A nine-year-old has passed his Maths GCSE, some seven years earlier than most school kids, after being home schooled.
Dad Simon, 53, entered his son for the exam years ahead of the boy's peers because he showed so much ability for the subject.
At just nine, school pupil Tom Van der Velde from Gosforth took on his maths GCSE, and he is also considering moving on to A Level.
The youngster devoted last year's lockdown to "playing Minecraft and doing schoolwork", and dad Simon quickly noticed that Tom had a particular interest.
He told Chronicle Live : "What was surprising was not just how good he was, but how quickly he learnt it.
"We would do, say, a bit of fractions that was supposed to take an hour and it would take five minutes, so we just kept going. Within about four weeks, I thought he could probably do it at GCSE."
Author Simon said Tom "understood everything before I'd finished explaining it", and had been keen to keep going into the work that's usually set for teenagers.
As they worked their way through the textbooks, they realised how far Tom had come, and decided to officially register to sit the exam this January, as an external candidate.
Not wanting the youngster to have to sit a potentially intimidating test alone, Simon signed up alongside him, in a bid to replace his 37-year-old maths O Level with a new GCSE qualification.
At nine and 53 respectively, the pair may have stood out among an exam hall of teenagers, but they said it had been a good experience.
"It was kind of strange to be in an exam again, but it was good: I like a challenge, Tom likes a challenge - hopefully it will be the first of many for us," Simon added.
"It was quite nice afterwards to come out with him and start comparing, 'what did you get on that one?'. I'm confident he's done very well."
Tom, who says that sometimes he just gets "in a maths-y mood", said the exam "went great".
The tests went ahead in early January, and now it has been reported that he had passed and earned himself a GCSE qualification, years earlier than his peers.
Simon also passed with a slightly better result.
The Sun reports that Tom was thrilled to achieve a Grade 5 — the equivalent of a B or high C in the previous grades system.
Tom said of the achievement: “I am really, really happy. It’s great to find out I did so well.
"I’ve enjoyed studying with my dad. It’s been fun.”
He added: "Maths is fun and when I grow up I want to be an engineer to help build things.”
