Growing up in the bilingual city of Kyiv in the 1990s, I studied the Ukrainian language like a museum object—intensely, but at a distance, never quite feeling all of its textures or bringing it home.

Having taught for nearly a decade, I’ve worked through my share of classroom challenges. Nothing, however, prepared me for the toughest one: teaching my own children to speak Russian, my native ...

Ievgeniia Ivanova does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond ...