@MariusBajorski said in #9:
> Apart from going for scholar's mate, there's many other ways to play for tricks early on. It strengthen's a players tactical understanding, it introduces them to common motifs. On top of that, what is way more important is that it's fun. OP acknowledges this point, however unterestimates it. Positive emotions improve learning (Hascher & Edlinger, 2009), negative emotions, like boredom, are bad for learning (Tze et al., 2015). Also, successes have a positive effect on the self-concept of capability, which is positive for the formation of motivation, which is very important. This concept arises through comparing oneself with others. (Seidel & Krapp, 2014). Especially for kids this is helpful, as they will compare themselves to their peers of similar age. Is sounds dumb, but when I started playing chess, I wasn't motivated at all. It was only when I suddenly had a really good tournament and became the best in my age group in my region that I was motivated to study. I could also observe that the kids who played aggressive openings often became good chess players later.
I agree with the motivation part, and it is in my post, in case you haven't read it. But there are other, decent opening moves one can play - following basic opening principles - to win and boost their motivation.
Tactically it is irrelevant, as playing out, repeating the same motiv (tactical trick in the opening phase) doesn't happen by putting any real effort there, except of power of remembering how the line goes, how the known trick should be executed.
To underline, this is not about playing sharp openings/lines, but playing unsound moves, going against the basic opening principles, such as the Englund gambit, or getting the Queen early on h5 (1.e4 e5 2.Qh5).
> If a player enjoys playing the London System, there's nothing wrong with it. I wouldn't recommend it to my students if they asked for a repertoire, but I would certainly let them play it. In general, forcing players away from their favorite openings and learn new openings is a great way to make them enjoy the game less. This is also something I observed with many peers. A friend of mine really liked the "Hedgehog" opening and her trainer forbid it ??? Guess who stopped playing chess altogether a year later...
> Especially for beginners, theory is almost never something you need to work on, especially when they already play an opening that follows basic opening principles. I'd much prefer my students to play the London system than some bullshit like 1. h4 2. Rh3
I see no difference in my view. If you'd ask my students, they'd all say that I never insist on changing their repertoire. That's the most intimate thing chess-related and it is absolutely forbiden area for the coach. Whoever does insist on changing it - doesn't have my respect.
But it is hardly related with what I was talking about the London. It is widely known that getting always the same middlegame type, same pawn structure always - is not the best thing for a player. I'd say this is mainly targeting those with the intermediate level of chess understanding, while a beginner is not even able to understand why this pawn structure is built, and what their pieces suppose to do on those places. Not to mention that there is still some serious theory to be learnt. And that all is ignored by so many authors online, those who only want to get more viewers or sell their courses. Either way, it's about money.
> Now this is just complete nonsense. First of all, some people don't have time for longer games. Bullet and Blitz won't make you a worse chess player. Even somebody who plays ultrabullet for 30 minutes a day will probably be slightly better than someone who doesn't practice chess at all. In general, spending time with chess is good when you want to get good at chess. Obviously, some form of practice are more effective than others: Simply playing chess is one of the least effective training methods, no matter what time control. But instead of telling beginners they SHOULDNT do THIS, offer them possibilities what they can do instead.
It is interesting that one who is against the absolute thruts uses a formulation like: "this is just complete nonsense". But when I read your argument, it looks like just wrote something that you don't believe in. First of all, there is no coach on the whole planet that would recommend playing bullet or blitz to a beginner level player, except if they are drunk or out of their mind. If you have ever worked with any chess beginner, you'd know what their main common weakness is, and I described it in my initial post. Every chess coach is wrestling to fix that habit of their beginner level student, that this is not even a question to discuss.
What you are at least a little bit right about is this thing you are constantly repeating - never forbid anything to a student. A coach's part is to direct their studying, but not to insist on anything. But that's just my approach. I know coaches that are much more strickt, and incidently turns out they get some really great success with that attitude.
But once again, I am really susprised by the way you are discussing this things related with the chess coaching, but also with the education in general - with someone who is already for decades in those fields. I am okay with that, just keep yourself decent, don't use those arbitrar labels, and fight against the arguments of the other side instead of fighting the person. If the other side has good arguments, I'd recommend you to accept it. If you have something to add, feel free to do that. For example, saying that spending time with chess (anyhow) is better then not spending time with chess at all is almost like a self-evident thing, but it is possible that I didn't put in my post. That may be seen almost like an addition to what is already said, but it is a good, constructive critic. On the other side, telling a beginner to play bullet or blitz chess, without thinking of how that reflects on their playing habits, that's just a bad suggestion and poor coaching. You should look at coaching as upbringing: if they play blitz, they will be blitzing over the board on a serious tournament (classical time control). If you teach them to spend their time thinking, if you succeed as a coach, they'll try to do that when they play. This is a simple, self-evident point for every chess coach, but a very difficult goal to achieve - developing the thinking process of a student (which means spending time when they play, instead of blitzing).
> .... a beginner won't understand why you play THOSE MOVES IN PARTICULAR. They could also play the italian, the ruy lopez, even London System or queens gambit, they all follow the rules you mentioned. If you don't have your students memorize opening moves, you will never be able to teach them advanced concepts of certain openings, because they won't get there.
What you are saying is an interesting thing and comes to this part that is quoted. Then you choose a terrible word to describe the end of the process of choosing the right move and opening - memorizing. I can't agree that we need that term.
A student/beginner should understand the benefits of either of those opening moves - Scotch, Italian, Ruy Lopez, Ponziani... They don't need to know the names of those openings, how this or that one goes, but the reasons behind every of those moves should be understood. And that's exactly the type of opening knowledge and understanding they should develop at that level. Cause a player of 800 rating points is not going to profit from learning the Italian, as much as knowing why this move - 3. Bc4 - is done, and answer why they prefer it over 3. Bb5 or 3. d4. From that perspective, memorizing is not required.
Talking about the damage one (especially a beginner) does to their own chess understanding by memorizing moves is - I hope - not required.
> Saying that not analyzing games is bad is a double negative, what you're actually saying is "Analyzing your games is good", which is something I can get behind. But turning on an engine is certainly not harmful. It helps you find your mistakes and important points in a game much faster. My own trainer (who is an IM and has won awards - so there's some merit to what he says) always analyzes games with the engine, even with stronger or titled players. It's simply an efficient tool.
I see that you don't understand what I am saying here. The post I wrote is regarding the beginner level players. I would like to see you having a student of 800 Lichess rating points, turning on the engine after playing a blitz game, and then telling you - you known, coach, the engine says this is a mistake, but I can't get my head around it.
So, let's underline this (althought that's another well known point) - you can't coach or advice the same way a beginner of 800 rating points, and the one who is 1800 or 2200 FIDE. A good chess coach can imagine themselves being a beginner and thinking from that perspective what are the real needs and understanding of such player.
Also, regards to your coach. Don't know what kind of regards one gets as a coach except of seeing their student getting better and better, but I believe he is good. But also I believe that if he is good, he would definitely agree with what I put in the post. Only differences are possible when it comes to the part regarding the London, IMO.
> And for beginners, it's even more helpful: Beginners are so bad at the game (sorry) that they don't even understand WHAT the mistakes are. You can't improve on something you don't know exists.
You're partly right - they don't know what to search for in their game, indeed, without any concepts already understood. But at least those that they already know or have heard about - they can practise by going through the game without using the engine.
Using the engine, on the other hand, is completely taking that part (exercise) away from them.
You can think different then this, but if you want to check, try it with someone who is below 1000 rating points. I feel like wasting time discussing this.
> I mean I agree with your general point which is probably that doing chess puzzles with 100% focus is definitely better than just doing them quickly. This is definitely correct, you will get much, much more out of chess puzzles which take you 5-15 minutes to solve than the ones that you solve in 10 seconds by just looking at the position. But still, my general point applies: Doing chess puzzles relying on intuition is still better than doing nothing at all. It also helps discovering motifs and is a quick way to practice chess without putting much effort in, you can do it when you're tired or in a meeting you don't care about etc. When I played more actively, I also did a puzzle storm run before each game, just to "start my tactical brain" and get in the chess mood.
Indeed, the intuition is getting better by just "trying" without calculating. But for a beginner, again, it is almost essential to develop the habit to calculate. Puzzles are the best exercise for that matter.
> In general, I think "You shouldn't do these things" is a very bad approach for beginners. Let them do what they enjoy doing. Instead, you should offer more effective alternatives for learning, that are also fun and engaging.
When you write something like this as a conclusion, it seems like you even haven't read what is writen in the text.
Let me tell you what I think. Checking your profile, it seems like you are a decent player. Although being a decent player doesn't mean you would be a good coach, still, you can't really pretend something in the text is wrong (you can look back at your own growing as a chess player and see that this is how things should be done), but for some reason you want to show what you know. In most of these points you added something that often corresponds with my text, while somewhere you just put some nonsense to look like you have some arguments. I don't think you believe in those words.
I'd suggest you to write your own blog post and present what you know. You seem like you know some absolute thruts, so it would be good for the world to know as well. I'd really like to read that, so feel free to let me know here.
Thank you anyway.
> Apart from going for scholar's mate, there's many other ways to play for tricks early on. It strengthen's a players tactical understanding, it introduces them to common motifs. On top of that, what is way more important is that it's fun. OP acknowledges this point, however unterestimates it. Positive emotions improve learning (Hascher & Edlinger, 2009), negative emotions, like boredom, are bad for learning (Tze et al., 2015). Also, successes have a positive effect on the self-concept of capability, which is positive for the formation of motivation, which is very important. This concept arises through comparing oneself with others. (Seidel & Krapp, 2014). Especially for kids this is helpful, as they will compare themselves to their peers of similar age. Is sounds dumb, but when I started playing chess, I wasn't motivated at all. It was only when I suddenly had a really good tournament and became the best in my age group in my region that I was motivated to study. I could also observe that the kids who played aggressive openings often became good chess players later.
I agree with the motivation part, and it is in my post, in case you haven't read it. But there are other, decent opening moves one can play - following basic opening principles - to win and boost their motivation.
Tactically it is irrelevant, as playing out, repeating the same motiv (tactical trick in the opening phase) doesn't happen by putting any real effort there, except of power of remembering how the line goes, how the known trick should be executed.
To underline, this is not about playing sharp openings/lines, but playing unsound moves, going against the basic opening principles, such as the Englund gambit, or getting the Queen early on h5 (1.e4 e5 2.Qh5).
> If a player enjoys playing the London System, there's nothing wrong with it. I wouldn't recommend it to my students if they asked for a repertoire, but I would certainly let them play it. In general, forcing players away from their favorite openings and learn new openings is a great way to make them enjoy the game less. This is also something I observed with many peers. A friend of mine really liked the "Hedgehog" opening and her trainer forbid it ??? Guess who stopped playing chess altogether a year later...
> Especially for beginners, theory is almost never something you need to work on, especially when they already play an opening that follows basic opening principles. I'd much prefer my students to play the London system than some bullshit like 1. h4 2. Rh3
I see no difference in my view. If you'd ask my students, they'd all say that I never insist on changing their repertoire. That's the most intimate thing chess-related and it is absolutely forbiden area for the coach. Whoever does insist on changing it - doesn't have my respect.
But it is hardly related with what I was talking about the London. It is widely known that getting always the same middlegame type, same pawn structure always - is not the best thing for a player. I'd say this is mainly targeting those with the intermediate level of chess understanding, while a beginner is not even able to understand why this pawn structure is built, and what their pieces suppose to do on those places. Not to mention that there is still some serious theory to be learnt. And that all is ignored by so many authors online, those who only want to get more viewers or sell their courses. Either way, it's about money.
> Now this is just complete nonsense. First of all, some people don't have time for longer games. Bullet and Blitz won't make you a worse chess player. Even somebody who plays ultrabullet for 30 minutes a day will probably be slightly better than someone who doesn't practice chess at all. In general, spending time with chess is good when you want to get good at chess. Obviously, some form of practice are more effective than others: Simply playing chess is one of the least effective training methods, no matter what time control. But instead of telling beginners they SHOULDNT do THIS, offer them possibilities what they can do instead.
It is interesting that one who is against the absolute thruts uses a formulation like: "this is just complete nonsense". But when I read your argument, it looks like just wrote something that you don't believe in. First of all, there is no coach on the whole planet that would recommend playing bullet or blitz to a beginner level player, except if they are drunk or out of their mind. If you have ever worked with any chess beginner, you'd know what their main common weakness is, and I described it in my initial post. Every chess coach is wrestling to fix that habit of their beginner level student, that this is not even a question to discuss.
What you are at least a little bit right about is this thing you are constantly repeating - never forbid anything to a student. A coach's part is to direct their studying, but not to insist on anything. But that's just my approach. I know coaches that are much more strickt, and incidently turns out they get some really great success with that attitude.
But once again, I am really susprised by the way you are discussing this things related with the chess coaching, but also with the education in general - with someone who is already for decades in those fields. I am okay with that, just keep yourself decent, don't use those arbitrar labels, and fight against the arguments of the other side instead of fighting the person. If the other side has good arguments, I'd recommend you to accept it. If you have something to add, feel free to do that. For example, saying that spending time with chess (anyhow) is better then not spending time with chess at all is almost like a self-evident thing, but it is possible that I didn't put in my post. That may be seen almost like an addition to what is already said, but it is a good, constructive critic. On the other side, telling a beginner to play bullet or blitz chess, without thinking of how that reflects on their playing habits, that's just a bad suggestion and poor coaching. You should look at coaching as upbringing: if they play blitz, they will be blitzing over the board on a serious tournament (classical time control). If you teach them to spend their time thinking, if you succeed as a coach, they'll try to do that when they play. This is a simple, self-evident point for every chess coach, but a very difficult goal to achieve - developing the thinking process of a student (which means spending time when they play, instead of blitzing).
> .... a beginner won't understand why you play THOSE MOVES IN PARTICULAR. They could also play the italian, the ruy lopez, even London System or queens gambit, they all follow the rules you mentioned. If you don't have your students memorize opening moves, you will never be able to teach them advanced concepts of certain openings, because they won't get there.
What you are saying is an interesting thing and comes to this part that is quoted. Then you choose a terrible word to describe the end of the process of choosing the right move and opening - memorizing. I can't agree that we need that term.
A student/beginner should understand the benefits of either of those opening moves - Scotch, Italian, Ruy Lopez, Ponziani... They don't need to know the names of those openings, how this or that one goes, but the reasons behind every of those moves should be understood. And that's exactly the type of opening knowledge and understanding they should develop at that level. Cause a player of 800 rating points is not going to profit from learning the Italian, as much as knowing why this move - 3. Bc4 - is done, and answer why they prefer it over 3. Bb5 or 3. d4. From that perspective, memorizing is not required.
Talking about the damage one (especially a beginner) does to their own chess understanding by memorizing moves is - I hope - not required.
> Saying that not analyzing games is bad is a double negative, what you're actually saying is "Analyzing your games is good", which is something I can get behind. But turning on an engine is certainly not harmful. It helps you find your mistakes and important points in a game much faster. My own trainer (who is an IM and has won awards - so there's some merit to what he says) always analyzes games with the engine, even with stronger or titled players. It's simply an efficient tool.
I see that you don't understand what I am saying here. The post I wrote is regarding the beginner level players. I would like to see you having a student of 800 Lichess rating points, turning on the engine after playing a blitz game, and then telling you - you known, coach, the engine says this is a mistake, but I can't get my head around it.
So, let's underline this (althought that's another well known point) - you can't coach or advice the same way a beginner of 800 rating points, and the one who is 1800 or 2200 FIDE. A good chess coach can imagine themselves being a beginner and thinking from that perspective what are the real needs and understanding of such player.
Also, regards to your coach. Don't know what kind of regards one gets as a coach except of seeing their student getting better and better, but I believe he is good. But also I believe that if he is good, he would definitely agree with what I put in the post. Only differences are possible when it comes to the part regarding the London, IMO.
> And for beginners, it's even more helpful: Beginners are so bad at the game (sorry) that they don't even understand WHAT the mistakes are. You can't improve on something you don't know exists.
You're partly right - they don't know what to search for in their game, indeed, without any concepts already understood. But at least those that they already know or have heard about - they can practise by going through the game without using the engine.
Using the engine, on the other hand, is completely taking that part (exercise) away from them.
You can think different then this, but if you want to check, try it with someone who is below 1000 rating points. I feel like wasting time discussing this.
> I mean I agree with your general point which is probably that doing chess puzzles with 100% focus is definitely better than just doing them quickly. This is definitely correct, you will get much, much more out of chess puzzles which take you 5-15 minutes to solve than the ones that you solve in 10 seconds by just looking at the position. But still, my general point applies: Doing chess puzzles relying on intuition is still better than doing nothing at all. It also helps discovering motifs and is a quick way to practice chess without putting much effort in, you can do it when you're tired or in a meeting you don't care about etc. When I played more actively, I also did a puzzle storm run before each game, just to "start my tactical brain" and get in the chess mood.
Indeed, the intuition is getting better by just "trying" without calculating. But for a beginner, again, it is almost essential to develop the habit to calculate. Puzzles are the best exercise for that matter.
> In general, I think "You shouldn't do these things" is a very bad approach for beginners. Let them do what they enjoy doing. Instead, you should offer more effective alternatives for learning, that are also fun and engaging.
When you write something like this as a conclusion, it seems like you even haven't read what is writen in the text.
Let me tell you what I think. Checking your profile, it seems like you are a decent player. Although being a decent player doesn't mean you would be a good coach, still, you can't really pretend something in the text is wrong (you can look back at your own growing as a chess player and see that this is how things should be done), but for some reason you want to show what you know. In most of these points you added something that often corresponds with my text, while somewhere you just put some nonsense to look like you have some arguments. I don't think you believe in those words.
I'd suggest you to write your own blog post and present what you know. You seem like you know some absolute thruts, so it would be good for the world to know as well. I'd really like to read that, so feel free to let me know here.
Thank you anyway.