Lesson of the Week: Beginners

After school clubs run October to April. Saint George's School, where I have been coaching for 13 years, meets twice per week, but the children are divided into groups. One afternoon, the students are new to chess--often brand new, making their first moves on the first day of chess. The other afternoon, players are more advanced.

Much of the instructive time has been focused on learning to checkmate with rooks, but I also spent a day teaching students about ranks, files, and diagonals, as recommended by Momir Radovic (see "How to Teach Chess in the Modern Age").

Last week, students were shown these two positions from some online games.

Black to move

Although there are pawns on the board, beginners need to learn to use king and rook together to force checkmate. Here, checks by the rook only needlessly prolong the game. Rather, 74...Kg3 maintains control of the second rank and forces 75.Kg1. Now, the rook check is checkmate.

The second position starts with a checkmate in one, then we backed the game up a move to learn about Black's fatal error.

Black to move

28...Qxc2??

White checkmated Black with 29.Rh8#

Black had been winning before the blunder. We spent some time looking at possibilities.

28...Qe3+ 29.Kh1

Here, again, a check is tempting, as it seems that White has a weak back rank. Indeed, after 29...Qe1+ 30.Rxe1 Rxe1+ 31.Nxe1, Black has a mate on the move.

Black to move

However, 31.Ng1 blocks the check, revealing that 29...Qe1 would have been a terrible mistake, playing hope chess.

Instead, Black stops White's major threat with 29...Qxh6, although White maintains a material advantage.

I did not use this next position last week, because it was played yesterday. It represents the critical idea in elementary checkmates of cutting off. Young players have difficulty learning this idea because youth likes a direct attack. Once they get it, however, chess skill begins to grow.

Black to move

Black played 46...Rfc2, threatening checkmate in one. White can only delay with spite checks.

47.a4 allows bxa4#
47...Rab2# is the principal threat.

White played 47.Rb6, but could have thrown away both rooks to last three additional moves.