Kelsey Robinson, son of PLP backbencher Delaey.

For the Robinsons are joining an enthusiastic band of parents who are educating their offspring at home.

It is just part of a seemingly novel approach to childrearing championed by Mr. Robinson.

But he is keen to point out that far from reinventing the wheel he is simply learning from more traditional ways of raising children.

He explains: "We hit on the idea of home learning with the advent of Kelsey.

We did a lot of reading on child care and early childhood development -- it was a continuation of that.

"It's clear a large number of practices with babies and children are not considered from the point of view of the child at all.

"If they were an awful lot of the things we do would change right from the cradle. We haven't followed the line.'' He says people were advised to keep their child in a separate room but the practice sprang from legislation passed in the middle ages in other countries to stop infanticide where birth control methods were unreliable.

He explained: "It was a common form of infanticide for people to claim they had accidently rolled over in their sleep and crushed their child.

"But we have far more effective methods of birth control which don't involve infanticide.

"But if you have your child in a separate room in a separate bed and your child needs two or four hourly feeds it is unlikely you will wake up exactly when it needs feeding so it means the child has to wake up howling and screaming to wake up the mother. She will probably have to wake up properly, then the father probably wakes up.

"They may or not get back to sleep. Everybody is interrupted for one feed. If you have a crib attached to a bed you find the baby gives out signals of being hungry long before he wakes up screaming. Our child gave head butt signals.'' Teaching children at home becoming more popular "If that didn't wake us he pounded the bed with his feet. If that failed the child woke up and started to cry but there was minimal disturbance. He could be fed without the mother fully waking up.'' He says western methods of delivering the baby did little to ease the birth.

"Mothers lie on their backs with the hips and feet elevated so the small but significant advantage gravity provides is completely lost.

"Weak muscles of the uterus can't expel the child without help. That's why Andrea stood up to deliver our child.

"Most people in the western world have been brain washed by the baby feed multinationals but breast feeding is by far the best way to go - the human race evolved from breast feeding.

"It's almost the case that (baby feed) should be made illegal. Just comparing my child to children who are not breast fed -- you can see they are underweight, scrawny, skinny things. Kelsey is healthy and vigorous.'' But he said women were discouraged from breast feeding because of public embarrassment.

He said: "There are taboos about exposing the breast because of this stupid fetish with the breast.

"Women feel reluctant to expose themselves publicly but for the sake of healthy children let's get our priorities right.'' Mr. Robinson left his job as Principal Budget Officer in the Ministry of Finance to spend more time with his child.

He says it is a time a fresh look was taken at child care.

"Women might get pregnancy leave of three months or as little as six weeks.

"In third world company children spend far more time in the company and care of adults. We spend precious little time with our little people and then wonder why there are disciplinary problems in schools and the kids are little terrors.

"The vacuum is filled by peers but peers don't know any better. That's the crux of the problem in traditionally education -- the reason it doesn't work.

"Adults have to design their lives in such a way as to be good parents. You can't give time if you are working three jobs.

"I am in my mid fifties -- I have wanted a child an awfully long time. I waited until the circumstances allowed me to that.

And Mr. Robinson said the extra care is already paying off with Kelsey.

"We took him to a political function for two hours and then on to a church meeting for another two hours but he didn't raise his voice. Most children would have been screaming. This has a lot to do with the attention we have paid him.

He challenged the notion that his child rearing ideas would mean little to those doing three jobs by pointing out that it wasn't always necessary to work so hard.

Rampant consumerism led people to work all hours to get cash which they then squandered on unnecessary items, says Mr. Robinson, and a different approach is needed.

"Advertising makes people buy goods and services they don't need.'' He says: "`There are a number of people educating their children at home in Bermuda. We will work with the Ministry of Education who need to be satisfied things are being done properly.

"Education was designed for the masses in the 1880s in the industrial revolution to make factory workers placid and docile, to go right from school into factories.

"Education was established on a false premise -- it's for adults not for children.

"Children spend a lot of time in schools lining up to establish the conditions for learning rather than learning itself.

"If there are 15 people in a class room it is not possible for them all to be learning. The child is very lucky to get as much as two hours learning a day at school - we can do that two hours a day at home far more efficiently.

"Tests are a bad deal - they say `we don't have confidence in you so we have to test.' So we try to encourage positive ways for people to use their knowledge.

"If he wants to go to school he can but if he decides school is not for me then we're quite happy to know that.

However some testing will have to come as Kelsey gets the qualifications to go to university.

"Home school kids are twice as likely to get into university.'' But he denies his child will suffer on the socialisation front.

"I wanted to make sure I didn't have a latch key kid. We live in an inn so he gets some exposure to the guests. He has never not been in the company of a loving adult. That can't be said for most 14-month-old kids.

Mixing with other kids can be done through sport and hobbies suggests Mr.

Robinson.

"And there are oodles of kids in the neighbourhood, he'll get to play with them. He'll have fascinating things to tell them.'' Asked whether Kelsey might run the risk of bullying from children who might think him different from themselves Mr. Robinson replies: "You are never going to get rid of that. But kids don't bully unless they have been bullied themselves.

Mr. Robinson is reluctant to say how the lessons will be structured -- he simply says that there is masses of material available from educational establishments such as the Institutes of Learning in America.

But it is clear that Kelsey won't be spending his time just messing round with crayons -- as Mr. Robinson enthuses on just what the young mind is capable of.

"Six-year-old children are incredibly absorbent, they can really pack information in.

`If a six-year-old child lived in a family where there were 12 languages spoken it would pick them all up, that gives you an idea of how incredible the young brain is.

"The Institutes of Learning have demonstrated this. By the time is over six it's a little over the hill! "There's a book called How to Teach Your Baby Math which shows that while they are still on their backs little infants, who just eat and cry and can't even turn over, can learn math apparently.

He said red dots are put on a white background and are shown to kids for just a second.

"There's one dot for one, two dots for two etc. They are shown these cards up to 100 and they can distinguish between a card with 99 dots and a card with 100. Then they are taught one and one, two plus one etc.''