If you’re looking for a simple game to engage children and teenagers in maths lessons, chess would probably not be the obvious choice.
But for Hari Neocleous, a specialist intervention teacher working across primary and secondary schools in London, chessboards play a regular part in her teaching.
Maths-based games, she says, are brilliant for intervention classes: they allow a teacher to build connections with the children outside of structured teaching which, in turn, is crucial for fostering the strong relationships that support learning.
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Over the course of her career, Neocleous has tried many different maths games, from simple card and dice games, to ones such as Bongo (in which students rotate and flip over tiles to make them fit together) and Qwirkle (a mathematical take on Scrabble, in which rows of different shapes are placed on a board and connected together).
But, it’s chess that she keeps coming back to. And she’s even designed a series of maths investigations based around the game.
“The overlap between chess and maths is that students are problem solving, they’re planning ahead, they’re having to be strategic in their thinking. They’re also analysing, being creative, thinking independently; and the game is brilliant for arithmetic skills, and shape and space skills,” she says.
Children are naturally fascinated with chess, she continues. At some time in their lives they will have encountered it, whether at home (many of us will have an old chess set gathering dust at the back of the games cupboard) or through books and television shows.
“Visually, it’s really attractive and, when playing on a proper board with the individual pieces, it’s something tangible and real that they can engage with,” she says.
But while chess might be familiar, it is also a complicated game that requires time and skill to master. Do children need to be experienced players to access the activities that Neocleous uses?
No, she says: “Most of these maths investigations don’t require children to be chess players. I will give children a quick introduction on what they need to know, depending on what the game is, but they don’t need to know all the intricate rules.”
Schools also don’t need to worry about purchasing an expensive class set of chessboards, she adds. If pupils can use real boards, that’s great, but they can also carry out the investigations using a paper version of the board and counters in place of chess pieces.
Chess in the classroom: what activities work?
What sort of activities does Neocleous use, then? The first game she highlights is called “each square has a name”. This is aimed at Reception and Year 1 children, and is about understanding location.
On a paper version of a chess board, each square is named according to its coordinates: for example, the first square in the top left-hand corner would be A1. You then give children counters, and ask them to walk their counter up, for example, street C, and to house number 7. You can also give children a route to follow, and get them to draw a line to show the route they took, or place a counter in a random square and ask them to work out its coordinates.
Another game Neocleous uses is called the “magic square matrix puzzle”, which teaches mental arithmetic to children in Years 5 and 6.
She explains to the children that each chess piece has a value. She then places different combinations of the pieces on the board - for example, two rooks and a queen - and asks children what the value of the board is.
Once they’ve got the hang of that, she will tell them that the board is worth 30, for example, and they need to find the pieces to make up that total. A missing piece can be incorporated into this, too: the total of the board may be 15, and it may already have a knight on it. She’ll ask the children what other pieces need to be added to make the total.
All of these activities use the chess pieces and board without being as complicated or time-consuming as a full game of chess might be.
That’s not to say that teachers can’t also get pupils playing full games, if time and resources allow, but Neocleous’ approach provides a scaled-back version that anyone can try.
So, how often does she recommend using these activities? As much as some pupils may love the idea of playing games in every lesson, Neocleous points out that this isn’t realistic.
Instead, she suggests that breaking out the boards once a month will offer a good balance. And if there is appetite for more chess from the children, a lunchtime or after-school club can be a great option.
“Often, once children experience the chess activities a couple of times, it really sparks their interest in learning the full game, so chess clubs are brilliant for that. And it can be accessible for all ages: primary children can play mini games, like ‘rooks versus pawns’,” she says.
There is an additional bonus to these clubs, she adds: “When they are at these chess clubs, they are building on their maths skills without even realising it.”
In terms of advice for others who might be looking to harness the power of chess in their classrooms, Neocleous points to a free resource, produced by Erasmus, which contains 50 maths and chess games for children of all ages. This, she says, is invaluable.
She also suggests that teachers work through problems themselves first, to really make sure that higher-level maths is being squeezed out of the exercise wherever possible.
“It can be daunting for teachers, especially if they aren’t comfortable with chess. But it’s all about having a growth mindset and having a go. So many will find it as fascinating as the children do, I’m sure,” she says.
Perhaps, then, it’s time to get that dusty chess set out of the loft and into your classroom.
