Chess at MCP

Chess is an excellent tool for enhancing critical thinking skills. Join our monthly chess tournaments!

My Coding Place (MCP) has recently started chess tournaments to give students opportunities to learn problem-solving and critical thinking in the company of other kids! On the first Saturday of every month, we open early to host tournaments that include coaching and guidance from our chess instructor. We introduce participants to opening moves and strategies such as castling and forking. Thank you to all the chess players who have joined us over the past 3 months. We recently hosted our last chess tournament of the year with the top 3 winners being 4th grade boys!

We introduced chess into our curriculum in 2020 when we welcomed a coding instructor who was passionate about chess. Our first chess classes were virtual and are now all face-to-face, using chess sets and incorporating puzzles and videos from lichess, chesskids, and chess.com. Chess fits well with our mission to encourage kids to think critically and analytically by offering them various tools that support problem-solving like coding and chess.

Chess thinking often involves a complex structure of problems and sub-problems, and the capacity for retaining and manipulating such complex structures of data correlate with having a high IQ. In fact, chess has been shown to raise student's overall IQ scores. In addition, other benefits of playing chess include:

• Develops perspective.

• Improves memory.

• Deepens focus.

• Elevates creativity.

• Boosts planning skills.

• Increases self-awareness.

Chess is a valuable skill with numerous benefits to learn at an early age. If your students are curious about chess or are interested improving their skills, please join us for our monthly tournaments or enroll in one of our chess classes!