Meet the Pontefract maths whiz who has become a member of Mensa - aged just four
A four-year-old boy from Pontefract has become a member of Mensa with an IQ of 141 – putting him in the top 0.3 per cent of the population.
Michael Portas has gone from being a quiet little boy in nursery school to amazing his family and teachers with his maths skills.
Proud mum, Jordan Day, said she and Michael’s dad, Luke Portas, knew their son was excelling in mathematics when he started Reception.
"He hardly spoke when he was in nursery,” Jordan said.
"But when he moved into the Pre-School room, they learn how to count independently – but he just carried on counting into the hundreds!
“He has always excelled with numbers – he’s performing ahead in English and phonics, but his strength is clearly in mathematics.”
Talented Michael can already add up and knows all his times tables, so much so, his school is giving him work aimed for Key Stage 2 children.
"We knew he was advanced, but then school highlighted it saying they'd never had a child like Michael before. He was exceeding all the targets for his age."
A friend then suggested Mensa – the world's oldest and largest high-IQ society.
Michael scored an IQ of 141, which, Mensa says, indicates ‘exceptionally high intelligence’, placing them in the 99th percentile and ‘within the range classified as ‘gifted’ or ‘genius’.
"When you’re a member of Mensa, you’re a member for life. He’s only four, he still wants to do what any other four-year-old does, but he can get bored playing with others his own age – he’s always wanting to do maths questions, not something other children want to do while playing!”
Michael is now learning to count in Spanish.
"He just loves doing sums! He walks around the house with a calculator, giving us all sums to do so we can check our answers – he’s already done them in his head!”
And like any other four-year-old, what he wants to do when he grows up changes – from teacher or firefighter to builder or You Tuber.
"He makes little videos of himself – he’s such a comedian. We say he’s a funny little old man in a four-year-old’s body.
“Everyone who meets him is obsessed with him. He’s such a happy little boy.”