Friday, September 5th, I attended a meeting of The University of Texas at Dallas chess club. I saw two of my current Chess Online students, Mihail Bantic and IM Marko Zivanic. I also saw former students IM John Bartholomew, IM Drasko Boskovic, WFM Lilia Doibani, FM Keaton Kiewra, FM Igor Schneider, and WFM Bayaraa Zorigt. Although many students in my online courses are chess beginners, I have also had many UTD chess team members take the courses.
I attended the Texas Chess Association business meeting this morning. The TCA meeting was at 10 a.m., before the 12:30 fourth round of the Southwest Open. After the election results were reported, the four new board members took their places: President Clemente Rendon, Vice President Lakshmana Viswanath “Vish,” Treasurer Barbara Swafford, and Secretary Robert Sturgeon.
Friday night was the first football game of the season for Denton HS, and therefore also the first outing for the marching band. My daughter Clarissa is Marching Officer for the trombones. She pointed out that there are at least two similarities between marching and algebraic notation. First, marchers find their spots on the field by a combination of file-first, then rank.
My son William and I played in the Denton Sunday Frolics #16 yesterday. William was the top-rated player in the intermediate (under 1300) section, and he won 3-0. Now he is rated 1318. I was the top-rated player in the Open section. After winning my first two games, I played the following game against 1884-rated Jonathan Cearley inthe last round. In the final position notated, I offered a draw because I was going to have less than five minutes to complete the game.
Michael Bowden of Lewisville I.S.D. emailed that his district has approved chess as one of the “specials” rotation areas. In elementary school, students rotate to a different special area everyday of the school week. Currently, choices for the five special areas include art, music, creative dramatics, library, Spanish, Science Enrichment, and mandatory PE. For the 2009-2010 academic year and beyond, principals will have the option to have chess as one of the special areas.
On my Amazon page for Children and Chess: A Guide for Educators, I noticed a review excerpt from Chessville. A Chessville review excerpt was also on the Amazon page for Science, Math, Checkmate: 32 Chess Activities for Inquiry and Problem Solving. From that information, I located reviews of my books at Chessville. Thanks to the reviewer, Rick Kennedy.
Last night the dry erase board stated, “Denton Chess Club: Home of IM Doug Root, 4th place U.S. Open.” Results of the U.S. Open are here. During the week of August 4-8, Doug went to work at the University of North Texas, then drove 45 minutes to the tournament site, and then played chess from 7 p.m. until around midnight. As another player pointed out, though, Doug had the advantage of staying at home rather than in a hotel room.
Today (Friday, August 8) was the final day of my chess teaching week at MOSAIC, summer courses by the Coppell Gifted Association. From 9-10:30, my son William assisted me with my 16 students, grades 4-7. After pairs of students finished practicing, and getting tested on, a basic checkmate such as king and queen against king, William would teach them five moves of a chess opening. Students wrote down the five moves, thus learning notation too.
Today was the USCF Chess in Education workshop. Most of the presenters used handouts, but the two Power Point presentations (by Michael Bowden and Russell Harwood) should be available soon on the USCF Chess in Education Web site. At that site, you can also view slides from past Chess in Education workshops. More about the workshop in my upcoming Chess Life report.
My husband IM Doug Root is playing in the U.S. Open. Tonight, thanks to MonRoi, my children and I are watching Doug's round 2 game live. It's fun to be able to see the game without having to drive 45 minutes to watch in person. I wasn't sure what Doug would play for his 16th move, but both Clarissa (age 15) and William (age 11) guessed 16. Bxf6. They were right.
The Barnes & Noble book release party for Breaking Dawn ended up being a busy night for the seven Denton Chess Club volunteers, who played about 40 games against the public. Look for a full report, with photos, in a future issue of Chess Life magazine.
On August 2nd, at 12:01 a.m., is the release of the best-seller Breaking Dawn. Because Breaking Dawn has a chess queen and a chess pawn on its cover, my local Barnes and Noble is having a chess event Friday night leading up to the release. From 10-10:30 p.m.
