Liliana's Profound Question

"Why is there no tomorrow?" Liliana asked David and I tonight. "What do you mean?" I asked, thinking that maybe she knew something about the end of the world that we should be preparing for (*just kidding). She then began to sing the 'Days of the Week' song. "Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, the you start again.... See. No tomorrow!" I love this little girl! Seeing how her little brain works is fascinating for me. We had a little discussion about tomorrow not being the name of a specific day, but referring to the day after the one we are in at the moment. I asked her what day it was and she responded, "Sunday." I asked her what day tomorrow will be and she replied, "Monday." Then I told her to pretend that it was Monday now and asked her what day it would be and she responded, "Tuesday." I know she already can answer these questions, because we do it as part of our preschool calendar activity all the time, but I wanted her to talk it out as part of this discussion to help her understand the abstract concept of tomorrow not being a specific day of the week. She, like most people, gets those "ah ha" moments much more frequently when I let her talk it out herself than when I try to explain things to her outright. Giving her nuggets of information and then helping to guide her thinking through questions enables her to feel like she can figure things out on her own and helps her develop problem solving skills and the ability to think about things and come to conclusions/resolutions without just waiting for someone to tell her what or how things are. I am not always good about facilitating this type of discovery thinking, but I am working on it because it is important.