Since people develop the majority of their skills during their childhood years, it only makes sense to have your child take chess classes at a young age. While it’s never too late to learn something new, young minds are more flexible and learn faster. With so many benefits, why not start your child off learning chess as early as you can to develop positive lifelong skills.
Check out these 10 reasons why children should start playing chess at a young age.
Learning to Think Critically
Chess involves a specific set of rules to be followed, but allows for many different patterns and combinations which helps your child improve their problem solving and critical thinking skills. As children learn to think through chess logic, they become more prone to trying to find solutions when faced with problems both in the game and in real life situations.
Improved Patience
Playing chess requires a calm mind – and children who play chess tend to be more patient – observing their opponent and thinking through their next move.
Developing Respect for Others
Chess is a great way to develop good sportsmanship skills, and showing others respect by being polite, saying nice things, and telling their opponent “good game!” whether they’ve won or lost.
Healthy Brain Development
Playing chess improves memory function, and has been proven to increase IQ. Games like chess stimulate the growth of dendrites (the nerve cells that send signals from the neuronal cells of the brain). The more dendrites you have, communication within the brain improves and becomes faster.
Boosting Self Confidence
When children have to think critically in order to get a desired result – it results in confidence of their thinking abilities. Children learn that they can do hard things, and that they are responsible for the results of their own decisions.
Improving Concentration
Children can tend to be easily distracted – but when focused on a game of chess, they may be forced to concentrate on one thing for hours. When children want to play well, they will focus more on the technicalities of the game, thus improving their concentration.
Building Friendships
Getting involved in group activities gives children an opportunity to socialize with peers that have similar interests. Children also get a chance to learn from and challenge each other.
Teaches Planning and to Think Ahead
In the game of chess you always need to be thinking multiple steps ahead. Growing this ability in chess makes it easier to bring those skills to the real world.
Improves Attention Span
A game of chess isn’t a quick activity. Along with building patience, playing chess will help your child improve their attention span and ability to focus on one activity for an extended period of time.
Learning to Manage Wins and Loses
In every game someone wins, and someone loses. It’s important for children to understand the value of defeat, what they can learn from it, and what mistakes they want to avoid in the future. It’s also important for children to learn how to win gracefully and show good sportsmanship to their opponents when they do. Chess is a wonderful way to learn real life skills that go along with managing strong feelings and emotions.