I have always loved sports, especially watching my own children play them year round. You may not see the baseballs or football helmets on the back of my van, but I do consider myself a soccer mom and a basketball mom and a baseball mom and a football mom. These roles came naturally, but a few years ago I would have never guessed I would have become a chess mom, too. I never dreamed I would take more out of town trips for chess tournaments than anything else my children did, but I absolutely love the chess circuit.
My 14 and 11 year old sons joined their school's chess club five years ago. For the first four and a half years they played kids their own ages from other schools in the area. This past spring I discovered chess tournaments in Houston, Baton Rouge, Hammond and New Orleans. So we started packing our bags for overnight weekends at chess tournaments.
Mostly adults and a few teenagers play at these tournaments, so it's been quite an experience for my sons. They also have discovered winners get money, not trophies. That's quite a motivator! They have won some and lost some and quite often have returned home with some cash of their own.
What really blows me away is that some of these chess games can and do last up to four hours! The longest my sons have played were two and a half and three hour games. Wheeew! Multiply that by five to seven games over a weekend, and that's a lot of thinking. (Local school tournament chess games aren't nearly that long. Unless a child loses from a three move checkmate, the games last about 30-60 minutes, and the kids play about four of them.)
If hours of chess sound boring, just ask any serious chess player and they'll tell you they love it. It's like solving a puzzle the whole time. I learned how to play chess as a child, but never knew the strategies. Last night my seven year old daughter, who joined her brothers in the school chess club two years ago, put me to shame. Without showing mercy, I had captured the most pieces and was on my way to winning the game, when she pulled a fast one on me and captured my queen, I was in checkmate two moves later. This old dog may need to learn some new tricks.
If your school has a chess club, I encourage you to check it out. Kids learn strategies in chess club meetings from chess coaches. You don't even have to know how to play. Your child can come home and teach you. There are all sorts of articles about how chess improves math skills, concentration, etc. If you would like to start a chess club at your school, email me at pdixon@kplctv.com And I'll hook you up with Sam Breaux, a wonderful volunteer and excellent chess player himself, who helps coordinate chess programs and tournaments at area schools. It's a great workout for the brain.
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Posted by: Alex Smith | July 18, 2007 at 02:22 AM