[tpiha]

You simply help him widen his horizons in areas that interest him, engineering in this particular case. Provide him with support and logistics.

Get him smart toys as he's growing, like the thing you mentioned, like Lego, like Makeblock (http://www.makeblock.cc/), toys that encourage creativity.

I'm sure you can find great resources for kids to learn how to code, that's where you come in. He expresses the wish to learn how to code, you find out what's best out there to do it in his age.

[orless]

Thank you.

My problem is that I don't know a lot of "smart" things. A normal offline toy shop does not have much to offer. And you have to know what to look for online.

Makeblock looks interesting.

[raspasov]

When I was a kid I had a number of Lego Technic sets - they are great! Might not be proper "engineering" but still allows you to touch and build a simplified version of many real-world things, for example a car's drive shaft.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3D...

If he's already pretty skilled, he'll definitely be able to handle even the sets that are marked 10 years old +. I recall I had one of these when I was 6, it was a slight challenge but that was the fun part : ).

[orless]

Yes, he handles 9+ pretty well. He's now playing a lot with Fischertechnik (http://www.fischertechnik.de/home/produkte.aspx), it's a German analog of Lego Technic (or vice versa, whatever), but as far as I can tell it's somewhat closer to reality. I'll take a closer look at Lego Technic though, thank you.

[tpiha]

Those old Meccano sets were awesome too, you can still find them on Ebay.

When he's older, radio controlled airplanes, cars, helicopters, boats.

You could probably have a general DIY attitude and build some toys for him with him.

This looks cool too:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/infento/infento-worlds-...

[orless]

Oh, yes, Meccano is a good hint. Requires different mechanical/fine motoric skills compared to Lego Technik/Fischertechnik.

As for Infento - looks very neat, a bit too "prepared" for my taste. We do such things from wood and stuff you can buy from the local hardware store. Here's an example of something we've built in a day:

https://twitter.com/orless/status/632590264964657152

[TeMPOraL]

Get in touch with a local Hackerspace. There are lots of them in Germany, usually related to the Chaos Computer Club. They'll happily provide you with pointers and directions about what to get and where to look for it.

[orless]

Oh, Hackerspace is a good hint. We'll definitely come by. And they're basically around the corner (allright, a few kilometers).

http://www.hackerspace-ffm.de/