Chess For Children - How To Get Started

At Silver Knights, we’ve taught thousands of kids how to play chess. Over the years, we’ve learned a lot about what works and what doesn’t. You can follow our guide to help you get your child started with playing chess!

1. Make it fun for your child to learn chess

2. Turn chess into a social activity

3. Encourage curiosity and learning for your young chess learner 

4. Practice patience and set goals for learning chess 

5. Take advantage of modern chess resources 

It’s no secret that playing chess comes with a wealth of benefits for children. Besides boosting memory and concentration, chess for children is known to improve self-confidence, problem solving skills, sportsmanship, and overall mental and psychological wellbeing. 

How To Teach Chess To Kids

Chances are you’ve stumbled upon this page because you’re interested in getting your child started on their chess journey.  Well, you’ve come to the right place! 

If you are not a chess player yourself, the world of chess might seem a bit intimidating.  At Silver Knights, we've taken a lot of the guesswork out of it for you. 

We strongly believe in the value of live coaching with a great instructor.  We have a roster of excellent chess coaches waiting to work with your child.  

Whether your child wants to be the next world champion or just wants to play chess with their friends, we can help you get started. It certainly doesn’t hurt to get them started early with playing chess.  We have coaches who specialize in working with total beginners, grandmaster coaches who work with the most advanced students, and everything in between. 

So, if you’re interested in having your kid learn and play chess, here are some crucial tips that will help you both get the ball rolling! 

Make it fun for your child to learn chess

The first thing you want to remember when introducing your child to learning chess is that chess is a game.  Games, including chess, are meant to be fun, and if your child wants to make any reasonable progress, having fun should be central to their learning process. 

But how can you make learning chess fun for your child? It’s a well-known fact that children learn best through play, and the same principle very much applies to chess. 

And by “play” we don’t just mean playing chess games–we also mean turning chess into a social activity (more on this in the next section), trying different chess variants, encouraging creativity on the board, and, of course, celebrating your child’s chess achievements. 

Even five-time World Chess Champion Magnus Carlsen once said, “The day chess stops being fun is the day I give up.”  All of our regular lessons include some form of supervised game time.  The same applies to our popular online summer camps where kids can learn a lot of chess in a week but the teaching time is always balanced by play time. 

If you want to make learning chess fun for your child, explore how our coaches at  Silver Knights Chess Academy make online chess lessons fun for children of all levels. 

Is Chess A Social Activity?

When you think of ways to turn chess into a social activity, the first things that probably come to mind are scholastic chess clubs and tournaments. And you’re right, those two are great ways for your child to make friends while playing chess! 

At school chess clubs, your child can bond with peers with similar interests while pursuing an activity that’s fun and intellectually stimulating. In scholastic chess tournaments, your child can be exposed to all kinds of people by meeting students from other schools. 

But there’s another avenue through which your kid can socialize with peers. Our chess academy program at Silver Knights, too, is a great social place, where many parents and kids have said they’ve “found their people.” Here, your child can also find “their people.” 

Through our academy program, chess students can bond with peers of similar chess levels. By learning and practicing with students at their level, you can rest assured your kid will be getting a lot of social interaction–in addition to quality chess instruction. 

Encourage Curiosity To Learn Chess

There’s a saying that people who are curious about something tend to learn more quickly. If your child develops curiosity and inquisitiveness while learning chess, you can be confident your child will be well on their way to leveling up their chess game. 

And whenever a curious chess student learns something new on the board, whether it’s a new tactic or strategy, they immediately want to learn more. 

Our chess coaches at Silver Knights Academy are experts at sparking curiosity. Besides making chess fun and fascinating for our students, our coaches encourage our learners to practice critical thinking.  Our coaches love curious kids who ask tricky "what if" questions in class. 

As your child progresses from beginner to more advanced levels, our chess coaches can provide them with more opportunities to learn and explore on their own. This more independent learning approach, coupled with our online group classes and activities, increases confidence, fosters self-motivation, and gives your kid more control over their chess learning process. 

Be Patient And Set Goals For Learning Chess

Another key ingredient for your child’s chess success is patience. Learning chess won’t always be easy, but growth can only happen if there’s patience and persistence. 

In addition to realizing that making mistakes on the board and losing games are inevitable, your child should also learn how to use these mistakes and losses to their advantage. In other words, they should use these losses as learning experiences. 

Our coaches help with developing the right mindset. This can mean helping their students deal with losses in a healthy and productive way, learn from their mistakes and blunders, set realistic goals, and develop confidence as chess players. 

It’s easy to focus on rating and tournament results, but at Silver Knights Academy, we focus on a sense of progress. After all, learning more about chess is its own reward. 

Take advantage of modern chess resources 

There’s never been a better time to learn chess than now. With online resources like ChessKid.Com, where kids can play live online games, complete puzzles, and learn tactics, kids have a wealth of chess knowledge right at their fingertips. 

We believe that learning from a chess coach is the best way to learn! When your child learns chess live with a skilled coach and peers, they can then reinforce their learning with online chess resources.  There's simply no substitute for being able to ask an expert teacher a question and receive a personal answer.  

That being said, we certainly utilize modern technology to support our teaching.  And we are here to help you find age-appropriate resources for your child. If your child is on the younger side, for example, you’ll probably want to limit their screen time or control which websites or videos they can access. 

Video content on ChessKid.Com is a pretty safe bet for younger kids.  Their content generally features high quality chess instruction with fun animations.  For older kids, there are many chess YouTubers and streamers who deliver quality content, but you should exercise care when selecting chess content for your child. 

Technology, at the end of the day, is only there to help your child practice their chess skills.  It’s not the be-all and end-all of their chess learning.  

Conclusion

If you truly are serious about jumpstarting your child’s chess journey, look no further than Silver Knights Chess Academy, where our chess coaches have their students’ best interests at heart. 

Whether your child’s goal is to make new friends or become a highly skilled chess player–or a combination of the two–we have the teachers and tools to help your child reach their goals. 

A good first step would be to take a trial chess class to see what the academy program has to offer. As an actual online class with real students, it begins with a 25-minute lesson and finishes with games between students, which your child can choose to participate in if they wish. 

We look forward to seeing you there!