Bryant Elementary Chess Club

Chess Club is a community for new and experienced students to learn and play together. Our focus is Standard Chess, including checkmating patterns, chess tactics (tricks), and how to start a game. All students receive a ChessKid account with 24/7 access to supplemental chess puzzles, lessons, and games! Students learn how to play in chess tournaments (optional), including reading/writing chess notation and using chess clocks. Students also learn popular chess variants around the world and may invent their own variants. Our vendor is Orangutan Chess Academy (OCA), which has instructed 1000+ chess students since 2018, including 100+ new tournament players, 16 teams that have won trophies, 80 students who qualified for the Washington State Championships, and 33 Champions!

A typical Chess Club meeting is divided into three parts:

1. Chess Announcements and Lesson (~10-20 minutes), including teaching board, worksheets, and videos (as necessary).
2. Student play and Instructor testing (~30 minutes). We may also have in-club events such as “student challenges,” teacher-student games, chess movies, or optional tournaments. Some students use ChessKid.com for supplemental lessons, puzzles, and games.
3. “Wind down” time (~10 minutes) finishing any remaining games or watching short educational videos such as chess lessons, TED ED content, or the award-winning Shaun the Sheep.

Studies have shown a strong correlation between learning to play chess and academic performance. A landmark study by Smith and Cage (2000) posited that students who received chess instruction scored significantly higher on all measures of academic achievement, including math, spatial analysis, and non-verbal reasoning ability (p. 19-26). Other findings in various locations around the United States and Canada indicate that chess results in improved scores on standardized tests in both math and reading.

This year the Chess Club registration and class sessions will be synchronous with other ASE classes.  Students will need to register at the beginning of each Fall, Winter, and Spring term.

Instructors: Chess Coaches – Cary “Coach Ray” Easterday, Kyle Wasierski, Michael Marshall

Day of Week: Thursdays

Time: 2:30 pm to 3:30 pm

Dates of classes: 4/23, 4/30, 5/7, 5/14, 5/21, 5/28, 6/4, 6/11 – 8 classes

Location: Library, Room 307

Grades: K-5