Online Chess Resources for Teachers
There are some fantastic online resources to help teach yourself chess, to practice solving puzzles and to play against other players. There are also educational resources available to chess teachers to help them manage their chess clubs – whether it be in school or an out of school club.
Chesskid
Chesskid.com is perhaps the largest and well known site for chess playing children. It is part of the chess.com family – the largest most innovative chess website going. Children can register for free and gain access to many features free of charge – though to access the full features you need to create a ‘gold account’ which is chargeable.
We chose Chesskid to host the first UK Online Chess challenge as we wanted a partner with size and stability – but also someone who would work with us as partners to improve our offering. We are hoping that together with chesskid we can bring to the attention of many UK chess teachers some of the great possibilities that are available on this site.
Chess teachers can create clubs within chesskid to manage and keep track of their children’s progress. You can setup online blitz tournaments and even matches against other schools. Please see the following page for some useful links to some of the features of the site
https://www.chesskid.com/article/view/how-to-do-everything-on-chesskid2
Learning chess
Learning chess.net is a less well know chess educational site which has a very strong management tool for keeping track of children’s progress. Some of the features include a full chess course, play chess online and recorded Grandmaster levels.
We haven’t used this site as much in our own schools, but we do know the team behind it and can vouch for their professional approach. The program has been successfully deployed in other European Countries.
https://learningchess.net/uk/index
Play Magnus App (and Magnus Kingdom)
Play the World Champion Magnus Carlsen at various ages of his development! OK – so you are not playing the real Magnus Carlsen, but a machine impression of his moves. This app is extremely slick with excellent production values and has been developed by the Magnus Carlsen Company.
iOS https://itunes.apple.com/app/id1097863089?mt=8
Android https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.playmagnus.development.magnustrainer
The team behind ‘Play Magnus’ have also developed a fun game for beginners. This is chess with a difference as you have to explore strange world and rescue your pieces so they can help you in your journey. Despite being aimed for beginners I enjoyed the game and it is interesting to see a fresh approach to things.