Colman Noctor: How children learn our core values  

Many of us take on the values taught to us by our parents, despite rebelling against or disagreeing with them at the time

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 ‘Come in or stay out, you’re letting all the heat out’; ‘Dublin Airport wouldn’t have as many lights on as we have this house’; ‘Everything doesn’t have to go into the wash basket if you’ve only worn it once’.

These are just three sayings I have noticed myself saying to my children in recent weeks, which are word for word the phrases that my parents used when I was growing up. Although it might have appeared that I took little notice at the time, they sunk in by some form of osmosis.