Openings
Explore strategies, game analysis, student achievements, camps, tips, and more!
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May 29, 2025
Three Great Chess Openings for Beginners
We believe that kids can learn something from studying any opening – even the “bad” ones. Once kids have mastered the basics of chess, we encourage them to explore many...

September 22, 2023
Billy's Mighty Moscow
This week’s article will feature two games from the weekly Wednesday MCA Arena, which were played by Billy. Billy joined the academy as an already high rated player and is...

September 07, 2023
IM Sandeep Annotates - #8 - Grace Goes Modern
This week’s article will feature a game from the weekly Wednesday MCA Arena, which was played by Grace, along with a couple of grandmaster games. Grace played the Modern Defense...

June 08, 2023
Great Gambits and Surprising Sidelines
This week’s article will feature a game from the 2023 K-5 Rockefeller Invitational, which was played by Sachit. In this game, Sachit purposely employed a risky response to the Fried...

June 02, 2023
Students Play the Alapin Sicilian
This week’s article will feature two games from the MCA weekly Wednesday Arena tournament, which began with a popular opening, the Alapin Sicilian. In the world of chess, the Alapin...

May 19, 2023
IM Sandeep Annotates - #1 - Sunkrith
Welcome to MCA’s new weekly blog series featuring the games of our students, annotated by IM Sandeep Sethuraman! In this article we will be featuring Sunkrith, who had his best...

August 13, 2021
Weekly Thematic Tournament
For the last year, we've been doing weekly thematic tournaments right after our Wednesday broadcast lesson for members of our online chess club