Tomorrow, middle, later

Tonight The Girl (nearly 4 y.o.) correctly used the words ''tomorrow'', ''middle'', and ''later'' within the span of a few sentences. I didn't know those words were in her vocabulary -- but clearly, they are!

When you think about it, they're pretty advanced words to understand, and be able to use. ''Middle'' is a little easier to intentionally teach someone, since you can physically demonstrate putting something in between two other things. ''Tomorrow'' is a bit harder, since it requires the person that you're teaching to actually remember things from day to day.

''Later'' is probably the most difficult, because it's the most abstract. At least with ''tomorrow'', you could have someone go to sleep, and the next morning explain to them that now it's tomorrow. But ''later'', as a concept, is looser: ''next week'' is ''later'' -- but so it a few minutes from now.

Actually, the concept of ''now'' is pretty subtle, too -- and I'm pretty sure **that's** in her vocabulary. Wow. :)

Language stuff.


--GG