ASD kids do you stick to same range of toys as a safe bet for Xmas???

[mysonben]

Hi , not sure what to do.
DS is 4, mild asd. He just loves cars and trains. Previous birthdays and xmas, we tried to get him a selection of toys. Half of which he never played with such as megablocks, creative sets, pretend play stuff like a doctor's case..., we felt it was a bit of a waste of money tbh.

So do you still buy stuff they don't normally go for to try to bring in some variation and maybe widen their interests? Or do you stick with the limited range of usual things that interest them because it's simply a safe bet?

DS was in awe last sunday in front of a huge train table covered with tracks and trains. Had to drag him away from it screaming. But if we get that for him, it's just a bigger extension of what he already has, although we know he will love it and play with it lots.
Not sure what to do.

We have decided that for DS5 (Autismic, 3.5, GDD of 2yrs) we are going to get him a heap of stuff with wheels on. It matters not one jot of the make - he doesnt care, so long as it has wheels on. Oh and a bit of hotwheels track, cos most hand held wheely things will fit.

I have looked longingly at little noah's arks, and 'little people' things, but really its a total waste of time. It wastes money, takes up space, and makes the place look a mess when its tipped onthe floor and left for something interesting, which spins!

Its become quite obvious that of our 5 children, 4 of which are on the spectrum. I bought a dolls house quite a while back, a shop complete with grocerys, and I suppose this would explain the wasted £200 we spent on playmobil a few years back and sold it untouched 4yrs later...

I would advise to buy what he likes, its pointless to waste money.

After 5 sons (eldest being 17y) you wouldnt believe the amount of brio thomas, take-along thomas and matchbox cars we have!

(incidently, IMO, take-along thomas seems to be favoured over the wooden stuff, as the magnets are stronger and it lines up better and longer without breaking! )

I do stick to the stuff he likes and try and broaden it too.

So, for example, he loves Star Wars but I will try and get him other superheroes and have tried to broaden it to soldiers, to history etc etc.

Or, we'll go another way and go from star wars to rockets to space travel

It has worked when I have him to myself in the hols. He becomes much more interested in things on a one to one and loves to go to museums and stuff if I can make enough links to something he likes.

This is why I LUV school hols. Really wish I could HEd he'd get so much more out of it

Imagination toiys don't really exist here, neither do rpetenrd play toys though we are getting some for ds4 this year.

We havea set routine- gift from us, 6 from FC etc etc etc andspenda lot of timedropping hintsw to ds1 so that nothing is a surprise but he thinks he is clever to suss it so doesn't let on he knows LOL

I'd go for thetable tbh, they are lovely and well asd kids know what they like....

Thanks for the tip.
DS loves nothing better than making the longest trains as possible and they often break or tip over in which case he gets quite upset. So might give the Thomas ones a go if it lines up better, for the sake of sanity (mine of course! )

Yes, my DS is a bit older (nearly 7) but I remember the train days. We have a massive box of Thomas trains, all the books, loads of track and nothing else really did the trick.

When we did a Thomas day out on one of the steam railways, he looked like I would if I bumped into George Clooney.

As he gets older, you can encourage other things but Thomas is good for faces and talking about emotions etc. The story books are quite good for that too.

And you can re-enact the stories (I remember we had flour everywhere on the track for Terence pulling Thomas out of the snow)!!

Ds has managed to be quite open to other toys, we did go through the train phase, but even though he still likes trains he has managed to enjoy playmobil stuff. We got a train, but it is too big and bulky to be out all the time and eats batteries. He loves his playmobil crane, and even likes some of the figures and has named some. He also liked the boats we got, they were good for bath time.

He goes on playmobil and plays the games on there and this has helped get him interested in other toys - he wants the pyramid for Christmas.

I think, get a few trains/things that will appeal, but if there is a film he likes get some toys from that? DS loved Toy Story and Wall.e and that kind of led him to other toys. He also loves torches, anything interactive.

He hasn't got a dx, ASD trait, language disorder and generally quirky, but happy.

We took DS last spring for a ride on Underground Ernie , his face was a picture. Will take him next year on one of the Thomas'day out, he will love it.

Yes DS is mad about disney dvds, we got him a Buzz a while back, but he doesn't play with it much only now and then for a bit. However i have seen the remote control car with buzz and woody on its back in the shops, he might like that and re-enacts the scene.

That sounds like a good idea myson ben. DS likes Buzz's wings, which keep coming off and getting lost and he likes Woody, because he is soft and speaks when you pull the string. He plays with them now and again.

He is now completely in love with his toy cat, which he only got a few months ago, but he takes it everywhere, sleeps with it etc, the thing is falling to pieces already and I am not sure whether I should buy a replacement and make it look like the original, or just to leave him with the disintegrating moggy?

DD is getting a marble run for Christmas. DS is NT but is mad on anything with wheels (he's 2) and will probably be getting stuff for his train set. Best present we ever got DD was a megasketcher.
DD does play with playmobil, but only to line up all the figures. Mostly DS plays with the sets now. DD likes anything that goes round so am trying to find a wind-up music box that plays a decent tune (as opposed to the one she spent 20 mins playing with in the toyshop this morning which sounded like rusty cans bouncing behind a car!!)
Have given up on getting "age-appropriate" toys unless they are dead cheap in a car boot and I get them just to see if she's interested. Actually she did have some imaginative play when she was two but it hasn't really developed since then.

mysonben my nt son now 8 had the buzz and woody remote control car twice and it broke twice within 5 mins, just to let you know.

my dd 5 asd has no intrest in any toys just music, got her a karoke machine dunno if she'll be interested

ds got a wwf tiger, needs a new one (would be no3) but they don't have the tiger this year, not sure what to do!

trains and cars. went to a friends house and they had thomas take-along set up on a table, keep him happy for hours. with crane, and bertie bus on a different track. I'd wish we had gone done that route rather than the wooden. with different engines and the canal boat, airports etc i think you could have lots of fun.

he also has the brio remote control train that is good, especially driving it in the dark with lights on.

I'm going to try hotwheels this year and the easy scalextric or Shake ?n Go!® XTREME? Speedway. he likes construction so got the playmobil car that you build he loved that, took it apart and rebuilt it again a few times.

Cars the disney movie, WALL-E and Madagascar
oh and gogo's - i like these, their's stickers to put in, he lines them up and they battle (well he knocks them over) and numbers on the back so his learning numbers and he can carry them in his pocket.

took him to thomas on the trains, he loved it, but would not get of the train at the other end as he was certain it would leave without him! a day trip to legoland is fab

sorry went on a bit

Dd1 has had playmobil 3 years in a row, she's getting a few bits this year but im also getting them both Go Go Hamsters as a joint present.

Dd2 is getting a large wheely bug as she has out grown the smaller one and its the only thing i know she will play with.

jasdox, my dd got a wwf tiger toy for her birthday in July, it was part of sponsorship type thing.

I think that age was trickiest for me too mysonben...it was trains trains trains for ds at about 4 too. As he got older, i got better working out what it was that ds liked about a certain toy and then broadening his horizens or thinking around an obsession and going from there.
He likes thinks that go from a to b are ordered/can be controlled but do something..so as well as trains and hotwheels when he was younger, he also liked those ball bearing roller-coaster things,rc toys, domino cascade things...this kind of lead him to construction really
Then once the lego/construction obsession was well underway...(lego train sets are great btw if you are looking for a way into construction) he moved on to electronic sets ..making lights and sets for his lego 'world'. Hornby too. Cue filming and animation (still working on that ordering and controlling things obsession obviously).Animation has been fab for his creative story telling...he sets his films to music and uses story boards.
Computer animation ,filming,reading and the obligatory lego is where we are at atm. I find him much easier now...he seems to be interested in lots of things.

Fascinating thread as I have been thinking exactly the same thing about xmas.

My DS has moved away from trains now but has substituted this with balls!! He is particularly obsessed with ten pin bowling and plays with a £3 skittle set from sainsburys for ages. Like troutpout I have worked out with my DS that what he loves is the knocking down bit. He is fascinated with watching items (can be anything) fall over, into or off things. He likes to hastily and erratically build towers but only because he loves to watch it being knocked down

We are thinking of getting him a little robust remote control car that he can hopefully play with outside etc but I can see him using it to run into things to knock them down, ie his skittles or whatever. We also wondered about a little pinball machine, watching the ball ping everywhere would probably be right up his street.

Am really interested in your post troutpout as it really does show that our DC's obsessions/fascinations aren't pointless but do actually tend to lead to something very worthwhile and that more importantly they are good at and love doing. Thank you for a great post

ds also loves the knocking over of things Barmy
How old is your ds? Mine loves boomblox We have it for the wii but i think you can get a pc version too. You can work through the levels or you can make your own set ups to knock down...ds likes making his own . I bet your ds would love it.

He is 4 and having just watched the video of the game I am sure he would love it Haven't got a Wii so will have a look around for the PC version.

Right from when he was small he was always knocking things over or scattering things. I would get so embarressed to watch the other kids at toddler group building these lovely towers and things and then my DS would come along and watch with glee as it all hit the deck.

Even now when I drop him off at playschool he instantly goes off looking for things that have been set up so he can knock them down , bet playschool love him

Have just come back from a trip to Toys R Us and DD is in her element making a xmas list as long as her arm (shame she ain't getting much of it ) whilst my little man bumped from aisle to aisle (likes the sensation of banging into things) and ending up with just one thing on his list that he desperately wanted: here

£6.99 for a main present that I know he will play with for hours??!! BARGAIN!!

loving the presents , ds's list is getting longer, the boomblox looks fab. ds loves knocking towers over, and has just started building them himself (yippee) to knock over. his 14m old brother has just started building them to (well 2/3 blocks) but prefers knocking them down (which upsets ds1 )

We just buy a very few presents for DS2 and either leave them unwrapped or put a piece of paper round with one bit of tape - he will unwrap things now but quickly loses interest. I think we are getting him a marble run and something from www.bubbleinc.com here - great website if you don't know it. Also quite fancy one of those big books that turns into a vehicle - he's just started enjoying a very basic imaginative game involving screeching to a halt in a pretend car. Mind you, could probably do the same with a large cardboard box!

www.bubbleinc.co.uk