Newsletter #10

Post date: Jan 24, 2018 2:53:20 AM

Chess Match with Coralville

First thing is to update you on is that we have match against Coralville Central and Northwest Junior High. I mentioned this earlier this month, but did not mention it in my last email. The Coralville schools will travel and arrive around 4:30 pm. We will play for about an hour, taking us to 5:30 - 5:45 pm. So we will basically have a long chess club next week. I am not asking for signups as we do not need permission for riding the bus. However, if you are coming to chess club Monday, but not going to stick around for the match let me know by replying to this email, that would be helpful. We will have some pizza at the match. If you would like to send 1 to 2 dollars with your young pizza eaters that would great.

Monday Lesson

The Point and Creek student lesson was on the tactic “double attack.” Here is a link to a very good video on the topic https://youtu.be/qumtoP4nsUA. Attached is the puzzle handout that we worked on in class. We will continue to tactics topics in future lessons. Last week, I shared some online chess tactics websites and apps that students can use to practice at home. Doing these puzzles, even 2-3 at a time, are the single best way to improve. For those players, especially those tournament players, please find a few minutes each day to practice with tactics puzzles.

The K-4 Elementary Students logged back into their ChessKid accounts again Monday. With chess club on Tuesday last week, we still had a very large number get their accounts. Please encourage your child to login from home and play around on the site. Next week,we will start getting into the video lessons and puzzles available through the website. I can send you usernames and passwords if they are forgotten.

Prairie Winter Classic Chess Tournament

Finally, just to put everything back into one email, registration for the Prairie Chess Tournament, Saturday, is online at at https://onlineregistration.cc/CII/2018PWC. If you have difficulty registering online, just email me and I will help you out. And the Prairie Chess Camp information and registration is also online at www.chessiniowa.org/chesscamp. We already have three Prairie Students registered within the first day!