Language

When it comes to the how of English language, there is a genuine thrill of discovering and decoding kids' lingua franca.

Before my daughter entered kindergarten, she coined words like "mouses." With time, she made fewer grammatical mistakes and observed new rules from her teachers. One of the classic clues that she was making (some) progress comes from her question: "Daddy, who is the beautifulest princess?"

Remember, my daughter goes to international school, and has been exposed to a rich verbal environment full of native English-speaking teachers. Many a time her spoken English is better than me. Much better. In time, my little one learns English faster than I can imagine.

Just a few days ago the two of us watched a drama adapted from the book Stick Man by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. That's one of her favorite books. We love to replay the story as if on stage, "I am not a stick. I'm a Stickman, can't you see?"

"Oh, well," my daughter added, "you're Miss Stick Man, daddy."

"Excuse me. Why do you call me Miss Stick Man?"

"Hey, 'cause you're silly and make lots of mistakes. You're Mistake Man."