First Lesson After The Rules?

honestly, i bet the the best answer will come from beginners themselves if you asked 100 beginners what they have issue with, you will find your answer

Of course if the beginner in question is so lucky that they have an experienced chess player as their opponent, willing to analyse the game they play after the game (or even during the game, allowing takebacks), then that is probably a very good first lesson. But the player doing the analysis and giving those tips has to be strong enough (far stronger than I am) to be giving correct advise.

But if they just learnt the rules, how would they know what they have an issue with?

the original question does not overlap with my new suggestion... one would assume that these would be beginners from the public and have experience playing some games... their answers might need to be interpreted and you would have to make them answer with 50+ or more words on why they think they lose and what they think they need to improve on...

Sure, I am one such beginner for example.

EDIT: sorry, I misread the word "these" as "there".

How did Capablanca learn?

From what I read he would sit around and listen and watch from the age of 4 or so as his father and a bunch of friends played in the early evening drinking coffee, or something stonger.

One day, he asked for a game. They probably all said give the nice little fella a try, while they all had a laugh, and inadvertantly saw the beginning of a fabulous Chess career.

He had had months, perhaps a year or more, of free informal lessons of absorbing hundreds of games form opening through middle games, and more than an endgame ot two.

I would not expect too many kids to be patient enough to stand watching adults play chess for months and trying to absorb the knowledge before playing their first game.

This kind of patience was probably very rare in Capablanca's day, but especially these days, it seems like the average child's attention span lasts for just around the length of one TikTok video.

I probably would not be patient enough to watch games for months as my first lesson either, before playing some games.

The kid was having fun just watching the men and being around his Dad. He probably never even had much idea he was learning anything.

Is here someone who still considers themselves as 'beginner' or weak player and does not know how to analyse their games?

This is the common thread I do see online nowadays. Everyone is watching streamers dishing out moves, theory, advice but there is literally very few that would emphasise how important it is for one to learn to think on their own instead of using ENGINE input to their betterment.

It is very convenient to check that review and see what went wrong and try to understand why. Most of us though accept these results and move on, trying to do something different.

What if I told you that you can analyse your games from day one meaningfully and according to your level and then improve upon that whilst studying more chess beside playing? Wouldnt it be cool if you can find your own mistakes instead of going to ask the engine?

yup, he just wanted to be near pops and be part of the group... the great thing about raising your own children is especially before they enter kindergarten you can set rules on how much screen time they watch... as they grow older and enter highschool, i think giving them a flip cell phone without data is very reasonable, your child doesn't need access to the internet unsupervised. the internet is a very dangerous place and likely the reason why so many kids have anxiety these days... let them do kids things and use their imagination...

Any time I ask an Engine, I am seeking an answer that is beyond my skill level, or too far down the critical line and its side branches.

You see the commentators these days trying moves and getting a plunge or a rocket launch of the side bar.

And doing it late on Cold Winter Nights, might I say!

I agree. Although I don't have kids and do not plan on having any in the future either.

The world seems to be headed towards a whole lot of conflict with these wars that are happening and also the climate change related disasters with all the flooding, wildfires and what have you happening around the world right now (the New York flood being the latest that comes to mind), so I'd rather not have children who get to suffer all that the future brings.

But that is "a little" off-topic, sorry.

I still consider myself a beginner and I really don't know how I would go about analyzing my games effectively without an engine... So I could surely use help with that if you have advise you can share.

Whereas general principles do most of the time, and "positional" factors, the Russians 50 years ago were talking about the need for "concrete" analysis, which is exactly what Engines do massively better than humans.

I will make short video explaining everything and analyse 64 games of relative beginners trying to show and explain what to look for with these games and why I think this is one of the first things one have to understand on the very beginning, apart from rules and annotation that is crucial for ability to see the board blindfold!

You will need to stay tuned for couple of days Habana because it will take me some time to annotate these games!

You had a good teacher!

http://chessskill.blogspot.com/2017/08/lesson-one.html

Hi Ziryab,

I had the best teacher out there! He was one of the main parts behind Frydek-Mistek talent academy. From their school came GMs and WGMs, namely Jana Jackova from those I remember.

Before I played my first OTB game, I was almost 1550 strength by reading approximately two books and playing few casual and very friendly games.

With each game I was improving my analytic skills and my strength was improving as I was focusing on learning in between and also analysing every game I played, even if it was (as later on) casual blitz 5-0 or rapid 15-0 game in the club. Writing each game down on sheet of paper and learning with my training partner was invaluable. I have learned for example how he always tricks me, his only way to beat me, it was his ability to play inbetweeners!