Children and Chess: A Guide for Educators

by Alexey W. Root

This book helps educators and librarians prepare students to succeed in University Interscholastic League (UIL) Chess Puzzle.

Children and A Guide for Educators is the first book to show the connection between accepted educational theories and chess. It features lesson plans teachers can use immediately, and from which they can learn the basics of the game. Since the plans meet academic goals through chess, teachers also learn that chess can be a part of reading, math, science, and social studies. An appendix showing how chess meets the requirements of curriculum standards is another plus.

Children and A Guide for Educators is the first book to show the connection between accepted educational theories and chess. The relationship of chess to academic and humanistic educational goals is convincingly illustrated as curriculum and psychological theories from John D. McNeil, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, and Howard Gardner are outlined and applied to the question why chess? Children and Chess features lesson plans teachers can use immediately, and from which they can learn the basics of the game. Since the plans meet academic goals through chess, teachers also learn that chess can be a part of reading, math, science, and social studies. An appendix showing how chess meets the requirements of curriculum standards is another plus. Grades 4-8.

136 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2006

About the author

Dr. Alexey W. Root was the 1989 U.S. Women's Chess Champion. Her Ph.D. in education is from UCLA. Alexey is a lecturer at The University of Texas at Dallas, teaching online courses about chess in education. She is also the Chessable Research Awards Coordinator.

Reviews

[Mikey Gee · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is only useful for classroom teachers who are seriously interested in trying to get chess integrated into regular classroom curriculum. It creates a decently researched argument of the benefits of chess which could be used when speaking to administrators. There are ten pretty good chess lessons in formal lesson pans (including TEKS standards). All of this written for people without any understanding of chess.

If you are doing a chess club most of this book is not for you. There are plenty of other resources with three times as many lessons (without formal lesson plans).

IF you are a classroom teacher who believes chess would be a good addition to a classroom, need convincing or tools to convince others this book is five stars... if you are a chess teacher this book bounces between between being over your head (in education lingo) or being beneath your notice (the chess lessons are pretty simple).

[Kristjan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not very helpful for me. It does state that it is "for educators", but it was unclear to me until I read through it that the main purpose is to use chess to fulfill state education standards. Which doesn't make it useful for home educators, or for teaching chess to beginners.