Paul Harris

May 01, 2009 12:00am

CHILD genius Elise Tan-Roberts, aged two years, four months and two weeks, has just become the youngest member of the high-IQ society Mensa.

Elise has an estimated IQ of 156.

That puts her comfortably in the top 0.2 per cent of children her age.

Here's the best bit, though. She seems to be a sweet little girl with charming parents who simply want her to be happy.

Elise was little more than five months when she looked her father Edward Tan-Roberts in the eyes and called him "Dada". She was walking three months later and running two months after that.

Before her first birthday she could recognize her written name and by 16 months she could count to 10. Yesterday she did it again in Spanish.

"What's the capital of Russia?" asks her mother Louise, 28. "Moscow!" comes the instant reply. Indonesia? "Jakarta!" It is tempting for outsiders to speculate if this is a well-rehearsed performance instilled by pushy parents.

But it seems to have taken Louise and Edward, of North London, as much by surprise as anyone. Until she started to communicate, all they noticed was a tendency for her to stare, as if soaking up information.

Later, at her play group, a mother gave her a toy animal and told her it was a rhinoceros. "That's not a rhinoceros," Elise said. "It's a triceratops."

Inspired by the story of Georgia Brown, who also joined Mensa when she was two, Louise and Edward took her last month to see education psychologist Joan Freeman. After subjecting her to a complex, 45-minute IQ test, she said Elise was "more than very bright and capable – she is gifted".

She was accepted for Mensa where only an IQ of 148 and above qualifies. The average IQ is 100.

Professor Freeman concluded Elise's "superb memory" was the source for her "excellent learning and progress".

Yet the major disappointment for her parents has been that no state schools they contacted wanted anything to do with Elise until she reaches 4½.

Yesterday as Elise danced in the sunshine at her local park, Edward, a 34-year-old motor consultant and car-buyer, told me: "Our main aim is to make sure she keeps learning at an advanced pace.

"We don't want to make her have to dumb down and stop learning just to fit in. I just want her to be happy and enjoy herself." So what's next, quantum physics maybe? "Give her another couple of weeks."

Elise was born in in December 2006 and can boast influences from England, Malaysia, China, Nigeria and Sierra Leone in her background.

Louise works part time as an account manager. Elise's love of music and dance has encouraged the couple to put her name down for education in that area. They have added her to the long waiting list for the Young Actors' Theatre.