Bruce Pandolfini will accept the Chess Educator of the Year award on February 23, 2012 at UT Dallas. Go to the UT Dallas Chess Program Web site for more information about this free event. Dr. Alexey Root will interview Mr. Pandolfini for Chess Life magazine.
Dr. Alexey Root showed a position from 1...d6 move by move (Cyrus Lakdawala, Everyman Chess, 2011, p. 13) to the Denton High School chess club students.
At the club meeting on Friday, January 20, Denton High School chess club members played notated games with each other. For the last 15 minutes of class, Dr. Root showed one of those games to the class, using the demonstration board. She pointed out good moves and mistakes. The students followed along on their own chess boards. Dr. Root had them pause at four different positions to find the best move.
At the meeting on January 21, Denton High School (DHS) chess club members discussed our goals for the rest of the year. DHS wants to have club T shirts, run a non-rated middle/high school tournament, donate chess books to the school library, and participate in a chess and education event at a bookstore (to be held alongside my signing my books). Also, students elected a new officer to replace the absent Treasurer.
On Saturday, January 15, 2011, six members of the Denton High School chess club traveled with chess sponsor Fred Mueller and volunteer chess coach Alexey Root to Lovejoy High School in Allen, TX for the Region III scholastic chess tournament. It was the first team competition ever for the DHS chess club.
The sixteenth meeting of Denton High School chess club for this school year was January 14, 2011. To get ready for the Susan Polgar simultaneous exhibition at the Region III championship on Saturday the 15th, I played a simul against five of the players who would be attending that event. So they were ready to play in a simul…but none of them were picked in the raffle to actually play GM Polgar. Those attending the club also practiced openings and basic endgame checkmates.
The thirteenth Denton High School chess club meeting of the 2011-2012 school year fell on Friday the thirteenth. At the meeting, I introduced progressive chess. Lior Lapid mentioned that chess variant to me at the Second Koltanowski International Conference on Chess and Education. In progressive chess, White moves once, Black moves twice, White moves three times, Black moves four times, and so forth. I showed the game White: e4 Black: c5 Nc6
My results article about the Pan American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championship is posted on Chess Life Online.
Follow the Pan American Intercollegiate Team Chess Tournament right here on MonRoi.com. Games are being broadcast live. And also look for my reports on it on Chess Life Online.
Friday, December 9, 2011 was our end-of-the-semester party for Denton High School chess club, as next Friday is early dismissal due to final exams. The party featured food, bughouse, and speed chess games.
I recommend FM Charles Hertan’s Power Chess for Kids: Learn How to Think Ahead and Become One of the Best Players in Your School (New in Chess, 2011). The organization of the book is stellar, the layout is cheerful (with cartoon-style characters), and the material is important for chess improvement.
I reminded students that UT Dallas Chess Coach Rade Milovanovic has chess team members show their games to the rest of the team. The team then comments on and analyzes those games. So I want to do that occasionally in our Denton High School chess club. I showed my win over Julie Wilson (published in Children and Chess: A Guide for Educators) on the Smart Board.
