The relevance of the study is determined by the increasing role of engineering and technical workers in the socio-economic development of a society. Orientation of school leavers to the choice of engineering professions becomes one of the main tasks of secondary education in the 21st century. The article clarifies the concept of "technical aptitude", determines its compositional structure, and reveals the main factors of its development. The authors proceed from the assumption that the most technically gifted person is characterized by professionally important qualities of an engineer. The results of the research conducted in Russia with 19 winners and runners-up of the national schoolchildren's Olympiad's regional stage in Handicraft, are presented to determine the main psychological and pedagogical factors in the development of the aptitude. It is shown that a high level of motivation to achieve success in the field of technical creativity plays a decisive role in the development of technically gifted children.