Elementary School Chess

Quick update: Things are booming! Just one year ago we had no open, elementary level chess tournaments. This year we've had two State Qualifiers, the Whatcom County Championships in Lynden and the Edison Elementary Chessfest in Bow.

News Blips:

A chess club for K-6th grades is beginning at Samish Elementary School (2195 Prairie Road, in Sedro-Woolley). The first meeting of the chess club is Friday, February 2, 2001, 3:30-5:30, Room 5. Since space is limited (currenly only one room available), students outside of the Sedro-Woolley school district who wish to attend should first contact Anne Lobeck at 854-5547, or email Anne.Lobeck@wwu.edu. If this club gets too large, you'll be asked to assume the happy chore of starting a chess club at your own elementary school!

In north Whatcom County a group of home schooled kids and parents meets regularly for informal chess. For more info email Sue at tdykstra.wa@netzero.net, or Joy at 110571.2343@compuserve.com.

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The below was written in 1999

This being a new section to our web site, I welcome all news from elementary schools for inclusion. Send me a report! Meanwhile, here are some news tidbits.

The Bellis Fair Kids' Chess Club is now in it's fifth year, meeting from 6:30 - 8:00pm on the second and fourth Monday of each month. Students from kindergarten on up are welcome. We reprint the article below with the kind permission of Fiona Cohen and the Bellingham Herald. For more information on the Club, contact Mark Anderson at (360) 671-6074.

Elementary chess in Washington is going strong! The Wa. State Elementary School Championships, held in Yakima on April 10, 1999, drew 584 participants. Consider that to attend Elementary State, a child must first qualify by posting a winning record in a regional qualifier tournament. (Visit the Little Chess Express newsletter's web page for a state-wide elementary tournament calendar.)

Currently the Northwest Washington area has no regional qualifier -- we have a director, but we await the emergence of an organizer. Contact Randy Kaech if you or your school would like to organize one.

Conway Elementary (south of Mount Vernon) recently offered a chess class open to ten students. 24 students enrolled!

Mrs. Heiner emails: "I am the chess club coach at Jefferson Elementary in Mt. Vernon. I currently have around 30 students who participate. Myself and another gentleman just put together a chess tournament for the Mt. Vernon School District and had four schools represented. We had 24 participants. It was a blast." (Nov. 24, 1999)

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Etiquette is king for young chess masters

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MERIDIAN: Bellis Fair Kids' Chess Club members learn strategy, decorum.

By Fiona Cohen
The Bellingham Herald, 9-30-99

It's an ancient game of skill and tactics, a test of intellect, nerve and concentration.

For about 20 Bellingham kids, it's a typical evening hanging out at the mall.

The Bellis Fair Kids' Chess Club, which started its fifth year on Sept. 13, meets two Mondays per month in the food court of Bellis Fair mall. Kids ages 5 to 18 practice their chess skills under the tutelage of Mark Anderson, a certified U.S. Chess Federation Chess Instructor and masters student in education at Western Washington University.

Anderson's skill is obvious -- he routinely plays about six games at once, moving from table to table. He also brings kids a love of the game.

"It's weight-lifting for the brain," he's fond of saying.

But Monday, more was going on at the food court tables than flexing of intellectual powers. The kids' games were punctuated with giggles and groans as they took each other's pieces, sometimes with a dramatic flourish.

Anderson said he tries to constantly challenge the kids, rewarding the mastery of moves by giving out "chess dollars" which kids can exchange for prizes. And many of the students make dramatic progress.

Three of Anderson's students now act as his assistants: Asher Paisley, 16, a home-schooler from Ferndale; Stephen Keele, 10, a fourth-grader at Birchwood Elementary; and Jazmine Okura-Youtsey, 9, a fourth-grader at Lowell Elementary. All three have beaten Anderson in games.

"I get over it. My ego survives," he grinned.

The club is an important place for kids to socialize with others of like interests, said Anderson, who added the most important thing he teaches isn't intellectual: it's social.

"The biggest thing I teach is etiquette and decorum," he said.

He insists the kids in the club learn to be gracious in winning and losing, sometimes asking them to write papers if their behavior isn't appropriate.

At one of the tables, Laura Lockwood, 10, jokingly turned her defeat into melodrama, writhing and grimacing as her opponent, Okura-Youtsey, moved her black pieces into position around Lockwood's white king.

"I'm trying to think. I can't think!" said Lockwood.

Lockwood, a fifth-grader at Columbia Elementary, said she started at the chess club about two years ago, after Okura-Youtsey asked her to come. The two girls are good friends and enjoy playing together, she said.

"It's fun to just sit around and play," said Lockwood.

Okura-Youtsey started playing at the chess club four years ago when she was 5 years old, said her father, Ron Okura, 45, who first taught his daughter how to play.

Now she routinely beats her father and plays in tournaments against adult opponents.

Okura said his daughter's foundation in chess helped her academically and socially.

"It's helped in terms of her being able to concentrate on staying on task, and learning to get along with others regardless of winnning or losing," said Okura.

Okura was impressed athow Anderson has built up the chess club. When it started there was a handful of kids, and Okura-Youtsey was the only girl, said Okura. On Monday, there were 23 kids at the food court, and eight were girls.

Anderson said he considered the number of girls in the club "a good start."

He said he hoped to eventually have as many girls as boys in the club, though it was often difficult to convince girls to come, particularly as the middle school years progressed.

Having more girls playing would please at least one parent who brought a child to the club. Nancy De Jong brought her daughter Taryn, 10, a fourth-grader at Carl Cozier Elementary, to the club for the first time this month. De Jong said she wanted to encourage her daughter to explore intellectual areas such as math and science, which have traditionally been dominated by males.

De Jong said her daughter and a friend recently began playing chess together, and so far she wasn't sure how to measure the club's value.

"I think they're getting a taste of it, but they need more individual instruction," De Jong said.

But in general, De Jong liked the program.

"I think it's a wonderful opportunity, and I think it's great that Bellis Fair has offered the space," she said.

Sarah Doesburg, whose home-schooled children Elspeth, 9, and Samuel, 11, also recently started at the program, liked the location and Anderson.

"I think he's really great with the kids," she said.

Anderson, who has run a variety of chess programs, including programs with the Boys and Girls Club of Bellingham and more than 20 schools, said he set up the program in the mall because it is accessible to people from around the area, it's a roomy and safe environment, and it allows parents to run errands while their kids ponder the intricacies of bishops and rooks.

"I've always thought the mall was an excellent location," said Anderson.

And Anderson said he's had good support from the mall. Bellis Fair donated 25 chess sets, as well as 100 T-shirts for the chess club members.

Cara Buckingham, assistant marketing director for Bellis Fair mall, said the mall was happy to play host to the chess players.

"It corresponds with our efforts to be a community center for the public," she said.

Other community efforts include Mall Walkers fitness program, and the annual community bazaar in June, in which local nonprofit groups set up displays, said Buckingham.

Reach Fiona Cohen at fcohen@bellingh.gannett.com or 715-2276.

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To survey the studies linking scholastic chess programs with increased math and verbal aptitudes, see Benefits of Chess for Youth.