Seeing The World Through Another’s Eyes

By Laura Sherman and Bill Kilpatrick, authors of Chess Is Child's Play: Teaching Techniques That Work.

Wouldn’t it be great if children could learn to see other people’s points of view, to really understand how they see things?

We all want our children to grow up to be instinctively tolerant of others. Chess can help teach them this.

Good chess players can read their opponents and anticipate their moves. Beginning players often forget this. They get so wrapped up in their own plans.

As a parent, you can help your children learn to look for their opponents' threats and teach them some possible defensive moves to those threats.

As you play with your children, try this exercise: play the game for a dozen or so moves. Then turn the board around. Now, they’re looking at the board from the side you were playing.

This causes them to look at playing your position and playing against their position of a moment ago. Ask your children to point out your position’s strengths and weaknesses.

It’s a powerful drill, one that helps novices improve rapidly.

Many young players never stop to think about what the other player is doing.

You will know your children are ignoring their opponents' moves when their eyes don’t even leave their own pieces during their opponents' turn.

They’ll make their move as soon as their opponents' hand leaves the piece.

If you see this, try asking, “what was my last move?” See if they can tell you.

If they don’t know, show them the move you made. Then ask “why do you think I made that move?”

You can accept almost any answer they give, as long as they looked at your move with a desire to understand it.

You’re simply getting them to think about the other person’s move, at least for a bit.

The best chess coaches have their students routinely consider the question “why did my opponent make that move?” It’s a great way to avoid losing pieces, or even the game.

After a while, your children won’t need to ask that question, because they will just look for the reason without thinking about it. And they won’t need to turn the board around, because they will naturally do it mentally.

When this happens, it’s an enormous turning point for young players. They’re putting themselves in their opponents' shoes, understanding what the other players face and how they might think.

It’s a game-changer on the chess board and in life.