FIDE Chess Educator's Course
Join the Educator's Course
In 2009, a FIDE Trainers’ Commission (TRG) succeeded the FIDE Trainers’ Committee (formed in 1998) to bring a higher level of worldwide promotion and the certification of chess trainers for the education of chess players. It is an attempt to license trainers similar to trainers licensed by the International Olympic Committee. The main idea is to boost the importance of chess trainers in the world.
“One of the primary differences between children and adults is the lack of life experience found in children. This is one of the reasons why children rely on their imagination to compensate for the lack of experience, especially when it comes to dealing with difficult and novel concepts. It is of paramount importance for the chess educator to enter this world of imagination and build on the current framework for a child to understand various concepts”.
The Preparation of Teachers course has a dual approach; on the one hand to assist existing chess educators (high performance and raw beginner level), and on the other hand to introduce school educators to the world of chess. The PoT course is in essence a bridge between chess and education, merging the two worlds either from the teacher’s perspective or alternatively from the existing coach/ educator.
Imparting knowledge to children at various ages does not naturally fall within the ambit, and often patience set, of a chess coach/ player. The course will assist chess educators with creative ideas to share existing knowledge with children at various ages by considering the development stages and abilities of children to improve the quality of learning.
Chess in Education serves to be a valuable vehicle to establish chess within the education system. The preparation of teachers course aims to empower teachers with the basic knowledge and skill in order to teach children the game of chess at various ages.
The rationale behind the method is to utilize, firstly, the amazing gifts of teachers to enter the minds of children at a certain age to impart knowledge, and secondly, empower teachers with a new skillset to stimulate and maintain their personal growth and “mind health”.
The course has an holistic approach to childhood development and offers various and creative ways to utilize chess as a valuable tool for cognitive, social, emotional and physical development of children at specific ages.
The course is developed for online as well as face-to-face presentation. The lecturers in this specific course will focus mainly on the face-to-face delivery but will also introduce the creative and new online methods to engage children and learners at various levels. This is a very exciting and unique opportunity to be at the very start of the “new normal” that the COVID pandemic is forcing most of the educational world.