We at BayAreaChess are very excited about the scope and number of our enrichment programs, which total over 80 throughout the entire Bay Area. A few of the many questions we often get from parents in considering choosing between various enrichment offerings is: How much can I expect my child to learn?  And, How fast can we expect him/her to progress? I enjoy answering these questions, because it gives me the opportunity to talk about the value I believe that our after school classes offer to children, and it has nothing to do with chess.

    In a typical after school class, there will be a period of time devoted to gathering the kids and taking roll. After the class is settled, a lesson may begin, followed by play. After allotting some time for cleanup, realistically, about 45 minutes is devoted to actual in class chess. If a student in any discipline devotes only 45 minutes a week to excelling in anything, there can be very little improvement. It will definitely be up to the child to put in extra work outside of class in order to improve significantly.

    So where does BAC and any quality enrichment program fit into this picture? With a limited amount of time, our goal and focus is to inspire, to make chess fun and enjoyable, to be able to offer something to both the serious student wanting to improve and the casual player who wants to have fun and play with friends. Our coaches serve as a guide, ready to answer questions and introduce new things that will want to make our students thirst for more.

    The greatest lesson we teach in all our classes is learning to lose. This is the greatest skill a child can take away from our classes, because dealing with adversity and losing is part of life, and a child who can learn how to deal with these situations over the chessboard; persevering in difficult positions or down material, being able to lose and say “good game” to his/her opponent after and ready for the next challenge, these are skills that they will be able to apply to any activity they do for the rest of their lives. I teach in my classes that losing is fundamental to improving, and you have to lose in order to get better. Once this is instilled into the mindset, children learn a skill that will give them confidence in life, as they are able to learn from adversity in order to do better next time. 

    NBA legend Michael Jordan said, “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed”. Our program teaches chess, and we also teach life skills that we hope students can apply to all areas of their life this year and beyond.

Sincerely,

        Abel Talamantez, Director of Enrichment, & the BayAreaChess Enrichment Team

        enrich@bayareachess.com

Highlights of the Month
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We would like to highlight three of our schools this month:

BAC Elite Team
While we offer over 80 enrichment programs after school, we also offer classes at the highest levels on the weekends at our headquarters. Our BAC Elite Team class is just one example. Lead by Grandmaster Cristian Chirila, it serves as the training ground for 10 of the top scholastic players in the country, every one with a USCF rating over 2000. We also offer structured classes for all level of players, taught by master level coaches and our top enrichment coaches.

If there are two tournaments in a year that every chess player should make it a priority to attend it has to be the Grade Level Championship in the winter and the Super State Championship in the spring.

This year, the 2015 CalChess Grade Level Championship is held on the first weekend of December at the Convention Center. We are bringing the tournament back to the Bay Area, and hoping for a great weekend with fun, exciting competition and many players bringing home trophies!

Let us introduce this tournament for those who are new to tournaments:
Sections: players are grouped into sections at any tournament, and at this tournament, each Grade is forming a section itself. So we'll have 13 different sections from Kindergarten to Grade 12.
Schedule and Time Control: Players in Kindergarten through Grade 3 are competing only on one day, Saturday, December 5th. They'll have 5 rounds, each round has a time control of G/30;d5, which means each player has 30 minutest to play with 5 minutes delay before each move. So one round roughly lasts for an hour.
Players in Grade 4 and up are competing in a 2-day event: Saturday and Sunday, and they'll have 6 rounds of G/60;d5, each player has 60 minutes to play with 5 minute delay, so one round can last up to two hours.
Prizes: Each player with a winning record will receive a trophy, and all others are earning a medal for their performance. K-Grade3 needs to have 3 points out of the maximum 5, while Grade 4-12 will need to have 3.5/6 to get a trophy.

More information at this webpage: www.bayareachess.com/grades
You need to register in advance, because late fee is usually turned on 3-4 days before the tournament. Register at: www.bayareachess.com/my/grades.
We are sending out an orientation email on Friday, 12/4, for every registered player who provide us with an email address. We are also working on publishing the standings and pairings before each round, so that parents can look up pairings on their smart devices :)
Free parking and the convention center's nice atmosphere will hopefully contribute to a great experience.

You can also call 408-409-6596 or email ask@bayareachess.com for more information.
Hope to see the BayAreaChess School Teams on the trophy ceremony's podium many times this December! Go Strong and Bring home some Trophies!
            

        Judit Sztaray, Chief Organizer, and the BayAreaChess Team
        judit@bayareachess.com

Fall terms of our Enrichment classes are ending end of November, and throughout December & January across out 80+ programs in the larger Bay Area. You can always check out the schedule of the term at your school by finding your school on our enrichment webpage: www.bayareachess.com/enrich
You can also try with the following link by replacing school with your school's name:
www.bayareachess.com/my/school
Should you have any question, or need help looking up your user ID, or getting the password, please email us at ask@bayareachess.com and we'll get back to you in no time.

Did you know that we started a new weekend club in Palo Alto?
Coach James is offering a Saturday fun two hours of chess activities between 3PM and 5PM.

Time: Saturdays, 3PM-5PM
Dates: November 21, December 5, 12, 19, 26 (No club on 11/28)

Location: Covenant Presbyterian Church
Address: 670 East Meadow dr, Palo Alto (map) - park in the back :)

There are several channels where you can connect with us and get updates on our events and specials.