3rd Tutoring Session

These past few weeks I have realized that there are far deeper differences between cultures than what I expected. I've always been intrigued by other cultures and known that there were differences, through reading Other People's Children I have begun to look at the cultural differences that lay beneath the surface. We see that adults deal with children differently, however, how often do we begin to see it is because our culture decontextualizes instead of viewing things as a whole. We simply see the surface level and say that the issue is simply in how they act with children. We must begin to ask, "why?" What is the reasoning behind the actions? We must do the same thing with our students, we must view them as a whole person. This includes trying to understand their culture. I have been doing some research on Chinese culture, especially that of children in school. I have found that in the Chinese schools learning is very structured and also a collective process. For E. to be singled out is somewhat of a challenge for her. This week I asked her a little bit how she felt about leaving class, because when I first arrived at school she hid from me under the table. She was giggling and said she was just being silly, but I think perhaps she maybe trying to avoid leaving.
However, this tutoring session did go slightly smoother than the last. I tried to work on having fun with E., and at the same time establishing the fact that I am an authority. This week I tried to use a powerpoint I found with pictures that you can talk about. E. enjoyed this for a little while, but then she got sick of it and wanted to do something different. It continued like this for most of the session. It seems that she gets tired of things really quickly and wants to switch. I noticed that this usually happened whenever she got frustrated. If I asked her questions about something she generally would just say "No, No." Perhaps next time, I should try something that she could better succeed with. It is difficult to know what things are at her ability level.
I also tried having E. be the teacher. I asked her to tell me about some thing in English and try to tell me about it in Chinese. This seemed to work well for a few minutes, but once again, when it got hard she got frustrated. However, she did enjoy feeling as if she had some control.
She really likes animals and playing games. I must find a way to allow her to be the expert in what we are doing. Even when we are just talking, she often doesn't want to talk much. It is hard to figure out how to capture her attention. I would like to try reading a book to her, but I must find one that will engage her for the time being. E. also moves around a lot, so perhaps a kinesthetic activity would be helpful. I must find a way for these things to be important to her and not just a game that we play. My question is how can I help E construct her own meaning from the things we do?