Well said, Barbara. Every school leader should make this article mandatory reading. 👇🏻 The efficacy, or lack thereof, of student-centered learning is the most exhausting argument in education. If you think about the things you learned from your parents - tying your shoes, riding a bike, cooking an egg, cutting with a knife - how did they do it? This was not child-led inquiry-based learning. You’d never figure it out! And in some cases maybe do real harm to yourself and others. There’s a logical time to allow students to think freely and explore their own ideas but that’s well after the basics have been mastered through explicit instruction.

Waking up without power, heat, or running water. (Again.) But the work here in Kyiv continues. Warming up in the car, writing in pencil — pen ink freezes — by headlamp. Despite how difficult this job can be, I am proud to be a foreign correspondent at The Washington Post.