ECU EDU & ChessPlus First Rank Newsletter 57 - December 2022

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ECU Education Changes

As another year passes, we feel that chess in schools has been making steady progress: children are playing again; school chess programmes are under way; specialised software is being deployed in the classroom. We pay tribute to all our readers who are each playing their part in introducing games into the education system especially after the social distancing period.

We have updated the layout of the newsletter to make it easier to read. From 2023 the newsletter will again be offered in six languages: English, Spanish, German, French, Italian and Dutch as we reach out across Europe.

Enjoy reading!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Fide Education Changes

The Education Commission of FIDE has been reorganised. Jerry Nash and Rita Atkins are the new Chairman and Secretary respectively. We would like to thank the previous office holders Smbat Lputian and Kevin O'Connell for their valuable work over the last four years.

Other members of the FIDE Education Commission are: Leontxo Garcia (Senior Adviser), Councillors Mothokomedi Tabano, Esteban Jaureguisar, G. Luxman Wijesuriya, Diana Dengler and Members Anzel Laubscher, Vivien Ramon Pita, Tamara Sargsyan, Ilker Pazarcioglu, Thomas Karyah, Sophia Rohde, Ali Abbas, Boris Bruhn, Nina Bodenchuk, Hanif Qureshi, Adriana Salazar, Abhijit Kunte, Charles Moura Netto, Bartlomiej Macieja, Andrea Marshall-Harris, Uvencio Jose Blanco Hernandez

Chess and Schools

Strategy Across the Board

We revisit this well-produced video from the Chess Club of St Louis, Missouri, in which the benefits of chess in school are explained. The behaviour and academic performance of children are improved.

Chess and Science

Some months ago, we announced that Chessable wanted to support chess research by offering an award of $1,000 for a graduate student and €500 for an undergraduate. Today, the first winners have been announced: you can read more about them here.

Anecdote

Source: Rauchgeruch effektiv aus Wohnung entfernen in 6 Schritten (more2home.de)

Smokers say that smoking helps them to relax and given the stress that chess players face, it is no wonder that many players used to love to smoke a cigarette, cigar or pipe while playing their game.

Today, times have changed. In most countries, governments are taking measures to discourage smoking, which is why tobacco has become a rare item in the world of chess.

In the past, however, non-smokers were expected to adapt to smokers. Botvinnik belonged to the group of non-smokers and, leaving very little to chance, the former world champion also integrated this aspect into his preparation for games or matches.

Thus, as Samuel Reshevsky used to smoke heavily during his games, Botvinnik asked his assistants to smoke during the training games before his match against the Polish-American grandmaster. There cannot have been a characteristically more methodical and complete preparation than from Botvinnik.

Source: Le saviez-vous ? – Anecdotes échiquéennes – Route64 : les échecs hors des cases (route64-lemag.fr)

Chess and Women

A new series of video shorts on the theme of Chess and Women has been produced by the indefatigable Walter Rädler from the German School Chess Foundation. The episodes are Leisure, Training and Career, Women’s Club, Ambience, Society, Romance and Role Models. They are a useful conversation point in an area that needs development.

Chess and Women - part 1: Leisure

Later, I will be Queen

It doesn't happen to often that major chess publishers pay attention to school chess. New in Chess released a fine work by Karel van Delft last year ("Chess for Educators"). This year, it is the turn of Thinkers Publishing, which launched an interesting book (books) with "Later word ik koningin" (Later, I will be Queen). The book is currently available only in Dutch, but the English translation is on the way.

The author is Christel Minne, a kindergarten teacher, who first attended a chess course herself, but was left hungry. Not surprising, in the pre-"Castle" era (the big chess project from the EU), chess training for kindergarten children too often assumed that the children would pick up the (competitive) game easily and would then develop all their skills thanks to the game, without too much assistance of the teacher.

Without knowing about the Castle project and the evolutions within the EDU commissions, Christel Minne worked out a real course for the pre-school children herself. Her preschoolers (and their parents) loved it and so she decided to share her approach.

The result is two books: a story-telling book with fine drawings and a 'toolbox' that is more of a manual for teachers and... parents and grandparents who want to introduce chess to their children or grandchildren, but are not sure how.

Indeed, the toolbox is split in two: one part gives tips for those who want to teach chess in a group of small children, the other tells you how to teach chess individually. The tips are well known by now for those delving into chess at schools: lots of mini-games, lots of stories that captivate and challenge children at the same time. But of course, the number of people who are familiar with how to use chess at school is still a minority. This book can therefore be very useful for those who have not yet delved into it.

Puzzle

ChessDefender

Blog

Author/teacher, Victoria Winifred started her ChessDefender blog with a story from her early days as a teacher and Chess in Education pioneer in New York.

Source: www.chessineducation.org

Event Calendar

There is no Discussion Group Meeting on the last Wednesday of December, we start again in January 2023.

Do you want to organise a course for your team?

Please let us know by sending an email to training@chessplus.net

Puzzle Answer

Save the date - Back in person in 2023

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