Chess Makes You Smarter!

Have you heard that a wooden chess set or an electronic chess game can actually make your child smarter? The truth is, playing the "game of kings" will make you smarter, too!

Mastering chess causes us to become smarter, and observations along with research in academia, and day-to-day life in general, prove this. It doesn't have to be played using a wooden chess set, either--it's quite simply that a well-made wooden chess set gives a creative and artistic angle to the delightful experience of playing this historically royal, aristocratic game. Regardless of whether chess is played on a traditional chess set or an electronic chess game--it will cause the consistent participant of the game become smarter.

Children who engage in chess learn to expand their decision-making, analytical, and synthesizing mental competencies which transfer to all areas of their day-to-day lives. So when they learn how to employ thorough and deep chess research, they develop their self-confidence in their competence for doing academic analysis--which particularly becomes apparent in higher mathematics and reading comprehension test scores. Kids today often have inadequate attention spans, and a declining educational system doesn't help this problem at all. However, actively playing chess has been proven to aid in reversing this attention deficit and teach today's youth the lost arts of focus and mental discipline. Chess also trains children to understand and appreciate healthy competition.

Even students with special challenges can learn how to play chess. One educator taught a highly effective course for emotionally and educationally disadvantaged children and used chess as a way for them to acquire and exercise self-control. It was like turning on switches inside their brains. You could see the child considering a problem, breaking it down, and then putting the entire thing back together. The process involves recall, examination, judgment, and abstract reasoning.As outlined by D. Calvin F. Deyermond, the Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction at the North Tonawanda City School District, "Chess develops intellectual, aesthetic, sporting, decision making, concentration, and perseverance capabilities...Not only is it mentally demanding, the game draws in not only gifted pupils but also students at all levels of learning. Many students who've been experiencing problems, particularly in mathematics and reading, often times demonstrate exceptional progress after learning chess."

A wooden chess set or an electronic chess device, therefore, could be the very best gifts you are able to share with your children. Sit down with them, have fun playing chess with them, and engage their minds. You, too, as an parent, can enhance your own cognitive skills and self-confidence with chess. These are the reasons it's "the game of kings".