Nana Approved Chess!

Our ability to play more kids tripled today! Pro Chess Coach Kala Dawson has joined the party and helped our kids learn. Then someone's Grandma came by to see what her grandbabies were talking about. She was so happy she brought the moms and aunts and cousins and neighbors in to see too.

Hip-Hop Chess: Exploring the art of the game

Mentoring: Think before you do anything

Artwork by Mike Magnan

Picnic puts spotlight on Lansing group's activities
Men Making A Difference strive to be role models
10:36 PM, Jul. 9, 2011

..."I was raised without a father, have kids myself and I want to show them the right way, I feel, to raise them as a male," said M.M.A.D. Vice President Dylan Greer.

The Dangerous Knights Chess Club of Lansing set up a row of chess boards at the picnic and taught kids to play when they got tuckered out from running around the nearby playground.

The one-on-one game offers a great chance for mentoring, the organizers said.

"What chess does is it teaches you to think before you do anything, and that's big in life," said club President Bryan Leek.

More here.

Chess stimulates memory, concentration

Chess stimulates memory, concentration, says Anand
Alok K N MishraAlok K N Mishra, TNN | Jul 8, 2011, 10.24pm IST

PATNA: World Chess champion Viswanathan Anand on Friday asked Bihar students to play chess since the game develops memory.

"It helps students develop sharp recognition capabilities and to remember lengthy variations with abilities to implement them," Anand told TOI on the sidelines of a function at DAV Public School, BSEB, here.

"During the game you are focused on only one main goal — to checkmate the opponent and become the victor; thus, it improves your concentration levels too. Improved concentration helps students learn more and perform well academically," the Indian chess Grandmaster, Anand, said.

He was in the city to inaugurate a state-of-the-art interactive classroom on DAV BSEB campus here. The 50-seat interactive classroom, designed as per the National Curriculum Framework-2005, has large projectors and high-tech audio systems to provide a holistic learning experience to students.

Launched by NIIT Limited, working on talent development, interactive classroom enhances teaching and learning through elements of interactivity, automation, customization, web-link library, and teaching learning plan.

Asked what lags chess talent in Bihar, Anand said: "There is a lack of interest in playing chess among youths. The situation will improve only when people take interest in the game and start playing chess."

Though he refrained from providing a specific answer to whether he planned to groom chess talent at the national level through coaching or otherwise, Anand called upon youths to play chess: "Chess induces holistic mental development. It develops logical thinking, promotes imagination and creativity, and teaches independence as you are forced to make important but decisive decisions yourself."

About Bihar's turnaround, Anand, who last came to Bihar in December 2008, said the state had witnessed remarkable and vibrant development in the recent years.

"Now the leadership should be focused on ensuring that the growth momentum is maintained. It is only through improving education further that the momentum could be sustained. Involvement of students in chess will make education exciting and propel the state's development," Anand said.

Later, he played chess simultaneously with 10 youngsters from various parts of the country, including four from Bihar, at a separate function held here at Rabindra Bhavan.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Chess bridges cultural divide

VIDEO: Chess bridges cultural divide in Dandenong
Arts & Entertainment6 Jul 11 @ 07:00am by Gilbert Gardiner

A BATTLE of epic proportions is taking place in Dandenong and it’s happening under all of our noses.

Pawns are being cut down in their prime as the kings and queens run scared on a giant rubber chess mat at Dandenong Plaza.

The black-and-white mat is a dream come true for those who find window shopping a chore.

>>Watch our video interview of some of the chess-lovers (above)

“My wife does the shopping and I play chess,” Dumitru Cupsa told Leader after beating Hekruan Celo in a battle royal.

“Chess is not a game of luck - it’s a mind war.

“The deeper you think, the better you are. It’s like reading minds, you know his next move.”

The chess mat is quite easy to find; just look out for would-be shoppers huddled together pointing and shouting out tips - in any number of foreign tongues.

“We understand each other through chess,” Mr Cupsa said.

He first started playing chess when he was 14, working as a shepherd in Romania.

“It was by accident really ... a fellow friend brought a board to the field.

“He taught me how to move because his father played chess.

“I find it interesting and slowly, slowly started building some strategies and getting better.”

Mr Cupsa is a regular on the mat on level three of the shopping centre, outside Safeway.

“There are things you must achieve in life and among those very important things - getting married, building a house and planting a tree - is knowing how to play chess.

“It’s the best game in the world.”

Springvale South resident Rene Carrere was just a happy observer when Leader joined in the board game phenomenon.

“I don’t know much about chess,” Mr Carrere said.

“I am still learning, but I might build up the courage to play one day.”

Source: http://dandenong-leader.whereilive.com.au

Life lessons found in chess

Life lessons found in chess

By Peggy Ussery
Published: July 03, 2011

DOTHAN, Ala. --

Lined up on either end of a chess board, the pieces are arranged a bit like they’re waiting to fight a battle.

There’s the respective king and queen, centered and protected by the knights, bishops, rooks and pawns. The pieces are moved into positions that will provide an advantage over the opponent. Strategies are developed and a king could be taken in the end.

A little psychological warfare may be thrown into the mix as players try to predict the other’s moves across the 8-by-8 checkered grid. Someone might complain of lighting as a way to distract their opponent, or they may simply choose the seat that faces a wall rather than the flow of people moving around them.

It should be no surprise that chess is often used as a metaphor for war. In its original form, the 1,500-year-old game was indeed an Indian war game.

As Bryan Tillis talks about the game, he refers to Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War,” the ancient Chinese military treatise still in print today. Just as corporate America applies the strategies of the ancient text to business transactions, so do chess players like Tillis.

But there are also life lessons on the chess board.

Tillis has been a student of chess since he was 6 and was taught to play by his older brother. It wasn’t long before Tillis was beating his brother — who was six years older — and his brother stopped playing him. He got serious about the game when he turned 15 in 2003.

“Everything was influenced by the game – life decisions,” said Tillis, a 23-year-old Dothan native. “It teaches you really to focus on the future and to make the right choices.”

He graduated from Dothan High School in 2006, finished both Wallace College and Troy University with honors in three years, and is now working on his master’s degree in sociology at Mississippi State University in Starkville.

Despite the workload his master’s program requires, Tillis still sets aside two hours a day to study chess plays.

Tillis reached the top five in chess in Alabama and is currently ranked No. 1 in Mississippi. He’s coming off two wins at tournaments in Tallahassee, Fla., and Memphis, Tenn. He currently has 2,148 points from tournament play. His goal is to reach 2,200 points to become a national chess master as recognized by the U.S.C.F.

When he’s home in Dothan, he returns to the same chess club where he learned his game — the Dothan Chess Club, which gathers to play each Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. at Atlanta Bread Company. He actually lost all his games when he started playing with the Dothan club at 15. He kept playing, though, and eventually began winning.

“It’s very daunting at first when trying to learn the game,” Tillis said.

But, he said, if parents notice a knack for recognizing patterns and spatial orientation in their children, they might want to consider introducing them to chess. Kids could learn a lot about long-term planning, math and even English skills, Tillis said. They may also learn to respect opponents and individuals, especially when playing with adults.

“Introduce the game to them,” he said. “You can tell very quickly with children — they get bitten by the bug very quickly.”

Those who don’t play the game, Tillis said, don’t necessarily understand its “quiet intensity.”

“They see plastic pieces on a board,” Tillis said. “But there’s infinite possibility.”

Source: http://www2.dothaneagle.com