Educators: Chess develops key abilities in young people

Educators: Chess develops key abilities in young people
By NATHANIEL WEST, Staff Writer

CHARLESTON — For centuries, the curriculum for young warriors included the game of chess.

And while the youth of today may worry more about the latest iPod than getting hacked with a broadsword, chess is still as relevant now as it was in the Middle Ages — especially for teaching life skills such as patience and foresight, according to educators.

“I think there are several very important things you can learn” from chess, said Patrick Coulton, mathematics professor at Eastern Illinois University and coach of the Charleston High School chess team.

Overall, chess can improve a high school or college student’s focus and concentration, said Jeremy Gibson, Mattoon High School government teacher and chess team coach.
“I think it’s very beneficial,” he said.

Cultivating the ability to think ahead is one of the more obvious benefits of chess, said chess team coaches.

“You have to really concentrate,” Coulton said. “We’re wanting these students to think three or four moves ahead.”

For high school team members, chess requires a study of various aspects of the game, such as “openings” — the first seven or eight moves, normally — in which mistakes can lead to a player’s downfall, according to Coulton.

“Even if you can think logically, if you don’t think carefully, you’ll get beat,” he said.
Gibson said he believes patience — a quality uncommon to young people — can be developed through the playing and studying of chess.

“They learn a lot about patience, and a lot about strategy, and that it’s not always good to be so impulsive,” he said.

Chess requires a player to keep track of numerous pieces and possible moves, which promotes logistical skills, according to Coulton.

And some of the military lessons of chess can translate to other arenas, such as business. “I don’t consider chess a war game, but I consider it something anyone can benefit from in terms of strategic planning,” Coulton said.

In particular, chess reveals the importance of analyzing and predicting the strategy of one’s opponent, whether in combat or in the marketplace.

“Playing both sides of the board is important,” Coulton said. Chess “teaches you to anticipate what the other person can do.”

David Conwell, an EIU physics major, said he played on the CHS chess team for more than three years because the game requires “reading the other player,” which appealed to him.

Of course, chess has applications for specific academic subjects, said educators.

For example, “In government we need to be patient, and we need to think things through before doing them,” said Gibson.

According to Coulton, mathematical algorithms and chess are closely related, particularly in efforts to develop computerized artificial intelligence.

“That’s a big area for study, and not just for chess,” said Coulton. “It has a lot to do with making machines that are said to think.”

For college students hoping to become engineers, chess helps them “anticipate what can go wrong and analyze a problem in many different directions,” Coulton said.

Chess has parallels with physics, which is “thought of as a difficult subjects that takes a lot of conceptual knowledge,” said Steve Daniels, EIU physics professor and advisor for the university’s Society of Physics Students chapter, which is organizing a chess tournament this weekend.

In other words, he said physics, like chess, “uses your brain a lot.”

http://www.jg-tc.com/articles/2006/02/16/news/news004.prt