<Comment deleted by user>
This little tale is my experience of the "floor" concept and validates it in my opinion. I am a 70 year old online player who played some OTB social chess in my late 20s at patzer level. I gave up chess for nearly 40 years and then took it up again. Once I started on Lichess, I realised how truly poor I had always been at chess. This was even after knocking the rust off my game.
This time around, I refreshed my very limited theoretical knowledge and started playing. Though I knew quite a few general principles of chess, my endless mistakes and blunders revealed my glaring weaknesses. Poor tactics, poor positional understanding, poor calculation, poor concentration, poor control of in-game stress and poor time management. The list goes on and on. All that was and is compounded by me being old. My learning is slower, my neural plasticity is low, my physical and mental stamina are low: all comparted to young players. Perhaps my only "quality" at this point is cranky stubbornness.
I began to search for a way to train in tactics. Initially, I tried the usual style of calculation puzzles, taking a long time on each difficult one and got a puzzle rating much higher than my playing rating. This did not seem to help my chess much. Then I researched and discovered I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles. On Lichess, I devised a method of doing up to 20 tactics/motifs on rotation with two puzzle sessions a day, for five or six days a week as rest days are important too. This method has gone through a few changes as I attempted to refine it.
My theory was that I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles to imprint pattern recognition and these puzzles needed to be done within a time limit. This should equate to ease of faster and more accurate moves. "Lift the floor" in other words and this concept now resonates with me. A further part of my theory was that if my puzzle sessions roughly equated in difficulty and time pressure to game conditions then my puzzle rating and game rating should converge and they should also then both start rising in tandem. This is if I try my best in puzzle sessions and in games. This is what has happened to my graphs to date albeit with a lot of statistical noise.
To achieve the above, I did and do 20 puzzle/motifs on rotation on "Easiest" setting. I have to do 60 puzzles in no more than 60 minutes which feels fast to a slow, old guy like me. If I get more than one wrong or fail the time limit, I must repeat that tactic/motif set next session.
There are some wild gyrations (making a saw-toothed graph) in my puzzle score regress and progress. Puzzle difficulty across the tactics/motifs varies quite a lot down at the low level of my puzzle rating minus 600 on "Easiest". I find some puzzles at -600 still very hard or impossible to get in a minute! This shows how low and inconsistent my "floor" is and why I blunder so much. I think it validates the floor theory.
My graphs have converged and tracked together, allowing for some big statistical noise caused by wide variability in the difficulty of different puzzle tactics/motifs to me. One type of puzzle (Defensive move) I find so difficult it distorts my whole system and causes huge drops in my puzzle score. This is diagnostic in a way I think. It shows a huge gap in my perception and calculation in chess: a gap related, I think, to my patzer failure to consider my opponent's threats first and to calculate the game from the opponent's side. I think I am going to have to make half my sessions Defensive Move sessions to see if I can rectify this. That is going to be a tough slog.
Of course, my progress is very slow. I hope I have the patience to keep going. Chess is hard. Much harder than I ever realised. I have been doing this for about 7 months with a one month break. I am up to 8.000 puzzles. I suspect I will need to do at least 50,000 puzzles this way to get significantly better. Hope I live long enough to do that! I am serious. There's not that much sand left in my hourglass.
I wonder if Steps would help me too? Can I do it free and self-taught?
This time around, I refreshed my very limited theoretical knowledge and started playing. Though I knew quite a few general principles of chess, my endless mistakes and blunders revealed my glaring weaknesses. Poor tactics, poor positional understanding, poor calculation, poor concentration, poor control of in-game stress and poor time management. The list goes on and on. All that was and is compounded by me being old. My learning is slower, my neural plasticity is low, my physical and mental stamina are low: all comparted to young players. Perhaps my only "quality" at this point is cranky stubbornness.
I began to search for a way to train in tactics. Initially, I tried the usual style of calculation puzzles, taking a long time on each difficult one and got a puzzle rating much higher than my playing rating. This did not seem to help my chess much. Then I researched and discovered I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles. On Lichess, I devised a method of doing up to 20 tactics/motifs on rotation with two puzzle sessions a day, for five or six days a week as rest days are important too. This method has gone through a few changes as I attempted to refine it.
My theory was that I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles to imprint pattern recognition and these puzzles needed to be done within a time limit. This should equate to ease of faster and more accurate moves. "Lift the floor" in other words and this concept now resonates with me. A further part of my theory was that if my puzzle sessions roughly equated in difficulty and time pressure to game conditions then my puzzle rating and game rating should converge and they should also then both start rising in tandem. This is if I try my best in puzzle sessions and in games. This is what has happened to my graphs to date albeit with a lot of statistical noise.
To achieve the above, I did and do 20 puzzle/motifs on rotation on "Easiest" setting. I have to do 60 puzzles in no more than 60 minutes which feels fast to a slow, old guy like me. If I get more than one wrong or fail the time limit, I must repeat that tactic/motif set next session.
There are some wild gyrations (making a saw-toothed graph) in my puzzle score regress and progress. Puzzle difficulty across the tactics/motifs varies quite a lot down at the low level of my puzzle rating minus 600 on "Easiest". I find some puzzles at -600 still very hard or impossible to get in a minute! This shows how low and inconsistent my "floor" is and why I blunder so much. I think it validates the floor theory.
My graphs have converged and tracked together, allowing for some big statistical noise caused by wide variability in the difficulty of different puzzle tactics/motifs to me. One type of puzzle (Defensive move) I find so difficult it distorts my whole system and causes huge drops in my puzzle score. This is diagnostic in a way I think. It shows a huge gap in my perception and calculation in chess: a gap related, I think, to my patzer failure to consider my opponent's threats first and to calculate the game from the opponent's side. I think I am going to have to make half my sessions Defensive Move sessions to see if I can rectify this. That is going to be a tough slog.
Of course, my progress is very slow. I hope I have the patience to keep going. Chess is hard. Much harder than I ever realised. I have been doing this for about 7 months with a one month break. I am up to 8.000 puzzles. I suspect I will need to do at least 50,000 puzzles this way to get significantly better. Hope I live long enough to do that! I am serious. There's not that much sand left in my hourglass.
I wonder if Steps would help me too? Can I do it free and self-taught?
@Wodjul said in #2:
> This little tale is my experience of the "floor" concept and validates it in my opinion. I am a 70 year old online player who played some OTB social chess in my late 20s at patzer level. I gave up chess for nearly 40 years and then took it up again. Once I started on Lichess, I realised how truly poor I had always been at chess. This was even after knocking the rust off my game.
>
> This time around, I refreshed my very limited theoretical knowledge and started playing. Though I knew quite a few general principles of chess, my endless mistakes and blunders revealed my glaring weaknesses. Poor tactics, poor positional understanding, poor calculation, poor concentration, poor control of in-game stress and poor time management. The list goes on and on. All that was and is compounded by me being old. My learning is slower, my neural plasticity is low, my physical and mental stamina are low: all comparted to young players. Perhaps my only "quality" at this point is cranky stubbornness.
>
> I began to search for a way to train in tactics. Initially, I tried the usual style of calculation puzzles, taking a long time on each difficult one and got a puzzle rating much higher than my playing rating. This did not seem to help my chess much. Then I researched and discovered I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles. On Lichess, I devised a method of doing up to 20 tactics/motifs on rotation with two puzzle sessions a day, for five or six days a week as rest days are important too. This method has gone through a few changes as I attempted to refine it.
>
> My theory was that I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles to imprint pattern recognition and these puzzles needed to be done within a time limit. This should equate to ease of faster and more accurate moves. "Lift the floor" in other words and this concept now resonates with me. A further part of my theory was that if my puzzle sessions roughly equated in difficulty and time pressure to game conditions then my puzzle rating and game rating should converge and they should also then both start rising in tandem. This is if I try my best in puzzle sessions and in games. This is what has happened to my graphs to date albeit with a lot of statistical noise.
>
> To achieve the above, I did and do 20 puzzle/motifs on rotation on "Easiest" setting. I have to do 60 puzzles in no more than 60 minutes which feels fast to a slow, old guy like me. If I get more than one wrong or fail the time limit, I must repeat that tactic/motif set next session.
>
> There are some wild gyrations (making a saw-toothed graph) in my puzzle score regress and progress. Puzzle difficulty across the tactics/motifs varies quite a lot down at the low level of my puzzle rating minus 600 on "Easiest". I find some puzzles at -600 still very hard or impossible to get in a minute! This shows how low and inconsistent my "floor" is and why I blunder so much. I think it validates the floor theory.
>
> My graphs have converged and tracked together, allowing for some big statistical noise caused by wide variability in the difficulty of different puzzle tactics/motifs to me. One type of puzzle (Defensive move) I find so difficult it distorts my whole system and causes huge drops in my puzzle score. This is diagnostic in a way I think. It shows a huge gap in my perception and calculation in chess: a gap related, I think, to my patzer failure to consider my opponent's threats first and to calculate the game from the opponent's side. I think I am going to have to make half my sessions Defensive Move sessions to see if I can rectify this. That is going to be a tough slog.
>
> Of course, my progress is very slow. I hope I have the patience to keep going. Chess is hard. Much harder than I ever realised. I have been doing this for about 7 months with a one month break. I am up to 8.000 puzzles. I suspect I will need to do at least 50,000 puzzles this way to get significantly better. Hope I live long enough to do that! I am serious. There's not that much sand left in my hourglass.
>
> I wonder if Steps would help me too? Can I do it free and self-taught?
Thank you for sharing your journey and experience!
The Steps Method manuals and workbooks are relatively cheap and there is a lot of attention to defending. I think you will like it!
I recorded this video on Defending in the Steps Method:
youtu.be/jiMxNCfAEcM?si=Fa5in8tm3P_dvXkj
Perhaps it can be helpful.
> This little tale is my experience of the "floor" concept and validates it in my opinion. I am a 70 year old online player who played some OTB social chess in my late 20s at patzer level. I gave up chess for nearly 40 years and then took it up again. Once I started on Lichess, I realised how truly poor I had always been at chess. This was even after knocking the rust off my game.
>
> This time around, I refreshed my very limited theoretical knowledge and started playing. Though I knew quite a few general principles of chess, my endless mistakes and blunders revealed my glaring weaknesses. Poor tactics, poor positional understanding, poor calculation, poor concentration, poor control of in-game stress and poor time management. The list goes on and on. All that was and is compounded by me being old. My learning is slower, my neural plasticity is low, my physical and mental stamina are low: all comparted to young players. Perhaps my only "quality" at this point is cranky stubbornness.
>
> I began to search for a way to train in tactics. Initially, I tried the usual style of calculation puzzles, taking a long time on each difficult one and got a puzzle rating much higher than my playing rating. This did not seem to help my chess much. Then I researched and discovered I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles. On Lichess, I devised a method of doing up to 20 tactics/motifs on rotation with two puzzle sessions a day, for five or six days a week as rest days are important too. This method has gone through a few changes as I attempted to refine it.
>
> My theory was that I needed to do a high volume of simple puzzles to imprint pattern recognition and these puzzles needed to be done within a time limit. This should equate to ease of faster and more accurate moves. "Lift the floor" in other words and this concept now resonates with me. A further part of my theory was that if my puzzle sessions roughly equated in difficulty and time pressure to game conditions then my puzzle rating and game rating should converge and they should also then both start rising in tandem. This is if I try my best in puzzle sessions and in games. This is what has happened to my graphs to date albeit with a lot of statistical noise.
>
> To achieve the above, I did and do 20 puzzle/motifs on rotation on "Easiest" setting. I have to do 60 puzzles in no more than 60 minutes which feels fast to a slow, old guy like me. If I get more than one wrong or fail the time limit, I must repeat that tactic/motif set next session.
>
> There are some wild gyrations (making a saw-toothed graph) in my puzzle score regress and progress. Puzzle difficulty across the tactics/motifs varies quite a lot down at the low level of my puzzle rating minus 600 on "Easiest". I find some puzzles at -600 still very hard or impossible to get in a minute! This shows how low and inconsistent my "floor" is and why I blunder so much. I think it validates the floor theory.
>
> My graphs have converged and tracked together, allowing for some big statistical noise caused by wide variability in the difficulty of different puzzle tactics/motifs to me. One type of puzzle (Defensive move) I find so difficult it distorts my whole system and causes huge drops in my puzzle score. This is diagnostic in a way I think. It shows a huge gap in my perception and calculation in chess: a gap related, I think, to my patzer failure to consider my opponent's threats first and to calculate the game from the opponent's side. I think I am going to have to make half my sessions Defensive Move sessions to see if I can rectify this. That is going to be a tough slog.
>
> Of course, my progress is very slow. I hope I have the patience to keep going. Chess is hard. Much harder than I ever realised. I have been doing this for about 7 months with a one month break. I am up to 8.000 puzzles. I suspect I will need to do at least 50,000 puzzles this way to get significantly better. Hope I live long enough to do that! I am serious. There's not that much sand left in my hourglass.
>
> I wonder if Steps would help me too? Can I do it free and self-taught?
Thank you for sharing your journey and experience!
The Steps Method manuals and workbooks are relatively cheap and there is a lot of attention to defending. I think you will like it!
I recorded this video on Defending in the Steps Method:
youtu.be/jiMxNCfAEcM?si=Fa5in8tm3P_dvXkj
Perhaps it can be helpful.
@HanSchut said in #3:
> Thank you for sharing your journey and experience!
> The Steps Method manuals and workbooks are relatively cheap and there is a lot of attention to defending. I think you will like it!
> I recorded this video on Defending in the Steps Method:
>
>
> Perhaps it can be helpful.
Thank you for your reply. I will indeed look into the steps method and possibly affording it. I am interested in how we learn different tasks, including learning chess of course. I am also interested in the ontology of real and formal systems. These two arenas (real systems and formal systems) are related in various complex ways. But I will leave that aside.
More to the point here, chess learning seems to require a combination of two things. The first requirement is the learned capacity for formal deductive logic, within chess rules (or axioms) as with any game or any formal system like language or mathematics. The second requirement seems to be a more basically learned ability in the relevant pattern set and syntax set of chess. This means a "vocabulary" of pattern /syntax recognition and a capacity for valid pattern re-combinations. What we call creativity appears in valid re-combinations which can be or can lead to novelties.
As an older adult with life experience, some science knowledge and a considerable ability to read and understand empirical philosophy, I have the general logic base covered. I can understand new and coherent concepts delivered in language: English as I am monolingual.
But when it comes to automatic chess pattern recognition and memorisation I am taking baby steps. It feels that hard. What people call "instinct" in chess is, I believe from my readings, an automatic brain-internal vocabulary of at least 30,000 to 50,000 patterns at the higher levels: as hard or harder than learning a new language. I further think, from my reading and research to date, that what happens in young brains exposed to chess early, especially in children, is that the brain demonstrating its neuroplasticity re-wires itself to remember, recognise and process these patterns rapidly, In essence it lays down new firmware (or wetware as some theorists call it).
Attempting to re-wire my rather average septuagenarian brain (except it has some English language ability perhaps a little above average) it a tall order, a Quixotic enterprise. It's "tilting at windmills" as the saying goes. Also, doing random Lichess puzzles is a scattergun approach and will only reinforce patterns in a rather unstructured manner: not by ordered and proper spaced repetition of closely alike, in other words. Random puzzles vary a lot even within one tactic or motif type.
Trying all the tactic and motif types and then selecting 20 initially for repeated random solving is still a scattergun approach and I suspect I am not getting anywhere near good value for my puzzle time.
I can see even from your one video that I have viewed, that "Steps" links cogent concepts to the tactics and motifs. It should reinforce learning if one starts with a cogent concept, a clear idea of the "macro" of what one is searching for, and then proceeds to learn and reinforce via a set of carefully selected, theme-consistent puzzles.
I can see from my own painful experience of failing at defensive puzzles even worse than at other puzzles, that there are deeper concepts beyond tactics and even motifs. Concepts like dual defence to dual attacks and higher order attacks to parry lower order attacks deserve a higher order name. They are not merely tactics or motifs, they are really axioms or theorems. I would prefer the term "theorem" as I use "axioms" to mean "rules" in a formal system. But enough of my waffle.
In the Lichess puzzles, the higher patterns I started to notice as I failed at quite a few puzzles, were:
(a) using higher order attacks;
(b) using the right tactic(s), even sacrifices, to defend and make a later gain; and
(c) escaping a check to the square that avoids the mating net and further checks.
But I did not notice much or at all of the clear theorem of dual defence. I certainly did not formalise it in my mind. I did develop the TIM acronym to help me escape checks and to check the effectiveness of my own delivery of check attacks and help calculate.
T - Take
I - Interpose
M - Move
Bur PC-MIC is more comprehensive. Anyway, I will keep looking into this... to see if my ossified brain can still learn new stuff at a reasonable rate. Cheers.
> Thank you for sharing your journey and experience!
> The Steps Method manuals and workbooks are relatively cheap and there is a lot of attention to defending. I think you will like it!
> I recorded this video on Defending in the Steps Method:
>
>
> Perhaps it can be helpful.
Thank you for your reply. I will indeed look into the steps method and possibly affording it. I am interested in how we learn different tasks, including learning chess of course. I am also interested in the ontology of real and formal systems. These two arenas (real systems and formal systems) are related in various complex ways. But I will leave that aside.
More to the point here, chess learning seems to require a combination of two things. The first requirement is the learned capacity for formal deductive logic, within chess rules (or axioms) as with any game or any formal system like language or mathematics. The second requirement seems to be a more basically learned ability in the relevant pattern set and syntax set of chess. This means a "vocabulary" of pattern /syntax recognition and a capacity for valid pattern re-combinations. What we call creativity appears in valid re-combinations which can be or can lead to novelties.
As an older adult with life experience, some science knowledge and a considerable ability to read and understand empirical philosophy, I have the general logic base covered. I can understand new and coherent concepts delivered in language: English as I am monolingual.
But when it comes to automatic chess pattern recognition and memorisation I am taking baby steps. It feels that hard. What people call "instinct" in chess is, I believe from my readings, an automatic brain-internal vocabulary of at least 30,000 to 50,000 patterns at the higher levels: as hard or harder than learning a new language. I further think, from my reading and research to date, that what happens in young brains exposed to chess early, especially in children, is that the brain demonstrating its neuroplasticity re-wires itself to remember, recognise and process these patterns rapidly, In essence it lays down new firmware (or wetware as some theorists call it).
Attempting to re-wire my rather average septuagenarian brain (except it has some English language ability perhaps a little above average) it a tall order, a Quixotic enterprise. It's "tilting at windmills" as the saying goes. Also, doing random Lichess puzzles is a scattergun approach and will only reinforce patterns in a rather unstructured manner: not by ordered and proper spaced repetition of closely alike, in other words. Random puzzles vary a lot even within one tactic or motif type.
Trying all the tactic and motif types and then selecting 20 initially for repeated random solving is still a scattergun approach and I suspect I am not getting anywhere near good value for my puzzle time.
I can see even from your one video that I have viewed, that "Steps" links cogent concepts to the tactics and motifs. It should reinforce learning if one starts with a cogent concept, a clear idea of the "macro" of what one is searching for, and then proceeds to learn and reinforce via a set of carefully selected, theme-consistent puzzles.
I can see from my own painful experience of failing at defensive puzzles even worse than at other puzzles, that there are deeper concepts beyond tactics and even motifs. Concepts like dual defence to dual attacks and higher order attacks to parry lower order attacks deserve a higher order name. They are not merely tactics or motifs, they are really axioms or theorems. I would prefer the term "theorem" as I use "axioms" to mean "rules" in a formal system. But enough of my waffle.
In the Lichess puzzles, the higher patterns I started to notice as I failed at quite a few puzzles, were:
(a) using higher order attacks;
(b) using the right tactic(s), even sacrifices, to defend and make a later gain; and
(c) escaping a check to the square that avoids the mating net and further checks.
But I did not notice much or at all of the clear theorem of dual defence. I certainly did not formalise it in my mind. I did develop the TIM acronym to help me escape checks and to check the effectiveness of my own delivery of check attacks and help calculate.
T - Take
I - Interpose
M - Move
Bur PC-MIC is more comprehensive. Anyway, I will keep looking into this... to see if my ossified brain can still learn new stuff at a reasonable rate. Cheers.
>>>When you perform at your floor, your standard thinking processes stop functioning. No more orientation-calculation-verification, no more blunder checks, no longer checking your opponent's intent and strongest reply but just intuition and gut feeling.
Just want to state that I'm guilty :-) Great Blog post. Very well put together, whenever I do those 1 move blunders I feel what you wrote in the quote above.... Noticing this is hopefully the first stop to erasing :-)
Just want to state that I'm guilty :-) Great Blog post. Very well put together, whenever I do those 1 move blunders I feel what you wrote in the quote above.... Noticing this is hopefully the first stop to erasing :-)
@Wodjul said in #4:
> Thank you for your reply. I will indeed look into the steps method and possibly affording it. I am interested in how we learn different tasks, including learning chess of course. I am also interested in the ontology of real and formal systems. These two arenas (real systems and formal systems) are related in various complex ways. But I will leave that aside.
>
> More to the point here, chess learning seems to require a combination of two things. The first requirement is the learned capacity for formal deductive logic, within chess rules (or axioms) as with any game or any formal system like language or mathematics. The second requirement seems to be a more basically learned ability in the relevant pattern set and syntax set of chess. This means a "vocabulary" of pattern /syntax recognition and a capacity for valid pattern re-combinations. What we call creativity appears in valid re-combinations which can be or can lead to novelties.
>
> As an older adult with life experience, some science knowledge and a considerable ability to read and understand empirical philosophy, I have the general logic base covered. I can understand new and coherent concepts delivered in language: English as I am monolingual.
>
> But when it comes to automatic chess pattern recognition and memorisation I am taking baby steps. It feels that hard. What people call "instinct" in chess is, I believe from my readings, an automatic brain-internal vocabulary of at least 30,000 to 50,000 patterns at the higher levels: as hard or harder than learning a new language. I further think, from my reading and research to date, that what happens in young brains exposed to chess early, especially in children, is that the brain demonstrating its neuroplasticity re-wires itself to remember, recognise and process these patterns rapidly, In essence it lays down new firmware (or wetware as some theorists call it).
>
> Attempting to re-wire my rather average septuagenarian brain (except it has some English language ability perhaps a little above average) it a tall order, a Quixotic enterprise. It's "tilting at windmills" as the saying goes. Also, doing random Lichess puzzles is a scattergun approach and will only reinforce patterns in a rather unstructured manner: not by ordered and proper spaced repetition of closely alike, in other words. Random puzzles vary a lot even within one tactic or motif type.
>
The following might be helpful for a structured thinker like you.
In the Steps Method, you improve your puzzle performance by
1. Separating Orientation and Calculation-Evaluation (and then Verification)
2. Making your Orientation more complete
When you ask yourself the right questions about the position, the moves will follow.
I describe this process in this video:
youtu.be/KkpUWUirKGw
> Thank you for your reply. I will indeed look into the steps method and possibly affording it. I am interested in how we learn different tasks, including learning chess of course. I am also interested in the ontology of real and formal systems. These two arenas (real systems and formal systems) are related in various complex ways. But I will leave that aside.
>
> More to the point here, chess learning seems to require a combination of two things. The first requirement is the learned capacity for formal deductive logic, within chess rules (or axioms) as with any game or any formal system like language or mathematics. The second requirement seems to be a more basically learned ability in the relevant pattern set and syntax set of chess. This means a "vocabulary" of pattern /syntax recognition and a capacity for valid pattern re-combinations. What we call creativity appears in valid re-combinations which can be or can lead to novelties.
>
> As an older adult with life experience, some science knowledge and a considerable ability to read and understand empirical philosophy, I have the general logic base covered. I can understand new and coherent concepts delivered in language: English as I am monolingual.
>
> But when it comes to automatic chess pattern recognition and memorisation I am taking baby steps. It feels that hard. What people call "instinct" in chess is, I believe from my readings, an automatic brain-internal vocabulary of at least 30,000 to 50,000 patterns at the higher levels: as hard or harder than learning a new language. I further think, from my reading and research to date, that what happens in young brains exposed to chess early, especially in children, is that the brain demonstrating its neuroplasticity re-wires itself to remember, recognise and process these patterns rapidly, In essence it lays down new firmware (or wetware as some theorists call it).
>
> Attempting to re-wire my rather average septuagenarian brain (except it has some English language ability perhaps a little above average) it a tall order, a Quixotic enterprise. It's "tilting at windmills" as the saying goes. Also, doing random Lichess puzzles is a scattergun approach and will only reinforce patterns in a rather unstructured manner: not by ordered and proper spaced repetition of closely alike, in other words. Random puzzles vary a lot even within one tactic or motif type.
>
The following might be helpful for a structured thinker like you.
In the Steps Method, you improve your puzzle performance by
1. Separating Orientation and Calculation-Evaluation (and then Verification)
2. Making your Orientation more complete
When you ask yourself the right questions about the position, the moves will follow.
I describe this process in this video:
youtu.be/KkpUWUirKGw
I watched one of Ben Finegold's video and he had a similar take on this. As I remember, he stated that there are two players inside you: the one that "knows" things, that can play brilliantly, has strategical understanding, etc; and then the one that makes the mistakes. The point was that they don't average out: your strength is as high as the level of your mistakes is (your real level is as high as your floor). It doesn't matter that your positional understanding is above 2000 if you're hanging your pieces like a 1400. You're a 1400 in that case.
In this regard, it would make sense to practise activities that elevate your floor, such as blitz or bullet, which is often discouraged by many trainers, because it develops the very fundamentals of chess (material, time management, intuitive decisions...).
In this regard, it would make sense to practise activities that elevate your floor, such as blitz or bullet, which is often discouraged by many trainers, because it develops the very fundamentals of chess (material, time management, intuitive decisions...).
The Steps Method has really got me thinking.
1. I intend to watch all the videos @HanSchut has very helpfully posted in this thread.
2. Further, my intention is to make comprehensive summary notes and convert these into an "algorithm flowchart".
3. Then this will become a training tool I use when in training games against Stockfish AI without time limits.
4. I will not use this algorithm flowchart in rated games. There would be no time in blitz or rapid anyway.
5. I do intend over time to fully memorise the flowchart and practice it to automaticity.
6. I will also use the flowchart to solve harder training puzzles.
7. In relation to puzzle training and Steps Method and calculation, I intend to train in both easy and hard puzzles.
8. Easy puzzles are for building up automatic "new synapse connection" firmware in the brain via high repetitions.
Old healthy brains can grow new synapses between neurons if positively challenged.
They just can't do it as fast or as complexly and extensively as young brains. Well, such is life.
9. Hard puzzles are for developing the human-brain-compatible "Step Method" and for calculation development.
10. The above is how I see it. Of course, I will do other practice, opening memorisation, middle and endgame parctice and play rated games.
If the above reads like some belated New Year's resolutions that's fine. Better late than never. I find chess interesting, although very difficult and it can be frustrating at times. Progress is slow for adult improvers. Along with physical exercise and positive social interaction, learning and playing chess must one of the best ways to keep the brain active and increase synapses and neuron connections.
On the issue of buying the steps Workbooks, I have to honestly say that buying the whole set looks too expensive to me for single personal use. But they would be great for schools, clubs and coaches training many children and beginners up to a very respectable proficiency level, in my opinion. Even though my Lichess rating is a modest 1550 (about), would the last one or two booklets in the series work for me I wonder? Still thinking about this.
1. I intend to watch all the videos @HanSchut has very helpfully posted in this thread.
2. Further, my intention is to make comprehensive summary notes and convert these into an "algorithm flowchart".
3. Then this will become a training tool I use when in training games against Stockfish AI without time limits.
4. I will not use this algorithm flowchart in rated games. There would be no time in blitz or rapid anyway.
5. I do intend over time to fully memorise the flowchart and practice it to automaticity.
6. I will also use the flowchart to solve harder training puzzles.
7. In relation to puzzle training and Steps Method and calculation, I intend to train in both easy and hard puzzles.
8. Easy puzzles are for building up automatic "new synapse connection" firmware in the brain via high repetitions.
Old healthy brains can grow new synapses between neurons if positively challenged.
They just can't do it as fast or as complexly and extensively as young brains. Well, such is life.
9. Hard puzzles are for developing the human-brain-compatible "Step Method" and for calculation development.
10. The above is how I see it. Of course, I will do other practice, opening memorisation, middle and endgame parctice and play rated games.
If the above reads like some belated New Year's resolutions that's fine. Better late than never. I find chess interesting, although very difficult and it can be frustrating at times. Progress is slow for adult improvers. Along with physical exercise and positive social interaction, learning and playing chess must one of the best ways to keep the brain active and increase synapses and neuron connections.
On the issue of buying the steps Workbooks, I have to honestly say that buying the whole set looks too expensive to me for single personal use. But they would be great for schools, clubs and coaches training many children and beginners up to a very respectable proficiency level, in my opinion. Even though my Lichess rating is a modest 1550 (about), would the last one or two booklets in the series work for me I wonder? Still thinking about this.
@Wodjul note that besides the booklets, there is also software that follows the Step method. Its a bit dated, but contains a lot of excersises, positions to play from etc. Also @HanSchut has numerous videos on his site and some past streams in which he goes through a lot of ‘Step method’ material. I find the quality of his teaching iway above what you find in typical, clickbatey Youtube chess content. Very structured, well thought through and ‘calmly presented’ (he is a typical ‘broodnuchtere Nederlander...’).
To reduce blunders, a flowchart is helpful but I find that impulse control is almost as important. I have lost many games by playing moves instantly because I thought they were the only / best option, especially under time pressure or when behind in material.
To reduce blunders, a flowchart is helpful but I find that impulse control is almost as important. I have lost many games by playing moves instantly because I thought they were the only / best option, especially under time pressure or when behind in material.
The subject blog post is splendid
Excellent writing often helps us to see old things in a new and unexpected light. It also often leads to excellent follow-on efforts by others.
The subject blog post has already done both, apparently.
And great teaching is splendid.
QED.
Excellent writing often helps us to see old things in a new and unexpected light. It also often leads to excellent follow-on efforts by others.
The subject blog post has already done both, apparently.
And great teaching is splendid.
QED.