My 10 yr. old jumps from one interest to the next!?

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I just wondered if this is a 10 yr. old boy thing or a spectrum thing? My son is very intelligent, verbal and curious beyond belief. His main source of information is books and I sometimes can't keep up with what his latest interest is - in the last 6 months or so he has gotten very excited about, actually began and even pursued the following:
sign language (he did actually teach himself the whole alphabet)
weight lifting
juggling
cooking
Boyscout merit badges (he's not in the Boyscouts)
composting and more I can't even remember.
The thing is that he gets very excited and wants to do a project and read books about the subject and then after awhile sometimes his interest just ends right there. He's just done with it. I know he's only 10 (will be in 11 in January) and maybe he is just trying out a "smorgasboard" of areas of interests as kids do.
He just seems to enjoy the planning and thinking about a new interest more than actually engaging in the new area of interest. Does that make sense? For example, he at one point had to know about football (the positions, teams, etc.) although he has never and will never actually play football. This can be frustrating because we never know if this latest interest will last and if its worth spending money on or if it will be short-lived.
As I write this I realize I'm not making sense (even to myself!). I really do want him to explore many things in life I just hope as he gets older he will actually "land" on a few things rather than just hover and flit around from one thing to the next.
"Jack of all trades, Master of none" comes to mind.
Thanks for listening

I am like this. At 37, I'm still like a kid who likes to read about stuff and never follows through with "doing it". I have no advice except to keep on keepin' on. Don't buy anything expensive unless he absolute shows that he a)wants it and b)can handle the responsibility to follow through with it.
My parents thought I was really into horses at 10 and bought me one. This despite my aloof nature (they have never been able to read me) and "so what" attitude towards horses. When I realized they were for real, I tried to show that I didn't really want that comittment but it was too late. They bought the horse, made me take riding lessons and tried to get me in a 4-H class for showing. When I finally bonded with the horse, they gave it back because they thought it was too "high strung". Then they bought a horse that I clearly didn't want. A gym khana (barrel racing) horse that wanted to ridden every day. We didn't get along.

I'm still like that at 52. Find some absorbing topic, race out and gather up everything I need to know about it, immerse myself completely, then... lose interest.

It's the learning part that's most enjoyable for me, I suppose. Once I know I could accomplish the thing, whatever it is, the interest kind of dies off.

I am not on the spectrum and I do this and sometimes I do feel like a jack of all trades master of none....I just keep thinking I haven't found MY thing yet. I am only 29, right? I feel like I must have some special talent or purpose, and I just keep looking for what it is and becoming accomplished at amny other things along the way-- But it has made me intelligent, great at trivia, and easily employable in many areas. no worries yet.

kate

Me too! I am NT but excited by new things. I love learning and become all absorbed in a new area of interest .... but then get bored and move on.

There have been a few things that I have maintained an interest in over the years: Belly-dancing, gardening, craft and keeping fit.

Helen

I am 43 years old (had my birthday yesterday) and I still enjoy reading about everything and anything. My interests include: cats, medical topics, legal topics, track and field (Roger Bannister is my favorite runner), figure skating, geography, history and literature.

I do this, but I also have a few longterm interests.

my son is the same way....it's somewhat frustrating because you can't count on the fact that he'll hold an interest in one specific subject for any length of time~ makes buying birthday and christmas presents difficult....so hard to tell if it's just a passing phase........if you ask him about it, he'll say that his current interest is the one that will last. and then a month goes by, and he's learned all he thinks he needs to ~ and it's on to another topic.
i've lost count of how many different topics he's settled on. most times, though, he's focused on role playing games & science.

At that age my biggest interest was reading. And I gues if you went by what I read then I did jump from one interest to the next though probably not as frequently as him.

However, that sort of thing can pay off in college where you will be writing research papers on different topics each semester, and perhaps each month depending on your major. Which reminds me the most difficult aspect of writing research papers for me is that I'd read something interesting and then spend 6 hours researching information about that instead of the subject I had intended to research.

Today the one thing I can say for certain about my interests is that I love learning.

wow...my parents never and still dont even remotely try to take an interest in anything I do
they tried to make me interested in things they liked
and as a result pushed me away...

just be patiant with him is the only advise I can offer

Rachel, your son reminds me of an episode of the cartoon Angry Beavers. Norbert all his life wanted to be a Lippezainer (sp) pony. Then they said, Daggit wanted to be a race car driver, roller rink owner, ect.. like all these different dreams he had, and he couldn't decide on one. So it sounds like your son is alot like Daggit, kind of restless in his persuits.

Violet-yoshi- so true! It's funny that your icon is Cheese and your quote is from Cheese - that character cracks my son up like no other - he thinks he is a riot! I've never seen him giggle like when he watches Cheese - "I like chocolate milk" LOL

I like Cheese too, because it's rather obvious his character is Autistic. His behaviour is totally Autistic, and I think if people realize that, he could help people understand that Autistic people can be fun to hang with too. I remember one episode where Frankie got really mad and hit her head against a sign, and Cheese did the same thing and was like, "Haha! I like this game!" LoL. It was so Autie!

I'm still like that to a point...

But I'd say it's probably to be expected from any 10-year-old boy, too.

This must be the ADHD thing....