My daughter is in Special Olympics and she does track and field and loves it. She is nonverbal and her school takes her to the practices and the events. The last time she went she was second in the 100 meter out of 42 children. If your child is athletic and you think they can handle it I would definitely get them involved in something.

DD does special needs soccer through the AYSO VIP program. I may also have her try T-ball through the Little League Challenger program next spring.

My daughter's OT recommended karate. She is 7 and always has a great time in class. If there is an ATA studio near you, I would recommend looking into that. Some of them have had special training in working with kids on the spectrum.

Thanks! My son also really loved the trial karate class, so that's why we were leaning toward it. We've also done a mini-sports camp that exposed him to T-ball, football, soccer. He didn't do as well with those, and I was guessing it was due to the large groups and how much communication there has to be between teammates.

We got our 4 year old to attend a trial karate class with his older brother. He had a great time during the trial. But then when we enrolled him, he shutdown during the first class - I think the instructor was going too fast for him (he was youngest) and even though he can imitate quite well, he just couldn't keep up, so he just gave up too quickly. We will try again once he is a bit older. He also had similar issues with skating/hockey, but on that one we just doubled his skating time with more 1 on 1 practice, so he could catchup rather than get discourage and give up. I would recommending trying a variety of sports and see which one sticks.