Five-year-old Matthew Sawchuk of North Sydney, Cape Breton, is not your average preschooler. In fact, he's not a preschooler at all.

He attends Seton Elementary School, where he reads at a Grade 6 level and learns math out of a Grade 3 book.

This week, Matthew showed off his whiz kid smarts to the rest of the world, appearing on the "Ellen DeGeneres Show" where he demonstrated his vast knowledge for the human anatomy.

"The lights goes through the cojunctiva," he explained. When the audience chuckled at the challenge of that tongue-twisting word, the young whiz kid set them straight.

"That's a real word," he assured them.

Matthew's mom, Lynnette, a registered nurse, first noticed her son's talents when he was about nine months old. By then, he was already learning to speak and could count to five.

When he was 15 months, he was able to assemble the alphabet using foam letters. By the time he was in day care, he was reading to the other children.

Matthew looks and sounds like a typical five-year-old with one difference -- he adores school. The five-year-old has an insatiable appetite for all knowledge but is particularly fascinated right now by human anatomy and the solar system.

He has the ability to describe with ease how the heart pumps blood in and out, and to read aloud information about the planets.

Matthew's mom heard back in February that was the Ellen DeGeneres Show was looking for expert kids. Lynnette made an audition tape of Matthew displaying his knowledge of the human anatomy using a plastic human torso.

His mother sent the seven-minute tape in and three weeks later, got a call asking Matthew to appear on the show. He and his parents flew down to Los Angeles last week.

When asked what he thought of his Hollywood sojourn, Matthew had a quick answer.

"Actually that was the best part of my life."

Considering his age, he's got a lot of chance to trump that experience.

As far as life goals go, Matthew also knows where he's headed -- he wants to be a combination astronaut / doctor that he's uniquely dubbed an "astrodoc."