Is this really reading ?

One child I work with is going into 3rd grade.  She has already failed once and would have probably failed this year had she not already failed a grade.  I have worked for a year to get her excited about even opening a book.
Today at the library she looked through many books and wrote them down as having read them.  She has already read the 20 required to finish the summer reading program.  I read them with her, to her or had her read them to me. When she was telling me  "Look how many I have read." Someone else said, "Yes, and I saw how you were reading them, too."  Where does reading start?  It is certainly not by leaving the book on the shelf.  I went over some of the books she had read. Some of the books she did not understand and possibly had not read or not understood. Instead of telling her I was not sure she had read them, I told her I wanted to see if she understood what she had read. I was pleased at how much she had understood.  Turning the pages and looking at the pictures and words you can read is certainly to be praised in my opinion.

I do not feel well today

Today, the 15 year old I tutor was not feeling well.  This is often the case when he comes.  He uses this as an excuse to cut tutoring short.  His grandmother and I are working on getting him to stay the entire hour.  Today he really did not want to come.  I told him that it was not my fault if he stayed up too late. I could tell he did not have the energy for me to push him.
I started out giving him a drink of water to sip on while I made him some tea.  He takes medicine that makes him feel ill.  I also offered him some chips which seemed to help.
We started out reading the book I am reading aloud to him.  He insisted he felt too ill to stand on the balance board. Then I had him play word go fish to encourage him.  He did well at that and it gives him the confidence to continue learning.  It is so much fun to see him forget he is not supposed to know how to read the word.  He has to build his confidence as well as his ability to read.  I also had him do some memory work.
I told him tomorrow hopefully he will feel better and he hopes so too.

Slow down, I am too tired to learn your way

 Yesterday, I worked with an 8 year old and was excited because I knew what I wanted to do.  Enter the 8 year old. This child was tired and needed permission to regroup.  He came in and asked to play a game. He chose Rummy-O. This teaches the same thing my set- making game does.  It also takes longer.  Instead of drawing one tile each play we drew two each time. Children like to draw tiles.  The object is supposed to be to Win by getting rid of all your tiles first. The child needed to learn how to play and learn grouping of numbers.  You are also not supposed to let the other player see what tiles you have.  We set the tiles up and then helped each other.  Before the game was over he was showing me what I had to play a couple of times.  What a confidence builder for him to find my move before I did.
Then we worked on the balance board and he did well.  I began tutoring by reading every other sentence while the student reads the opposite ones.  This prevents the negative, "You forgot to stop for the period."
It also helps understanding by stopping at each complete thought. I am working for this child to read every other paragraph. He likes the every other sentence better. The reading selections are also longer. He is resisting the longer as it looks harder so we stopped in the middle of the selection.
I hope today goes as well.