Cardiff

 

 
   
Cardiff shown within Wales  

 

 
Kitchener Primary School  

Kitchener Road, Cardiff, CF11 6HT

Coach: Nick Wilson

Age Group: 2 x Y3 classes.

 
 
 

 

 

Mount Stuart Primary

 

Adelaide St, Cardiff, CF10 5BS

Coach: Peter Morris

Age Group: 1 x Year 4 and 1 x Year 3/4 (mixed) &

1 x Y4 & 1 x Y3/4 classes.

 
 
 
 

 

 

Family who are hoping to show young people how much fun chess can be

Jan 3 2012

 
   

You don’t need to be an intellectual genius to play chess, Cathy Owen meets one Cardiff family hoping to show young people how it can be both fun and beneficial WHEN Tim Kett was four years old, he begged his parents for a chessboard.

 

Read more here

 

CSC is up-and-running with four schools signed up to the programme in Cardiff. In this Autumn term we have started teaching at two of them:

 

Kitchener Primary School in the Riverside area and Mount Stuart Primary in Butetown.

 

In both schools we have been welcomed by helpful teachers and hugely enthusiastic pupils – their excitement is so rewarding and delightful. They’re probably just naturally polite but they make us feel like the morning or afternoon we spend with them is the highlight of their school week.

 

 

 

 

     

 

 

 
     

The mixture of Year 3 and Year 4 children, almost without exception, had not played any chess in their lives before. Although they had heard some of the names of the pieces only a couple had any idea how any of them moved.

 

Over the next few weeks therefore we took them slowly and steadily through (in order) the Pawns, the Rooks, the Kings, the Bishops, the Knights and the Queens.

 

In each case we would learn how they moved then play mini-games using just those pieces or those pieces plus pawns so that they gradually came to master them.

 

Now at last they are able to play “proper chess” and once we return from half-term we’ll be getting engrossed in the mysteries of opening (develop those bishops and knights) and middlegame tactics (watch out for forks and pins). We can’t wait and neither can they!

 

Future developments

We are building up towards a Junior Team Tournament taking place in Cardiff on the 3rd December and will have teams there representing each of the four CSC schools. Our next report will be all about that – a first taste of tournament chess for most of the children. In January we will be adding two more schools to the weekly teaching rota:

 

St Paul’s Primary School in Grangetown and Hawthorn Primary School in Llandaff North.

 

We have started supporting these schools already and established chess clubs there, but we look forward to giving all Year 3 / Year 4 pupils the opportunity to learn the game.

 

Trip to the House of Parliament

On October the 18th we took some pupils from St Paul’s up to Westminster for the CSC First Birthday event at the House of Commons. Here is a shot of the children lining up for Garry’s signature

 

 

     

A fantastic day was had by all and the four children; Euan and Matthew Richards, Eve Farrow and Owen Stanley all gave great account of themselves in the simultaneous display by Nigel Short.

 

Finally here are the four St Paul’s children posing with their MP Alun Michael (Lab, Cardiff South and Penarth). All in all a great start, and we look forward to helping take CSC from strength to strength here in Cardiff.

 

Tim & Sarah Kett

26th Oct 2011

 

Click to see this report on our News page

 

 

Chess lessons will not just be conducted during lunchtime and after school. We are also seeking curriculum time from participating schools to allow coaches to work around existing commitments.
 
If you are interested in becoming a coach for Chess in Schools and Communities, please email  or fill in a CISC coach questionnaire.

 

 

 

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