How young to start kids (and how)?

Another successful idea is to get a belt and fold it over. Every time the kid moves a piece wrong smack them across the legs with the belt. In no time the kid will be a Grand Master. They're 2, let them be kids is my suggestion.

Originally posted by jvanhine
you have a chance to make your kids really smart with this game, so they already will be winning, just make it fun🙂

you can't make someone smart, if they're intelligent, they're intelligent, if their stupid, that's a shame. If you could "make" people smart, then what would be the point of intelligence quota?

What chess can do however is teach a kid...how to play chess... and have some fun. As a wise man once said: GMs are born, not made.

Originally posted by hamltnblue
Another successful idea is to get a belt and fold it over. Every time the kid moves a piece wrong smack them across the legs with the belt. In no time the kid will be a Grand Master. They're 2, let them be kids is my suggestion.

i prefer using a bat

Originally posted by YUG0slav
you can't make someone smart, if they're intelligent, they're intelligent, if their stupid, that's a shame. If you could "make" people smart, then what would be the point of intelligence quota?

What chess can do however is teach a kid...how to play chess... and have some fun. As a wise man once said: GMs are born, not made.

How do you account for the fact that average IQ increases with each generation. I believe that you can make kids smart with stimulation. It seems to have worked with my kids, although obviously I can't compare with an alternate universe in which I took a different approach.

IMHO, chess is a (beautiful) game and should be treated as such with youngsters. If and when they ever want to compete, enjoyment should still be the #1 goal. Different kids learn in different ways but I'd say most children aren't ready (even if they're motivated by maternal love or bats) for chess until 5 or 6 at the earliest. Exceptions exist, of course, but what's the hurry? In my area there are a few 4-5 yr olds who enter scholastic tournaments, but it's grades 1-3 that have the most players.

I taught 20 ESL 6 & 7 year olds how to play chess this year- some enjoyed it, others didn't care for it. We started with pawns and a king, added pieces over time, some brief opening principles--they now have rip-roaring blunderfests. My 6 yr old son learned to play from reading Keene's Pocket Book of Chess and playing Chess Mentor problems over and over on the PC (pattern recognition or just time wasting?); his brain just works that way. He also thinks he knows karate from some other book he read... 😉

Originally posted by HeyDreza
IMHO, chess is a (beautiful) game and should be treated as such with youngsters. If and when they ever want to compete, enjoyment should still be the #1 goal. Different kids learn in different ways but I'd say most children aren't ready (even if they're motivated by maternal love or bats) for chess until 5 or 6 at the earliest. Exceptions exist, of course, ...[text shortened]... n just works that way. He also thinks he knows karate from some other book he read... 😉

I've also heard about a teaching method similar to yours; I have heard that a good teaching strategy is to start out with the endgames. That way, kids can learn how the pieces move, how pieces interact with the king, and how valuable the king is. Just a suggestion, though.

Originally posted by YUG0slav
you can't make someone smart, if they're intelligent, they're intelligent, if their stupid, that's a shame. If you could "make" people smart, then what would be the point of intelligence quota?

What chess can do however is teach a kid...how to play chess... and have some fun. As a wise man once said: GMs are born, not made.

What makes you think there is a point of IQ (which actually stands for intelligence quotient)? Just because someone has designed a system based on the theory that all intelligence is inate, doesn't mean it is.

How did the Soviets dominate the game so completely? The game was played all over the world, but only one country sent its most promising child players to special chess schools for intensive chess training under top grandmasters. If GMs were born, not made, this wouldn't have made so much difference.

Also, consider the Polgar sisters. Laszlo Polgar decides to devote his three daughters' childhoods to intensive chess development using home schooling. He decides this before they're old enough to have shown any aptitude for the game. Hardly anybody does that (maybe only him). The result - three high ranking grandmasters. Were they born GMs? Only in the sense that their father was Laszlo Polgar, I suggest.

Not that I recommend home schooling or intensive training of child prodigies. I'm just pointing out that it can work, if you get it right. It can also turn your child into psychological basket case, if you get it wrong. Not worth the risk, in my view.