Getting started
What the pieces are worth, the A B C D of opening a game, writing your moves down, and the two rules everybody finds surprising.
Read more
Teaching pages
Learn chess
Graham’s own teaching material, written for the players at the club and useful to anyone learning.
-
Learn
-
Learn
Chess openings
How to start a game well: control the centre, develop your pieces, get the king safe.
Read more -
Learn
Opening lines
The openings and gambits the club plays — Evans, French, Sicilian, London and more — each with a board you can play through.
Read more -
Learn
Chess skills
The building blocks — forks, pins, skewers, and seeing one move further than your opponent.
Read more -
Learn
Tactics
Checks, captures and targets, then pins, skewers, removing the guard, and the plans that create them.
Read more -
Learn
Chess traps
Short, sharp ways games end early, and how not to fall into them.
Read more -
Learn
Endgames and pawn play
Pawn structures, the opposition, the crooked path, queening races, and the many ways a game ends in a draw.
Read more -
Learn
The Blackburne Shilling Gambit
A trap deep-dive: what happens after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nd4, and why the greedy reply loses.
Read more -
Learn
Blunders and dangerous squares
Most junior games are decided by a piece given away. The T.R.I.P. checklist, landmines, ticking bombs and the art of exchanges.
Read more -
Learn
Become a chess board ‘pirate’
Early attacks, gambits and daring sacrifices — not always sound, but a lot of fun.
Read more -
Learn
ECF Certificate of Excellence
The English Chess Federation’s award scheme — what Bronze and Silver ask you to know, and where the free practice sheets are.
Read more
Elsewhere
Playing and practising online
The club is one morning a week, and most children want to play more than that. These are the sites Graham points people to:
- Lichess — games, puzzles and lessons, free and without an account if you want.
- Chess.com — games, puzzles and lessons, with a free tier.
- Dorset Chess — local and junior chess across the county, including tournaments.
- Regency Chess — the retailer the club recommends for sets and boards.
These are other people’s sites, so the club has no say in what they show or ask for. A grown-up should be the one setting up any account.