Take one look at O’shane Hector and you’ll think he’s like any other active, adventurous, curious, outgoing three-year-old. You wouldn’t be wrong, but you would need to consider adding adjectives such as ‘brilliant’, ‘genius’, and perhaps ‘prodigy’ to the list once you hear him spell.

With an unassuming posture – hands clasped at his mouth and a disinterested stare – he can spell ‘leptospirosis’ before you even have time to reflect on the word’s meaning.

O’shane, who told the Sunday Observer that he wants to become a Spelling Bee champion once he’s old enough, has impressively mastered a list of over 200 words, including ‘pneumonia’, ‘neutralisation’, ‘gastroenteritis’, ‘abbreviation’, ‘leukemia’, ‘rheumatism’, ‘comprehensive’, ‘international’, ‘cosmetology’, ‘necessary’ and ‘management’. And what’s more, he can tell you what many of them mean.

As a result of his remarkable talent and potential, the boy has been offered a scholarship to attend Lannaman’s Preparatory starting tomorrow when school reopens. The scholarship, which was offered by the school board, will cover tuition costs (currently valued at $30,000 per term) and will initially be for a period of one academic year. Whether it continues up to the grade six level will depend on his performance in school.

“I think he has a very good memory,” said the principal at Lannaman’s Prep. “I haven’t assessed him fully because I only met him for a short while. He has a very good memory and if he takes that with him and transfers it to other areas, he’ll go a far way.”

She said she had discussions with his new teacher and plans for special testing of the boy are being put in place to ascertain whether his skills are restricted to only one area or if they spill over into others.

His aunt, Ann-Marie Moodie, with whom the child has been living since he was about 18 months old, told the Sunday Observer that she was quite pleased with the scholarship offer, especially since she was already experiencing financial difficulties.

She said she decided to teach O’shane to spell when she realised the incredible facility with which he handled regular three-letter kindergarten words as well as some music lyrics.

“When him start go school a jus start giving him the basic ‘rat’ and ‘cat’ and those little words but a always notice him when him hear di music how him respond to the music, so ah jus started to give him dem an ah see him going far in it,” Moodie said.

“Come like everyting him touch a jus him dat. Dis little bwoy is a genius. Him a go go further still because him love it. Him start learn fi read, him can count, him know him A-B-C because even on him report most of di tings dem him get mastery pon it. So mi jus a go start help him wid like Maths now,” she continued.

Moodie, who has one child and who completed her education at the all-age level, spends a lot of time supervising and coaching her nephew and sees him attending university in the future.

Other than his obvious genius in the area of spelling, O’shane is just a regular kid who enjoys the activities that typical three year olds do. He loves to play, and play, and play some more and he names football as his favourite game. When asked what he did at summer school with his teacher ‘Aunty Nicky’, O’shane let out an unapologetic “play”.

He said he loves going to school and meeting his friends whom he named only as Saski, Poochie and Latti-Ann.

“Him just run up an dung an play an so and him always a sey mi fi buy him a computer,” his aunt said. When asked why he wanted a computer, O’shane told the Sunday Observer quite frankly, “fi play game. Yuh just press and press and press”.

Moodie said she really wants him to get the computer since it is an essential learning aid and will only serve to improve his skills and enhance his development.

The young boy’s love for technology was evident on Wednesday when the Sunday Observer visited his Roberts Avenue home in Kingston. His fascination with our camera and the tape recorder suggested that there might just be a genius lurking inside afterall.

Among his favourite things to eat, said O’shane, whose level of maturity makes him at times appear like a child of about 6 or 7, are ackee, dumpling, sausage and macaroni.

O’shane’s parents, who live in the Kings Western area of rural St Andrew, are extremely proud of their son’s progress and upon seeing him on television last week, kept calling to say how happy and proud they were of him.