How to Get Better as a Beginner Chess Player

Practice!

• Daily practice is the most important part of improving.
• Ideally, practice with Mom or Dad, but it can also be a grandparent, aunt, friend, or neighbor.
• Playing against someone slightly stronger than you can be especially helpful.
• Practice gives students the opportunity to apply what they've learned in class.
• Making mistakes is part of learning. Students need to experiment, make mistakes, and discover what works.
• Students can then bring those experiences back to class, where we can identify mistakes, correct them, and improve together.

Fall in Love with Chess Puzzles

When to begin

• Once a student develops a genuine interest in chess, it should become part of their everyday life: before school, after school, during car rides, and on weekends.
• Once they're playing regularly, they're ready for Level Two: basic chess puzzles, also called tactics.

Why tactics are so important

• Tactics are unequivocally the fastest way for beginners to understand how chess works.
• The climax of a chess game often doesn't arrive until moves 20–25, but beginners are already confused on move one.
• Looking at a board full of pieces can be daunting for a beginner.
• Tactics remove that confusion by presenting positions at the climax, when one player has an opportunity to deliver a knockout.

Think of tactics as quick knockouts.

• Every puzzle teaches a different way to win.
• Repeatedly solving these positions helps students recognize winning opportunities in their own games.
• A developing player should internalize approximately 100–200 basic chess patterns and learn to recognize them on the board.
• Chess masters and professionals may recognize tens of thousands of patterns, sometimes estimated at 50,000–100,000.

The students who break through

• Students who improve significantly consistently practice and enjoy solving puzzles.
• Students who don't enjoy puzzles often struggle to develop a deeper interest in chess.
• At its core, chess is about solving positions and recognizing the opportunity to knock out your opponent.

Start Your Online Journey

When is your child ready?

Your child is playing all the time, solving tactics, and beating everyone in the family. Now what?

Look for signs that your child is developing a genuine love for chess

• Consistently enjoys solving chess exercises.
• Takes pride in their games, even taking pictures to show others.
• Watches chess videos on YouTube.
• Regularly asks family members or friends to play chess.

These are good signs that your child is ready to start playing online.

Why playing online is essential

• It's nearly impossible to reach the highest levels of competitive chess without eventually playing online.
• The strongest players in your state are scattered across different cities.
• Sometimes the only way to find strong opposition is to play someone on the opposite side of the world.
• Playing online gives students access to opponents of every skill level.

Internet safety and privacy

Some parents are understandably concerned about their children playing online.

• Always create an anonymous username for your child.
• Something like Pretty Monkey or Happy Banana is much better than Ernesto Aventura 305.
• Avoid using real names or personal information.
• Disable messaging and communication with strangers.
• In 20 years of teaching, I've personally never had a privacy issue involving someone contacting one of my students, but I still recommend keeping every child's account anonymous.

This is where the real growth starts.

Once your child starts playing online, websites like Lichess.org store their games.

• Every game becomes part of a permanent library.
• Students now have a record of their victories, defeats, and mistakes.
• Instead of simply remembering what happened, students and coaches can go back and study their games.
• A library of games becomes a library of mistakes, and those mistakes become opportunities to improve.

Moving to Level Four

Once a child is playing regularly, consistently solving tactics, and building a library of games, it might be time to move on to Level Four.

Private Lessons and Finding the Right Coach

Group lessons vs. private lessons

• Group lessons at school are great because they build community, friendships, and camaraderie among students.
• Kids love to play chess, and our school club gives them a place to play.
• Group lessons are more general and broad, while private lessons are tailored to the individual student.
• Once a child has shown a genuine love for chess and has chosen chess as one of their interests, private lessons are one of the best ways to help their mind grow.

What does a good chess teacher do?

1. Helps students understand what they need to study and how to improve.
2. Shows students his approach to the game and his process for making decisions.
3. Teaches the different elements of the game and how to use each element when needed.
4. Shares personal experiences and mistakes so students can learn from the teacher's falls without having to fall themselves.
5. Guides students through all the noise in the chess world today.

Finding the right teacher is difficult

• There are many chess teachers who are very good at promoting themselves but don't actually know what they're talking about.
• Not every student and teacher clicks, even when both have good intentions.
• I've had students whom I genuinely wanted to teach, but sometimes they didn't find me funny or thought I was boring.
• That's okay. I simply wasn't the right teacher for that child.
• Once the student is ready, the teacher will appear.

When the right student meets the right teacher

This is when astronomical growth can begin.

• The child now has someone holding him accountable and making him work.
• The teacher celebrates the student's victories in a way that family members sometimes cannot, because the teacher understands chess at a deeper level.
• The relationship becomes more than just lessons. The teacher becomes a mentor who understands the student's strengths, weaknesses, and potential.
• A talented student now has someone experienced in his corner, helping him navigate the road to improvement.

Talent + Experience = A Champion