"She won't get anywhere with earthbending if she doesn't figure it out."

"Then I'll do my best."

And she starts to very easily knock around the Avatar. She's faster, hits harder, and demonstrates very thoroughly that the Avatar can't avoid her.

And, lo and behold, the Avatar begins firming her stance, mostly after Hisame challenges her to take several blows head-on. 

The Avatar will probably come out of this with some broken bones, but, hey, she'll know the stance!

(Which Hisame has memorized, of course.)

Eliko is, quietly, privately, impressed.

Is Hisame going to fix those bones?

Yes, in fact - she notes she's not as good a healer as her girlfriend, but apparently she'd been careful not to do any damage she can't heal. She does, however, leave her student with some bruises, to let the lesson settle in.

Good. Then she can have Mara use her newfound stance to start on the basics of gross manipulation, which is to say, punching boulders in half. Eliko has some buried under the field which she raises for this purpose.

She seems to find this intensely fun, but isn't getting anywhere fast, again. Still, her stance stays as firm as it had been, and she does figure out fairly quickly she needs to be more forceful - though she still isn't committing.

She observes her student for a while. Then-

The next boulder Mara attempts to break, Eliko will force to stay whole.

She notices that.

She starts hitting harder, then - 

Finally throws herself into it.

She lets it break.

"You're not taking this seriously enough. You have a poor attitude for an earthbender."

"What should my attitude be, then?"

"Attack me."

She does! Mostly keeping to her airy style, though she's adaptable enough to mix in a bit of water.

Eliko stays exactly where she is, shifting at most one foot at a time in precise, calculated movements to meet or turn aside the other girl's strikes. A mountain upon which Mara's storm breaks.

And Mara starts to adapt.

She tries coming in like lightning, first.

Lightning that strikes the earth is grounded harmlessly.

Spin -

Deep breath.

And she settles.

She's still got a bit of fire in her, when she comes this time, but it's tempered by earth...

Eliko endures the assault. "Better," she says, when she's pushed Mara back again.

And then she's the avalanche, rolling forward to crush everything in her path.

She wavers for a split second -

And then she plants herself, pushes back.

(She can be stubborn, too.)

Eliko opens a pit underneath her feet.

Mara falls.

Eliko walks over to the lip and looks down at Mara for a moment. Then she raises the bottom of the pit back up.

"That was a good fight!" Mara says, jumping out with a gust of wind. "You're good!"

"What did you learn?"

"My air style doesn't work for everything. I need to adapt to my opponent, and sometimes I need to be in a different mindset, to do that."

"But I also shouldn't forget my best and most familiar tools, and I should watch my surroundings. Every enemy has surprises."

She nods. "Fire burns, air blows, water flows. You fight like all of these. Earth stands. Earth waits. Earth watches. That is the attitude you lack."