Chess Education Is A Pathway to Stem Education

STEM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) is a prevailing focus today in elementary and secondary education and work force development initiatives. Skills needed in today's workplace include problem solving, analytical thinking, and the ability to work independently. What do they all have in common? They're all skills taught through the game of chess.

STEM and Chess are Rooted in Math

STEM skills are rooted in mathematics. Chess relates to math in that both involve pattern recognition, logic, statistics, probability, spatial reasoning, predictive reasoning, geometric concepts, and a coordinate graph system.

These skills are on full display during a chess tournament. Chess tournaments are held in schools across the country each year. This is where all the hard work by kids, coaches, and teachers pays off. Kids learn chess openings and end game patterns, solve chess puzzles all year and practice playing in after-school clubs or during the school day to help them prepare.

Aerospace and Defense Company Sponsors Chess Tournaments 

The past few years, Lockheed Martin has sponsored a chess tournament in Madison, Alabama called the Queen's Quest. It offers kids the opportunity to play five chess games on a Saturday against an opponent of a similar grade level where players manage their time to complete their moves in an hour with each competitor having 30 minutes. This is the traditional time control in scholastic (K-12) chess matches across the country. As players gain experience playing in local tournaments like Queen's Quest, they will play in state and national tournaments where the time control can be as long as 120 minutes per side. That's right, elementary-age students can play games that last 3-4 hours in these contests of stamina, analytical skill, pattern recognition, and problem-solving.

This year, Lockheed Martin outdid itself as tournament sponsor, providing some cool swag to hand out to competitors and donating funds to pay for trophies and medals for individual and team awards.

They also provided unique 3D printed chess sets that were part of a silent auction that helped the Madison City Chess League raise additional funds to support its chess programs. Lockheed Martin planned ahead last summer by having their interns learn how to program and use a 3D printer by giving them an initial assignment of building chess sets. And they did not disappoint!

The most popular chess set was the "Space Race" chess set which had US and Russian spacecraft as chess pieces. Patterns for 3D printed chess sets can be found at thingiverse.com (search for "chess"). Next year, Lockheed Martin is planning to extend the summer assignment to have interns develop their own designs. One requested design after this chess tournament for next year is an Iron Bowl chess set with Alabama vs. Auburn. We look forward to seeing that one!

Companies like Lockheed Martin are leading the way by promoting STEM activities like chess. It's good business, and it's good for kids!

For more on why ChessKid is great for kids, check out this compilation of research studies and also the some newer research.