The End of Chess Blogging...

...where The Kenilworthian bids farewell to his readers.

I have been blogging about chess since May 2005 and have received the Chess Journalist Association's award for "best blog" three times: in 2008 (the first year of the award), 2010 (there was no "blog" award in 2009), and 2014 (announced this month).  Though I started the blog ostensibly to bring attention to the Kenilworth Chess Club, my motivations were mostly internal.  Like Walter White from Breaking Bad, "I did it for me; I liked it; and I was good at it."  As I wrote back in July 2007, this sort of work "seemed to bring together all of my strengths, as a researcher, writer, analyst, chess player, and budding web designer."  Compiling bibliographies, researching what had been written about a line, putting together a detailed analysis, and turning it into a blog post (complete with playable java board, diagrams, header graphic, and links) immersed me in a state that Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi calls "flow."

I am giving up blogging mostly because I have other projects into which I now want to get immersed.  So chess and chess blogging will have to be put away. But this also seems like a good time to withdraw from the field because I am convinced that professional chess blogging has made the amateur chess blog increasingly irrelevant.  

When I began blogging nearly a decade ago, Garry Kasparov had just retired from competitive chess and had closed down his chess mega-site just a couple years before, having demonstrated, it seemed then, that it was very hard to make money from publishing about chess on the web.  The world of chess seemed to have no center, and chess writing on the internet seemed a field completely opened up to amateurs -- all of this just at the moment when Blogger and Wordpress had made posting online easier than ever. Chess blogs also seemed to offer a refreshing addition to the sometimes stodgy and slow-paced news cycle of chess in those days.  Most new material came out on a weekly basis (for instance, at The Week in Chess and ChessCafe), mirroring the weekly chess columns found in print media.  I don't think that even ChessBase News was daily at that time.  The USCF website was a total joke.  And the most frequently updated and most closely watched site was Mig Greengard's The Daily Dirt chess blog.  Blogs seemed to fill a void in the world of chess news, as chess fanatics had begun looking for daily updates about their favorite obsession.  And a group of chess amateurs like myself began publishing online. 

Today, chess blogs and daily posts are no longer the domain of amateurs but also part of the offerings of professional chess websites.  ChessBase News is the most widely read chess blog on the planet and generally has more than one post a day. ChessCafe's daily blog offers nearly comprehensive links to everything of interest on the internet connected to chess.  Chess.com has absorbed the ChessVibes blog and has multiple new blog posts daily featured on its main page, many with video. Even "The Week in Chess" has daily updates, despite its name.  We have LIVE coverage of chess events on ICC, ChessBase, Chess24, Chessdom, Monroi, Chessgames.com, and multiple other sources. The world of chess news is completely saturated, and at nearly any hour of any day a chess fan can sit down at the computer and find more interesting chess than he or she has time to absorb.  Amateurs might have a place in the growing ranks of bloggers for professional publications.  But they will never get paid, and their writing will become less self-directed.

I think that my blog has been rather different from most in that I have always begun with a local perspective and tried to offer a comprehensive treatment of a topic, striving always to offer readers a definitive source of information or analysis (at least up until the moment of publication).  You can see my ambition for being definitive in many posts, whether I was compiling bibliographies (on the Smith Morra Gambit, Grand Prix Attack, b3 vs the Sicilian and French, Urusov Gambit, Vienna Gambit, Glek Four Knights, Scotch Four Knights, Spanish Four Knights, Elephant Gambit, 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 White Repertoire, Bird's Defense to the Ruy Lopez,  Stonewall in Black and White, Kavalek KID, Byrne Saemisch, KID with Na6, KID with h3, KID with exd4, Fianchetto Pirc, Blumenfeld Gambit, The Cochrane Gambit, or a Five Easy Pieces Open Sicilian Repertoire), doing chess analysis (The Complete Caveman Caro-Kann, Vienna Gambit, Labourdonnais - McDonnell Attack, Mad Dog Pirc, Monte Carlo Exchange French, Panther, Anti-Petroff with d4, Two Knights Anti-Modern, Black Jet in the Steinitz French, The Philidor Countergambit, The Bryntse-Faj Gambit, The Steinitz-Sveshnikov Attack I and II, Left Hook Grand Prix, Fritz Ulvestad and Ulvestad, Marshall's Anti-Italian d7-d5, Sicilian Dragon Trap with Nd5, Black Fianchetto in the Open Games I and II, Saemisch Attack vs the Alekhine, Spanish Four Knights, etc.), compiling webliographies (The Panov-Botvinnik Attack, Chekhover Sicilian, Budapest Fajarowicz, Lasker's Defense to the QGD, Anand - Topalov, Caro-Kann Fantasy Variation, The Sicilian Dragon), reviewing books (such as The Dark Knight System, Mayhem in the Morra, Modernized, Openings for Amateurs, Frank Brady's Endgame, American Grandaster, Calypso Chess, Zuke 'Em, Koltanowski Phoenix Attack, Alterman's Gambit Guide: White Gambits, SOS #10, or No Passion for Chess Fashion), uncovering chess history (such as The Dimock and Alrick Man Theme Tournaments, Lake Hopatcong 1923 and 1926, or Fischer vs Castro), or covering other topics (BBC's The Master Game, Endings with Bishops of the Same Color, Same-Colored Bishop Endings Again, The Big Clamp, Chess and Table Tennis, Morphy vs Mephistopheles, Chess and Evolutionary Theory, Cryptochessanalysis or Chess and Self-Control).  And that barely scratches the surface of my 1,200 posts.

Always trying to dive deep meant that I needed plenty of time to work on each article, and so posting became less frequent and more time consuming -- which is all the more reason I now have to set this uncompensated labor aside so that I can devote my energies to more socially rewarding work.  I hate to reckon how many hours I have spent on the blog.  But at least it has taught me that I have that many hours, despite my work and family commitments, if I decide to make good use of them.

The time commitment has always been the problem with chess.  As Savielly Tartakower famously said, "All chess players should have a hobby" -- implying that playing chess is more like having a second career than a relaxing pastime.  This might explain why so many chess players find that they have to give up chess completely to get anything done (following the lead of economists like Ken Rogoff and Tyler Cowen for instance).  As chess enthusiast Sir Walter Scott once wrote:  “It was a shame to throw away upon mastering a mere game, however ingenious, the time which would suffice for the acquisition of a new language.  Surely chess-playing is a sad waste of brains.”  I wonder how many additional long novels Scott might have written had he succeeded in giving it up.

It seems like chess has gotten more interesting than ever -- with a fascinating champion in Magnus Carlsen, amazing tournaments like the Sinquefield Cup in St. Louis, and an incredible array of online sources for news, analysis, live coverage, and play...which makes it all the more important for me to put chess aside right now, before I get sucked in again!  

So farewell.

Teaching Chess to Kids, Yet Again

Pawn Battle position
White to play and win.

Every year, about this time, I teach chess to rising-9th grade students as part of the Rutgers Future Scholars summer program.  It's a fun class and gives me a chance to think about teaching chess to beginners, about which I have written some things over the years.  There are many benefits of learning chess and it is a valuable tool for helping kids develop "self control" and the ability to "learn how to learn" (as Josh Waitzkin argues in The Art of Learning).  It also gives a teacher a chance to talk about how to make decisions after examining multiple variables, which is one of my main themes.

I have developed most of my techniques teaching chess to groups of young people. But I do not think a group setting is the best place to learn chess deeply, even if it does have the advantage of  providing motivation through friendly competition, which drives some kids to pay attention and study.  But to get the most benefit from chess, it has to be studied independently, and kids who do that will gain more confidence for when they finally go to a serious chess club or begin to play in tournaments.  I generally think it is a mistake for young people to play any rated chess until they have studied a bit on their own or with a coach. 

With groups of kids just learning the game (or who only have a basic familiarity with the rules), I generally use the "one piece at a time" method of instruction, using mini-games to accompany each lesson.  This way kids don't get bored and I can create an active, experiential learning environment where everyone can play as equals.  The first lesson is always on pawns and ends with "Pawn Battle" (handout / blog), where the first player to reach the other side of the board to make a Queen wins.  I learned the basic game from Lev Alburt's Comprehensive Chess Course (where he says it is an old Russian teaching game), but I modified it so that if either player has no moves it is stalemate, which is a great way to teach kids the stalemate concept.  I also use the game to teach them the power of zugzwang and all sorts of pawn theory (from pawn majorities to backward pawns), as you can see described in my handout.  The big advantage of starting with pawns, if you do it right, is they can learn some tough rules like en passant and stalemate and concepts like zugzwang and passed pawns right from the get-go.  I find it especially useful for teaching en passant in a way that sticks with them.

Our first lesson was on Friday, when I saw one of the games reach the position in the diagram at the top of the page after 1.d4 d6 2.d5 e6 3.e4 c5(?).  The player of the White pieces quickly showed off his new knowledge of en passant by capturing with 4.dxc6(?) -- and I was glad to see someone had fully understood en passant on day one!  But I noticed something else and later used the game to illustrate the power of the "breakthrough sacrifice."  I think this might be the quickest way you can win at Pawn Battle, with the powerhouse move 4.e5! (not something I'd expect a student to find on day one).  No matter what Black does, White is going to get a pawn to the queening square at d8 and win the game, e.g.: 4.e5! dxe5 5.d6 etc. or 4...exd5 5.exd6 etc.  It made for a nice lesson -- including a reminder about how en passant works and how you are not required to capture (like in checkers).

Later today, in our second meeting, I will follow up pawn battle with a game I call "Anteater" (download PDF), which teaches the relative value of the pieces and the concept of time vs. material, and another I call "Magnetic Sumo Kings" (download PDF), which teaches the opposition.  By Tuesday or Wednesday, though, I expect these older kids will lose patience with focusing on one piece at a time, so I will have to introduce the other pieces, teach them about checkmate, and then just let them play "real chess" -- following up by looking at a master game each day with them.  They will play and I will have them record their games so we can look at them too.  All along the way, I will also use their games to teach them lessons, trying to address their "patterns of error."  I have written about my first year of teaching like this on my blog:

• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part One
• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part Two
• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part Three
• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part Four
• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part Five
• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part Six
• Teaching Chess to Kids, Part Seven

Those looking to employ some of these techniques to teach chess to their own children might check out the book Chess Is Child's Play: Teaching Techniques that Work, which also uses an "active learning" approach with similar mini-games.  This would be the ideal book for a parent relatively new to chess who wants to get his or her child interested in playing.  It would make a good guide for those rainy summer days, which are ideal for getting young kids started with chess.

You can also find free online lesson plans, including Teaching Chess the Easy and Fun Way with Mini-Games, which looks especially appropriate for early elementary kids and features some creative mini-games that are new to me.  

Technology has definitely sped up the process by which kids can learn the game and practice getting better at it, and computer chess instruction has put the mini-games approach to good use.  Over the past eight years, my own children have tried out practically every chess instruction software I could find -- beginning with ChessBase's Fritz & Chesster (all three volumes, now combined), which does the best job of using the mini-game concept to help kids master the pieces and basic tactics.  Other programs my kids tried include Lego Chess (probably discontinued -- and a bit repetitive), Dinosaur Chess (excellent and the one my daughter liked best), and Majestic Chess (which my son liked best since it creates a mysterious medieval atmosphere). When the kids were using a DS (which they have since abandoned), I picked up Learn Chess for that, which is very good and has a story featuring ghosts and pirates.  I think Fritz and Chesster made it to DS eventually, but we never tried it and I cannot find a good link (maybe it was discontinued).  All of the programs use the mini-games technique to some extent to give kids practice in using the pieces and learning chess concepts.

Though modern technology has made it more accessible, the mini-game concept is really the classic way of teaching the game, beginning with "The Knight's Tour" puzzle, which is sort of the Rubik's Cube of chess.  In the 19th Century, masters used to give exhibitions that would include a demonstration of the Knight's Tour from whatever square the audience named.  It is an excellent exercise for young people to practice, and some used to play it with 64 pennies by the side of the board, laying a penny on each square that has already been traversed.  You could practice by giving yourself 80 pennies and work to reduce the number of pennies you "spend" each time.  However, this classic puzzle works most efficiently online and I found a couple fun versions:

• Renegade Knight -- the most fun version of the puzzle that I came across.  
• Free Chess Game - Chess Knight -- this version allows you to cross over the same squares with the goal of reducing the number of turns it takes you to cover every square.

In searching for those Knight's Tour games, I also stumbled upon the Troyis Online Puzzle Game, which also looks like a fun resource for helping kids get better at using the Knight.

There are a tremendous number of great online tools for learning chess, and a kid who is looking for some amusement might be directed to videos on YouTube, Chesslecture.com, Chess.com, and many other sites -- and to playing over master games at Chessgames.com.  The kids I am teaching now, though, prefer the social aspects of the game and are not likely to become serious students or spend time looking at chess online (though many of my former students definitely play online).  I think the game still has a lot to teach even those who try it out casually.  And you never know: once they learn, and know how to read chess notation, they might just end up reading a chess book some day.

ChessCube Reviewed at Chessville

I was surprised to find Chessville still alive after a very long hiatus.  Seems they have been publishing again since June.  This week's installment is quite good, with  NM Bill McGeary posting a review of one of my favorite play sites, ChessCube (which has a great interface and some good players, though not as good as ICC -- I have broken the 2000 barrier several times there playing as "kenilworthian.")