How to improve a 5 year old kid's Chess Tournament rating

Hi everyone, 

My son is 5.5 year old and he started to play chess this April. He is very into chess that we even carry chess board while we do international travel. He pushed everyone to play with him. Right now he is in K and in gifted school doing 3rd grade math. He took two beginner group class and then teacher told us that we can send him to intermediate summer camp. Since we were traveling this summer vacation so we send him to chess summer camp half day for one week. I thought he should have ability to get very well in his chess tournament. Before last weekend, he had two tournaments start from the end of August. First time is not too bad. His rating go to 400 and then drop to 323. And last weekend I let him join one tournament outside of his current club whole day that he play 7 games but maybe only win 1-2 games. I don't know should I let him practice more at home such as play chesskid.com puzzles and watch video. But I am afraid that it will be too pushy that I don't want him lose his interest like he lost his interest on math when I told him need to do two pages math everyday. If interest become routine that it won't be fun anymore. Am I expect too much that he should get a very good rating at this age or only couple tournament? Should I stop the tournament for a while until he understand more tactics and puzzles. Thank you for all the opinions. Thank you. 

Play one or two games by day. Play only under 8 tournaments.

He will be getting a higher level little by little.

As your child, of course, you have to do what you think is best.

If it was me,

I definitely would not push, if he's going to like chess he's going to have to like it on his own. If you push, the odds are great he's going to end up hating it at some point.

I'd treat tournaments as nothing special. Just an event where you can play games against different kids. This attitude will probably change later if your child becomes more competitive.

I'd let the child know that the goal is to win but losing happens and the plus from losing is that you can learn how to avoid losing that way again. One way to do this is to play 4 games with the child and lose one or two. Then go over the game together figuring out where you went wrong at first. Later on, you both can go over some of your child's tournament losses if it's agreeable. As your child gets better, might have a need to find better and better players.

The one thing all these have in common is that the kid leads. If he wants to play, he plays. If he wants to play tournaments, he can then enter. If he wants to get better and lose less, he can take steps that way too. All the parent has to do is offer the child a chance to play.

I was in your son's same position when I was younger. My uncle wanted me to get good at chess kinda fast once he taught me how to move the pieces. Even though I did well in school tournaments I quickly lost interest, I guess I felt pressured. Now years later I love the game.      My advice from experience...... Let him have fun at his own pace but introduce him to chess tactics early! Kids love computers so try letting him solve some puzzles online  sometimes until he gets better. There are free tips all over the web like here at chess.com, chesstempo.com and chessbounty.com. Hope this helps. 

I am a National Master with 10+ years of teaching experience; for more information about me, see www.premierchess.com and www.facebook.com/premierchess. Email erabin66@gmail.com to set up a free 30 minute consultation. 

Thanks everyone. After we tried several tournaments and found a right club that his rating increase. We are using chess to teach him how to do things in a right attitude and the tournament is the most effective way that he can see if he focus on his game that he got good result. 

Just let him enjoy it.

your son has a very good rating according to his age.let him solve few puzzles and tactics he will become a chess master one day

Thanks for the sharing. I just saw your post. It’s super super useful. 

He recently has tournament almost once a week in the weekend. Rating up and down. He was almost climb to 800 but drop to 600 these two months. He beat three rating 1000+ kids but he may lose couple rating 500-600 kids the next game and when I check with statistics that I found out that he haven’t win any kid rating is over 800+. I don’t understand why it happen? 

After several games, he started to make notation. We found out couple things. His pieces are not developing as fast as his opponents (maybe opening isn’t solid) and according to my husband that his middle game isn’t that good. Sometimes he try to set up a trick to his opponent but when he was too focus on that trick then he miss some threatened piece. Is there a way to improve the middle game? 

Really appreciate all the useful tips. 

Often times at new level, if you see a promising threat or move, you will neglect your opponent's intention. For example you got excited because you can win his queen, and you ignore your opponent's threat.  What if the threat is a back rank mate? If you ignore the threat,you will lose the game because of back rank mate. You might have won the queen of your opponent but in return you will lose the game! So always remind him to always study his opponnent's last move. Before he make a move check if there is a tactical drawback. 

The late great trainer Dvoretsky always addresses the noticable weakness of his students by giving a lesson to be followed by exercises. Since you mentioned one of the weaknesses of your son, of forgetting to notice his opponent's threat, give some lesson and excerises about this.

For example show him an example where your son can win a pawn with a bishop move, but doing so he will lose his queen.

Then set up a position in which there is a move that will fork his opponent's two rooks. But his queen is under attack.  Now if your son see the knight fork, he will get excited because he can win one the rooks. Ask him if it is okay to fork the rook or his opponent has a stronger move that he needs to be addressed. Do these everyday. Two or 3  exercises of this kind everyday is enough.

Also always tell him to look at the whole board to see the position of all the pieces. Aside from playing tournaments, the easisest and best way that you can help your kid improve is let him solve chess puzzles everyday. Maybe 3 or 4 puzzles everyday is enought. A good puzzle book for beginner is World Champion's Guide to Chess by Polgar. A good mate problems for beginner is  Chess:5334 Problems by Laszlo Polgar.

Your son must be also aware of  how many defenders and attackers.  For example your bishop or pawn is under attack. Is your defender enought that after a series of exchange the trade is equal(not losing material)? You can use the counting method. You will count the the number of defenders and attackers. If the attacker and defender are equal, you won't lose a material. Rather than counting calculating the series of exchange can be also done. This has the benefit of improving calculation skills. You can set up series of exchange execersises. You can ask him that if capture this, will you win material after a series of exchanges? You can make easy example. A good example is two rooks attacking a pawn that only has one rook defender. Just think of set up positions for this.

In the opening just make sure your son castles and bring out all his pieces. Put his rooks on open file. Open with 1.e4 or 1.d4. 

These rules are dogmatic for advance players, but are good rules to follow by beginners.

1. Don't move the same piece twice in the opening

2. Don't bring the queen out to early.

Ok, I'm like let's say, 6.3 years older than your child sir. Now from my perspective seen, I'm quite an ok player. Perhaps even good. But anyway, at this young age, try to put in a lot of tactics. No need for a coach. Expensive people my dad says. Back to the point. There is this site named "lichess.org" even with a special child mode, where all communication and chat etc is auto switched off  good no? And there the tactics are from real games played. Maybe also on chess.com. But not meaning that chess.com isn't great too. But my advice is, when your child is young, no coach, just tactics, and with special "child mode" an account made on lichess.org. When your child is older, my age, roughly 11/12 then enroll on chess.com too. That's the wae. If people ask what the wae is to be better at chess, it is too do it this wae! See ya later! Oh and look up GJ_Chess Dirty chess tricks. Learn them to your child by heart, and voila!

Don't push him. Tell him not to be discouraged and that losing is part of becoming a good player. If he gets discouraged, give him a break, back off it a while maybe? Just teach him the basics, make sure he's having fun.

     Have him do the tactics if he wants, but seriously these frustrate me. The most important thing (yeah, yeah, I already said this) is to not let him get upset. Teach him some engames (rook and king, two rooks and a king queen and king), the piece values (Queen is 9 pts, Rook is 5, Bishops and Knights are 3, Pawns are one), don't worry about notation.

     Getting a coach is a great idea, I improved from barely knowing how to checkmate if I was up a couple Rooks to playing in tournaments and getting first place 50% of the time and winning money. Just make sure s/he is a good teacher and is patient. If you don't want a coach, then videos are a great idea. Not long games from grandmasters that are up to a couple hours long, but simple attacks/defenses. 

     Sorry it's so long XD

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Experience is golden. I competitively play chess from age 7 till now and am still doing so. It helps no doubt.

You MUST do tactics definitely, let him read something like Winning Chess Strategy for Kids, that should be his level, around age 10 transfer him from chesskid to chess.com. Do not do lichess.org because he might get addicted with UltraBullet (15 second games). I have done that before, and my rating went into a deep stall. 

The Crazy World of Ultrabullet is insane. Premoves 90% of time, crazy trick sacs, that will be his worst environment and was mine.