tā zuótiān yǒudiǎnr gǎnmào, jīntiān hái zài késou.

In Mandarin, time words usually come early in the sentence, often right after the subject.

So this pattern is very common:

Subject + Time + Verb/Predicate

Here:

• 她 = she
• 昨天 = yesterday
• 有点儿感冒 = had a slight cold

So 她昨天有点儿感冒 is a very natural word order.

You can also sometimes put the time at the very beginning for emphasis:

昨天她有点儿感冒。

That also works.

有点儿 means a little, a bit, or slightly. It is often used when the thing being described is not desirable.

So:

• 有点儿感冒 = have a slight cold / be a little sick with a cold

A useful learner note:

• 有点儿 often suggests something negative or unpleasant.
• 一点儿 usually just means a little in a more neutral sense.

For example:

• 有点儿累 = a little tired
• 有点儿冷 = a little cold
• 有点儿麻烦 = a little troublesome

So in this sentence, 有点儿 softens the illness: she is not extremely sick, just somewhat sick.

The 儿 is an example of erhua, a feature of standard Mandarin and especially northern speech.

So you may see or hear both:

• 有点儿
• 有点

They mean the same thing here.

A few things to know:

• In speaking, 有点儿 is very common.
• In writing, both forms appear, though textbooks often show 有点儿.
• If you say yǒudiǎn instead of yǒudiǎnr, people will still understand you perfectly.

So this is mostly a pronunciation/style issue, not a meaning difference.

感冒 is a flexible word in Mandarin. It can function a bit differently depending on the sentence.

Here, in 有点儿感冒, it means something like:

• to have a cold
• to be down with a cold

So in practice, you can think of it as part of the predicate describing her condition.

Common patterns include:

• 她感冒了。 = She caught a cold / She has a cold.
• 我有点儿感冒。 = I have a slight cold.
• 他今天没来，因为感冒了。 = He didn’t come today because he caught a cold / has a cold.

English learners sometimes want a word like is before it, but Mandarin does not need that here.

Because 是 is not a general equivalent of English to be.

In Mandarin, 是 is mainly used to connect:

• noun = noun
• pronoun = noun

For example:

• 她是老师。 = She is a teacher.

But with adjectives, states, and many verb-like predicates, Mandarin usually does not use 是.

So you say:

• 她很忙。 not 她是很忙。
• 她感冒了。 not 她是感冒了。

In your sentence, 有点儿感冒 and 还在咳嗽 are already complete predicate expressions, so 是 would be wrong.

Here, 还 means still.

So:

• 今天还在咳嗽 = today she is still coughing

It shows that the situation continues from before into the present.

Compare:

• 她今天咳嗽。 = She coughs / is coughing today.
• 她今天还咳嗽。 = She is still coughing today.
• 她今天还在咳嗽。 = She is still in the middle of coughing today / she’s still coughing.

So 还 adds the idea of continuation.

Here, 在 marks an ongoing action, similar to be doing in English.

So:

• 咳嗽 = cough / to cough
• 在咳嗽 = be coughing
• 还在咳嗽 = still be coughing

This tells us the coughing is currently continuing.

Compare:

• 她咳嗽。 = She coughs / she has a cough / she is coughing.
  This is more general.
• 她在咳嗽。 = She is coughing.
  This focuses on the ongoing action right now.
• 她还在咳嗽。 = She is still coughing.
  This adds continuation.

So 在 is there to highlight that the coughing is an ongoing process.

Yes, it could.

• 今天还咳嗽 is grammatical.
• 今天还在咳嗽 is also grammatical.

The difference is mainly one of focus:

• 还咳嗽 = still cough / still has coughing
• 还在咳嗽 = is still coughing, with stronger emphasis on the action being in progress

So the version with 在 sounds a bit more vivid and ongoing.

Because in Mandarin, when the subject is the same in both clauses, it is often omitted in the second clause if it is clear from context.

So:

• 她昨天有点儿感冒，今天还在咳嗽。

  really means:

• 她昨天有点儿感冒，她今天还在咳嗽。

But repeating 她 is unnecessary because the listener already knows who is being talked about.

This kind of omission is very common and natural in Chinese.

Not exactly.

• 感冒了 often means caught a cold or has come down with a cold
• 有点儿感冒 means has a slight cold or is a little sick with a cold

So the difference is:

• 了 often points to a new situation/change of state
• 有点儿 emphasizes degree: only a little

Compare:

• 她感冒了。 = She caught a cold / She has a cold now.
• 她有点儿感冒。 = She has a slight cold.

You could also say:

• 她昨天有点儿感冒了 but that would add a slightly different nuance, often sounding more like a change or realization. The original sentence is simpler and very natural.

Yes. It is normally pronounced:

• késou

That means:

• 咳 = second tone
• 嗽 = neutral tone

Learners sometimes want to pronounce both syllables with full stress, but in normal Mandarin the second syllable is usually light.

Also, 咳嗽 can be both:

• a verb: to cough
• a noun-like illness expression: a cough

In this sentence, it is functioning as a verb.

Yes, but mainly for readability and rhythm.

The comma separates two closely related parts:

1. 她昨天有点儿感冒
2. 今天还在咳嗽

This is very common in Chinese writing: two related clauses are placed side by side, separated by a comma.

It helps show:

• first, what happened yesterday
• second, what is still true today

So the comma makes the sentence easier to follow, but the meaning relationship is also clear from the words themselves.

A useful way to see it is:

Subject + time + predicate, time + adverb + progressive marker + verb

More specifically:

• 她 = subject
• 昨天 = time
• 有点儿感冒 = predicate 1
• 今天 = time
• 还 = still
• 在 = ongoing action marker
• 咳嗽 = verb

So the sentence is built from two time-based clauses:

• Yesterday: she had a slight cold
• Today: she is still coughing

This is a very common way Mandarin organizes information: time first, then what happened at that time.