A Flintshire mum has featured on a Channel 4 programme revealing the story behind her son’s academic triumphs.

Child Genius has returned to Channel 4 for a fifth series and will see one child crowned the winner after answering a series of tough questions across numerous subjects during a gruelling six-day challenge.

But the show also hones in on the parents of the competitors and how they nurture their children’s special gifts.

Private A-level tutor Kelly Briddon, of Flint, revealed the secrets of son Joshua’s brain skills on episode two of the prorgamme.

Kelly, who now lives in Staffordshire with her family, said Joshua’s IQ places him in the top 0.1 per cent of the UK population.

She said: “When I was pregnant with him I used to play the Classic FM CD to him every day, to my stomach, because the theory was classical music can improve the intelligence.”

A former pupil of St Richard Gwyn High School in Flint, she also believes her son’s intelligence is “off the scale” which he proved in Tuesday night’s episode of Child Genius.

Joshua won the maths challenge involving sums such as 25 x 7 – 30 x 2 ÷ 5 (giving the answer of 58), which he had to work out in his head, and both he and his parents were absolutely delighted about the success.

Kelly also revealed on the programme that Joshua had “always been ahead” of the other children they knew and at two-years-old he could count to 20.

But she wasn’t the only one who was impressed with Joshua as presenter of the show Richard Osman, also the star and creator of BBC quiz show Pointless, described him as “brilliant” during the maths quiz especially with his answer that beat the competition and gave him a score of 12.

He said: “That last question – a little dramatic pause and then he just belted out the answer. That was brilliant.”

Joshua’s mum added: “I just jumped up with glee I was so happy.

”It was instinctive.”

Child Genius will be back on Channel 4 today (Thursday) at 8pm.