Tsimshian, Haida, Kwakwaka'wakw, Nuu-chah-nulth, and Coast Salish art; now he's mainly into maps old and new.

Groucho loves mediaeval history (he's especially into the Bayeux Tapestry, for some reason), and, his dearest love, recycling! Every scrap of possibly reusable stuff around here is pressed into service to become part of one of his "constructions"--sort of sculptures that he puts together out of cardboard and tin cans and so on.

Chico's turning into a card shark--he has a couple big books of card games, and he's always wanting to learn new games--it was whist this morning!

I love reading what all your kids are doing! I had friends with kids who loved Formula One and the East German railways, so a couple of the hobbies you're discussing are ringing some nostalgic bells for me!

peace
minnie

DS likes rocks and Greek mythology - I guess those are the only "out there" hobbies. Well, he is just now developing an interest in intricate paper crafts - he made an incredibly detailed model of a charcoal grill for his dad's birthday a couple weeks ago (complete with hinged lid and tiny utensils hanging off the side!), and before that he made an elaborate house/yard scene entirely out of paper. I hope this interest continues for awhile - it seems to be a good way to exercise his creativity, problem-solving skills and patience but it isn't overtly "smart" so he'd be less inclined to hide it like he has done with more academic interests.

He liked sudoku around age 5 too, but I don't think he ever did the full-size 9x9 puzzles.