Numbers and Letters (love 'em?)

Post Reply New Topic

I notice my children are gifted with numbers and letters. They both have autism.

As a child, I could recall long strings of numbers, license plates, phone numbers, social security numbers, serial numbers. I liked to do it, but it also sort of just imprinted itself in my head regardless of whether I made effort. My mom frequently would say, "Remember this number for me..." or ask me what her license plate number was, and I always had an answer. I also counted and knew my alphabet early.

My kids are better than that. My daughter, now 4, knew her entire alphabet shortly after her second birthday and could identify all the letters visually when asked by age 2 1/2. She can count to 100 now, and recalls strings of numbers. Sometimes she just says numbers over and over, like a stim when she is stressed or agitated by waiting.

My son, I just learned, knows his entire alphabet too. At 23 months!! ! On his little computer, if you ask him to find any letter, he will find it and press the corresponding key. No hesitation. He is mostly non-verbal with speech delay, but it isn't for lack of knowing.

Just wondering about others with autism/asperger's, if you have stories about number/letter fascination.

I am fascinated by numbers and letters. I am good at remembering them. Each one is a different color, and they have personalities too. I've also had people ask me to remember numbers for them.

I remember discovering multuplication, division, and fractions on my own before they were taught in school. As I lay in bed at night, I would imagine the different numbers in rows and columns. I thought of them as families. As soon as I learned how to count, add, and subtract, I understood that 4 3's are 12, and that 12 divides into 2 6's, 4 3's, 3 4's, and 6 2's. I kept all of this a secret because I thought the adults would just say, "Don't worry your little head about that. Wait 'til second grade," or something like that.

I love letters and numbers. My favourite activity is Bingo, as a result.

My parents or brother also often ask me to remember numbers for them. I'm way better at words, though. To see a word is to know it, more or less, which means that I can memorize foreign language vocabulary very quickly. I've always had a good rote memory.

I was reading by the time I was 2 and a half or 3 or thereabouts, so knew my alphabet and numbers well enough. I'm really good at memorising numbers, but oddly enough I cannot do maths for the life of me, unless I use a technique called Vedic maths which uses patterns and words to do it.

I'm great with words though (nationally published journalist since I was 10, which is my profession now) and I'm also great at other languages - words are my thing I guess. I learnt Japanese through High School and always worked way ahead at learning the different kana (the Japanese writing) and Kanji, they were never a problem for me. Taught myself 3 other languages after that, if I had more time I'd probably learn more. Whenever I travel I never really use travel dictionaries, I just tend to google the language online and learn enough in the week before I go to get by ok.

Numbers make my brain hurt when it comes to math, though I do have a few moments of clarity. Like you said, I always knew my moms license plate number though she didn't. I still have friends numbers memorized from elementary school. I know other peoples ssn by heart. Forget math though.

Letters, YES. I love word games... anyone play Boggle? God that's an awesome game. I love spelling, trying to correctly pronounce a word I've never seen before and things of the like.

I like both words and numbers, but words are far and away my strong suit. I could read at fifth grade level in first grade and scored at the top on vocabulary tests in the sixth grade. I also participate in the Literacy Council Adult Spelling Bee and enjoy it a lot.

I did well in math until about eighth grade, when I lost interest.

well not As myself my 4 year old son is, he knew his numbers up to 20 by 18 months, and he was able to count up to and down from 100 before he was 2, remember s birthdates, phone numbers, lisences addresses by the time he was 3 also began reading. is now 4 doing at least 2x2 number additon, and subtration learning his times tables working a bit on divided by and fractions just in daily life and he loves it. he has also been bale to tell time even in the 24 hour clock for at least a year now. and has been counting by 5's and 10's for about that long too.
he is currently reading at an 8yr old level, however i am not sure it's not higher, he was a bit distracted by the number blocks at his assessment.
he is so amazing. just thought i'd share.

I never understood why my workmates HATED going to the file room to look for stuff or put it away. I mean, it's only a sequence of 8 digits - how hard could it be??

It turned out I was very good at sorting through all the files, when my workmates' eyes would cross and start putting them in the wrong places.

I've been good with alphanumerics. If only I could turn that into a job I won't be fired from....

I love letters though I suck at numbers. My memory has always been a bit faulty in my opinion, i dont remember as much as I wish but I LOVE play of words like:

So they send for a witch with a terrible twitch
To ask how my future impressed her
She took one look at me and cried hehehehehe, he?
What else could he be but a jester?
A jester a jester, a funny idea a jester
No butcher no baker no candlestick maker
And me with the look of a fine undertaker
Impressed her as a jester?

I think thats where my fascination for musicals stem from

I liked that poem.

I love numbers and letters, but hate math beyond the basics.

Course, part of my thing is that I see numbers and letters in color (synaesthesia and all that); so it's easier to remember them.

thats part of the lyrics to "the maladjusted jester" from the movie "the court jester. old but great

My five year old son has Aspergers. When he was 22 months old, he only knew 25 single words. Because most of the "developmental milestone" sites said that a child should use at least 50 words by age 2, I worried that his language was lagging. Then, a month before his second birthday, he picked up a set of magnetic letters and started identifying them. To my astonishment, I realized that he knew most of them. So, by his second birthday he knew 65 single words, but more than 1/3 of them were letters of the alphabet. By 2 1/2 he knew all of the letters, the sounds they make, and could count to 20. Today, he doesn't have any particular facination with numbers or letters. He does, however, have an excellent visual memory.

I love numbers, colors, and polygons. Letters, not as much.

I also looove numbers, letter, colors, patterns, everything...I put everything in number sequence, and add everything i do, put all the colors i see in each little pattern. Its weird, everybody around me just goes along with it haha.

_________________
Being Normal Is Vastly Overrated

Any series of number that can be added together to get a number that ends in 0 or 5 is considered a perfect number. I add license plates while sitting at red lights. I add the phone numbers on delivery trucks. I add number sequences in my head when I cannot do physical stimming.