Ive reached a block

now ive been playing chess for 6 months now and ive really come a long way from where i started by playing every day and learning from friends in chess club. my skill has been dramaticlly improving, but lately my skill increase has started to platue, and slow down to where im no longer noticing any increase of skill by just playing. what things can i do to start to get my skill on a roll again. i would like to prepare myself for september when i start going back to tournaments with USCF. thank you 

read books. play through instructive games. get annotated games collections. etc..

* to plateau

Stop playing chess for a while and your passion will return shortly.

oh i still have passion, i love it and will continue to play everyday, its just that my skill dosn't seem to be going up, and can you recomend any books pdve?

I can tell you the books that have contributed the most to my improvement, along with a few others I'd definitely recommend (Ratings are OTB ratings, not internet ratings):

The Inner Game of Chess by Andrew Soltis (read this when I was 1400)

Bishop v Knight: The Verdict by Steve Mayer (read this when I was 1800)

Chess Lessons by Viktor Popov (read this when I was 2000)

Grandmaster Preparation: Calculation (read this when I was 2050)

And am about 2120 right now.

Other books that definitely have helped:

Winning Chess Tactics and Winning Chess Strategies by Yasser Seiriwan (read when I was 1100)

Middlegame Strategy With the Carlsbad Pawn Structure (read when I was 1700)

My Great Predecessors - Part 1 (read when I was 2000)

do tactic excercises! this is the most importat for improve at your level.

Next, understand the main ideas of x opening you play.

Uhm - Absolutely NOT!  Before trying to study openings, you need to understand positional aspects of the game as well.  The concept of weak squares, backwards pawns, when doubled pawns are strong and when they are weak, when an isolated pawn (especially the Queen Pawn) is strong and when it's weak, coordination of pieces, color complexes, understanding how a Dark Squared Bishop can have direct impact on the Light Squares.  Understanding the purpose behind moves and not just playing them either out of habit, or simply because they are aesthetically pleasing, etc.  You have a lot of work to do before you start delving into Openings.

i believe this is part of study openings XD!

No because when you study openings, it lends itself to certain middlegame ideas frequently, and others very rarely.  For example, if you study the King's Indian Defense, it will do you ZILCH in helping you understand IQP situations.

A middlegame book that features games using various openings is more effective at teaching middlegame concepts than studying a book full of games using one opening.

If you really want to improve, you need to understand all aspects of the game, and only after that, do you decide on openings to study.  Not the other way around.  Next thing you know, you do take on the King's Indian Defense, and somehow, you end up in a weird scenario where Black gets an IQP position late in the middlegame.  Nothing says this is impossible, it's just extremely rare.  But if you have already studied the general ideas of IQP positions, you have a better shot at knowing what to do any surviving than if you based all of your studying on positional play and strategy strictly based off games that featured the King's Indian Defense.

ok last time i checked bullet dosnt help at all, and thanks thriller fan would you like to play me sometimes and give me some feedback id apriciate it

Start by not doing this. Keep solving lots of tactical puzzles. Keep playing slow time controls and analyze afterwards with a stronger player. I hit that plateau as well but recently I feel I have been making small steps forwards improving.

noleryer wrote:

Play lots and lots of bullet.

As mattyf9 wrote

Practice tactics, do not play blitz/bullet and
analyze your games after you have played them.

Find out what you will do different if in the same position again.

For a start try to understand why your move 6 in the game with yousf_fawzy
is a terrible blunder.

Find a better move 16 (with continuation) in your game with RG1951.

Always check for threats, captures and checks (read Dan Heisman) before you move
and after every move by the opponent. Then you will stop making moves like 8 and 9
in your game with Buzzzz, move 10 in the game with Lovely_Jasmine and move 16 in
the game with varrliukass. (And maybe moves like 8 in the game with CANALLON.)

If you would like to read anything you could maybe try looking at

The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chess, Third Edition by Patrick Wolff,

the Winning Chess Series by Seirawan and the Comprehensive Chess Course Series by Alburt.

Good luck!

Sadler is an asset to this thread and forum for actually taking time to analyze your games, that's phenomenal of you man.

I don't think I can give advice on this because I haven't achieved huge ratings increases. I will say that since I started playing on chess.com, my rating went from about 975 to 1208 in 10 minute rapid, and I studied a lot of tactics during that time.

Just think critically about your games. Thoroughly annotate them, and you will learn from your mistakes.

To TS, read chess books.

i learned to play 6 months ago too and experienced the same thing. i could not get over 1300 for awhile then  i took 2 weeks off and when i came back i felt stronger. maybe the material you learn needs some time to be conceptualized and fully understood. now i am about 1500 in correspose.

While i agree it can help your tactics, playing bullet is not gonna help a 1000 rated player get better. It will only allow him to continue to make the same mistakes because he has no time to think. Playing slowly against stronger players will allow him to see the mistakes he's making. Something bullet won't do. Bullet for him will just be a bunch of blunders only to end with a bunch of mindless premoves.

noleryer wrote:

Bullet and Blitz work on your tactics for you, trust me i know what im talking about on this, this is how i improved over 400 USCF points without studying one opening.

I want you to study this game and get whatever you can get.

It's not a GM game. It has many blunders and mistakes. But you can learn from a lot from this game. Study it carefully.

You may have many questions. I am not gonna answer them. It's you who must find the answers. Agree?

Well, I don't know whether are you member of http://chesstempo.com/ already - if you are not, you ought to register. I know from my own experience, that my strength increased. I used to train there every day and I got constant improvement: http://chesstempo.com/chess-statistics/ardweaden . Free, really quite high quality and, most important of all, much easier and practical to learn from then from books.