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Target-oriented Research of the Strategic Programmes on Chess Activities as Specialized
Experimental Platform for Dynamic Development of Public Education
Srbuhi Gevorgyan, Vladimir Karapetyan, Ruzanna Petrosyan
Khachatur Abovian Armenian State Pedagogical University
Key words: education, research, school, chess.
Abstract
The Republic of Armenia, as a world superpower in chess, is engaged in continuous
development and implementation of specific strategic programmes which are aimed not only at
providing high achievements in chess, but also at (1) modernizing the educational sphere in the
Republic of Armenia, (2) increasing the quality indexes of chess education – as a basic resource in
the context of global educational system, (3) considerable deepening of education subjects’ cognitive
interests towards education through the possibilities provided by chess, (4) developing learners’
educational-cognitive motivation, (5) creating conditions for activating learners’ mental potential
and the abilities to expose them, as well as promoting the awareness of the social value of chess in
interpersonal relations.
The process of widening and enriching the modern teaching technologies and innovative IT
resources throughout the world has opened up new opportunities for promoting the formation of
professional and personal competences, in particular, on the basis of the headway of new methods
and ways of teaching, and widening the underlying guidelines of educational activities. Nevertheless,
because of either scarce, limited potential, insufficient executive efforts made or utterly complicated
and persistently revised and changed procedures, the schemes of efficient teaching/learning models at
certain time hindered or slowed down the implementation of the cognitive, executive and operational
constituents of perception, understanding and assimilation in teaching/learning. This is evidenced in
a variety of researches published in different countries on the difficulties and typological analyses in
the realm of education.
The psychological analysis of the models of teaching moves us into the field of activating
learner’s own activities taking into consideration the necessity of learner’s new cognitive and
exploring possibilities activating the reflexive field as well. The development of new concepts is
based on a series of fundamental ideas which might be important for the activation of cooperative
component in organizing effective joint activities. The concept proposed is exclusively based on the
idea that chess, due to its structural-functional potential, may procure the role of a stimulating
model for teaching/learning, comprising, in a concise format, at least, the following instances: 1)
the perception of educational situation (situations typical of chess), sorting out the intermediate
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problems involved in the given situation, 2) the stability and proportion of emotional tension and
attention (sustained attention is a key factor for organizing teaching/learning processes), 3) the
presence of persistent spontaneous feedback in teaching/learning different from other educational
processes, 4) the control over the situation and your own activities, 5) the continuous monitoring and
evaluation of the situation and your own position in it.
Although the constituents mentioned above are significant, from the perspectives of providing
the relevant constituents of teaching/learning process, they do not suffice for giving a comprehensive
explanation for the ways that the structural and system-based peculiarities of this model are
expressed under the circumstances of harmonious integration of cognitive and social realms. While
discussing the subject matter from this standpoint, we should separate the essential components of
educational system which would be reckoned as sufficient for setting forward new models in
teaching/learning, with one precondition reserved: the educational involvement of chess activities or
the intellectual possibilities of the game of chess taken apart, still cannot claim to single out the real
role of chess in teaching/learning processes, unless the models developed encompass the learner’s
unique age and individual characteristics. Consequently, if the teaching/learning through the
academic subject of chess is referred to, there is a need to develop certain pattern-based
configuration, which, besides being an open one, should also comprise the components of age
development and proportion of pertinent abilities. Furthermore, the researches on the psychological
processes – based on general methodological orientation – might conventionally be classified into
three major phases: researches which refer to (1) the intellectual potentials of chess, (2) the
educational value of chess, and (3) the social value of chess. It goes without saying that all the phases
declared appear interconnected and mutually completing, however, as we perceive it, the target-based
researches of the aspects announced would enlarge the field of evaluation of the educational and
cultural functions of chess. The functions mentioned are introduced below together with the current
situation of the research of these components, as well as, the possibilities to enlarge them in
accordance with the vision of the expert group of the Chess Academy of Armenia. Thus, (a) while
analyzing the current state of the research issues of cognitive or epistemological resources of
chess, it was confirmed that the sphere had been submitted to a considerable number deep researches
in different countries. It particularly refers to the surveys into the processes connected with attention,
concentration, memory, thinking, imagination (with particular reference to the case studies on such
chess masters as José Raúl Capablanca y Graupera, etc.). (b) The exclusive role of the game of
chess is revealed in the ways of expression of higher psychological activities, more precisely, the
intellectual value of chess is shown from the standpoint of public consciousness, in particular,
which yet does not comprise the presence and the real picture of subjective or individual
awareness of the level of perception and evaluation of the intellectual value of chess. In our
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opinion, what should be shown explicitly is the demonstration of the real itinerary that the process of
interiorization or transformation of the evaluation of intellectual values covers under intercultural
integration. Meanwhile, taking into consideration that it has been for only some years since chess
was involved in the education system of the Republic of Armenia, we consider it necessary to provide
certain illustration of certain peculiarities of psychological processes, including the age peculiarities
of intellectual development starting from the early schooling age. The present series of researches has
been carried out through psychological and sociological methods covering the research domain
ranging from the interest towards chess – noticed among the population of the Republic of Armenia –
to the chess itself as an integrative transferor of intellectual values. For surveying into the
peculiarities of subjective perception of intellectual values of chess, a series of target-oriented
researches has been carried out in different provinces of the Republic of Armenia, and together with
the brief description and analyses of the surveys, the researches embark the vision of advanced
progress as well.
Chess as an educational value. Education, as a universal human value, has been highlighted
and evaluated all over the world from the perspectives of social consciousness, while the issue of
subjective or individual awareness of the importance or significance of chess education in child’s
educational activities still needs further investigations.
In his “Why offer chess in schools” Jerry Meyers discusses all the advantages that serve to
ground the integration of chess within the school curriculum. To his view the curricular enhancement
in favour of chess helps to increase children’s academic progress, as this game enhances the
development of the following skills: (1) concentration of attention: the students become aware of
the advantages of attentive observation and concentration (i.e. irrespective of their abilities, if
children do not keep focused on what’s going on, they certainly won’t be able to react); (2)
virtualization: students are usually reminded to draw beforehand the imaginative picture of stepwise
successions. However, Jerry Meyers does not make a special reference to the learning difficulties that
constantly emerge at the lessons of chess or while completing the pertinent home assignments. The
surveys and discussion organised with 500 teaches of chess in some provinces of Armenia evidenced
that the major educational difficulties in assimilating chess, as a curriculum discipline, are mainly
related to the following objective units: (1) “low concentration degree”, (2) “assessment”, (3)
“organization of group work”, (4) “inclusive class management”.
In the Chess Academy of Armenia with the help of Egoscope (50 millisecond record) the
peculiarities of attention (from the perspectives of attention stability, ability to follow a moving
object, intellectual flexibility and other criteria) of schoolchildren of low, average and high academic
progress among the students with certain experience of playing chess between the 2 nd and 4th grades
of secondary schools number 50 and 60 in Yerevan (Armenia), as well as among the 4th-grade
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students in Nagorno-Karabagh Republic without any experience of playing chess (in total: among
450 students) were studied. Besides that, with practical use of the version for children of Burdon-
Ruddick test [1] the peculiarities of the attention of the schoolchildren between the 2nd and 4th grades
were studied – but with one difference: instead of the images “house” (instead of the image of house
the image of window was asked to be added) and “tree” (the missing part of a leaf was asked to be
added) determined by the method mentioned above, were substituted by the chess pieces. The
quantitative analysis of the diagnosis of the degree of attention focusing showed that in the group of
the 2nd-grade students the degree of concentration resulted in 91%, among the 3rd-grade students it
was 85% and among the schoolchildren of the 4th grade it turned out to be 58%. A propos, a similar
picture of decreasing indexes may concurrently be observed in the dynamics of educational
motivation. It might be stated that among the 4th-grade students the decrease in attention stability is
motivated not only by the increase of the number of academic disciplines at that very grade, but also
by the decrease of interest towards learning: peculiarities of the age crisis which was evidenced by
parents as well. The individually organized interviews with parents, in particular, have supported that
children spend less time on home-assignments and tasks. Consequently, certain educational
difficulties that occur at that age hinder the schoolchildren’s mental development which, as a matter
of fact, adds up certain indifference in children’s attitude towards learning. Thus, there are all the
possible bases to conclude that the educational difficulties, that occur on regularly basis, considerably
obstacle the “crystalisation” of the positive educational instances and motives and deepen the
educational failures fixed. The daily increasing educational failures result in a decrease of children’s
self-esteem. Using numerous scholars’ perceptions and concepts set forth on the role of chess
activities aimed at increasing attention stability, we carried out a special experiment to clarify mainly
the following two issues: (a) children’s reaction to moving objects and (2) the interconnections
between the above mentioned reactions and some individual characteristics (self-confidence,
psychologically balanced nature, tolerance, etc.).
There is a need to find out the time of reaction among 2nd-4th-grade students in the conditions of
the application of “Reaction to moving object” method. While completing 20 assignments, the speed
of angle completion maintained at the rate of 100 degrees per second. The 3 cases recorded (reaction
before the time set, timely reaction, reaction delayed) evidence considerable changes in various
answers; however, the reaction to the moving object (15 and more) prevailed in every case. It turns
out that measuring the reaction time allows envisaging children’s social values as well. The
discussion of the issue from this viewpoint sets us closer to Meyer’s and other authors’ statements
and claims according to which in the course of time it’s 1) tolerance, 2) sensibility, 3) balanced
judging, 4) analysis through specific method, 5) planning, 6) abstract way of thinking, 7) multi-factor
judgment skills that develop in children [ ].
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Nevertheless, none of these skills taken in isolation is typical of chess, as they are drilled in
different aspects of the game [ ]. Consequently, the methodology of developing the educational value
of chess must be based on a number of fundamental proofs. It must be explicitly evidenced by: (1)
the relationship between the education motives and teaching/learning chess, (2) the comparative
analysis of the indexes of academic progress in assimilating chess and other subjects involved in the
curriculum of primary classes (3) the transference of intellectual abilities through chess (that is to say,
complex of actions) to the domains of other parallel subjects taught at the same grade. In both the
provinces of the Republic of Armenia and in Nagorno-Karabagh Republic in the period from 4 to 6
months from the standpoint of this approach through a large number of investigations carried out
with the help of Egoscope among the schoolchildren of the age between the 2nd and 4th grades it
became evident that there is a close linkage between the psychological activities and educational
motivation. The major achievements registered among the children playing chess were the cause-and-
effect relations mastered by the children investigated, and to which we referred to in details in the
interviews immediately after the experiment. The interviews were constantly based on “why?”,
“how?”, “what for?”, “when?” and other types of inquiry, however, in the course of the interviews it
became clear that the complex nature of verbal communication did not allow the children to think
aloud and express their thoughts and viewpoints during the game. This seems to be the possible
reason why the whole process of game was persistently monitored and methodologically guided by a
category-holding chess player. The aim of the game was to teach the children of the focus group not
only to bring the game initiated to the end, but also to make decisions on the priorities previously
determined for every single step taken, as well as the step or steps to be necessarily taken in future.
The aim addressed does not seem to be really difficult in the case of the game, nevertheless, actually,
the decision made on certain step in the game, as well as, the appropriate comparison of the step to be
taken in 3 positions facilitated by the experienced chess instructor, results rather difficult; and, from
the perspectives of the results, it provided with pertinent guarantees for objective chess consultancy
aimed at the formation of the reflexion on the process proper.
The problem is that within the group format of the lessons of chess it is impossible to model the
pertinent activities in a relevant way that it could involve more components of consultancy and
monitoring over the process. In reality, during a real-time game the category-holding chess player in
charge of the monitoring, assessment and correction of mistakes, due to his immediate participation,
provides the young learner with the opportunity to interiorize the set of activities embraced in
different processes enabling her/him to perform in future similar functions all by herself / himself.
This quality gets even more consolidated as schoolchildren are trained to keep separate “pieces”
of situation in memory (one by one). The schoolchild is actually taught to think first and then act. The
succession of actions is maintained and assessed by the category-holding chess player. The child also
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gradually learns to address questions to himself/herself: (1) “If I do this, what will happen and how
can I tackle the consequences”[ ]. As at early ages school children’s memory is mainly mechanical,
the category-holding chess player-instructor is obliged to reiterate the questions and verify whether
the child has understood it or not. As a result, it becomes clear not only that the child’s cognitive
search is not only guided, but also that there is a relevant basis for the child to combine the elements
of convergent and divergent thinking. Due to the immediate participation or support of the category-
holding chess player, who appears in the roles of consultant, corrector and opponent, the detailed
clarification of the basis of the activities performed by the child gradually results in a productive
choice of plan-based and target-oriented steps. Though the experiments initiated in the realm of the
subject matter have not been completed yet, the results obtained show that the inner planning or
mental envisaging of the strategy of stepwise activities proceeds in an incomparably quick way when
the consulting chess player simultaneously addresses similar questions to at least two players,
irrespective of the fact who is playing at the given moment. Consequently, every player shows his/her
own variant (alternative) to act taking into account the presence of opponents and proof claimer. The
three separate standpoint roles of one and the same player (his/her own, his/her rival’s and his/her
instructor-chess player’s) naturally create a cognitive dissonance which might find an optimal
solution if the instructor-chess player does not insist on the idea of final winner or loser, at least, in
the first stage of teaching/learning. Considering the enrichment of the chess experience as the main
achievement, the schoolchild gets focused on separate processes, and not on the result proper, as
there appears awareness that the processes scheduled correctly are more likely to result in the
outcomes expected. Furthermore, the simultaneous performance of different roles grows into an
authentic chess activity and not into separate pieces of instruction which, in the course of time, are
likely to be reshapes or forgotten because of a disproportional application or combination of the
components of control/monitoring, testing and assessment.
The mechanisms of activation of specific components and functions of cognitive searching
activities open up actual paths for developing a model aimed at uplifting the educational and
cognitive activities, which has been referred to as a hypothesis at the beginning of the present paper.
We reckon the development of such a model necessary, from both activity management and
correction perspectives, for facilitating the transmissibility of knowledge from sphere to sphere. In
this respect, a close connection between chess and mathematics there has been discovered, expressly,
from the perspectives of algorithm-based thinking.
The educational value of chess is emphasised by other scholars as well, as, for instance, by F.
Kazemi and his colleagues in their respective researches (Kazemi, 2011)**, the results of which point
out that the students who play chess gain more achievements in both metacognitive skills and solving
math problems. Moreover, there is a considerable and definitely positive correlation between the
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students’ metacognitive and problem-solving mental skills. Thus, chess can change into an effective
means if there is certain objective to develop higher-category mental skills.
Chess as a social value. In point of cat, we think that, though the game participants establish no
direct verbal interaction, their actual planning is guided through the inner speech and non-verbal
means of communication (gestures, facial movements, etc.), expressing, thus, in the unity of speech
and thinking the expression of interpersonal and intrapersonal ways of thinking (claimed by
Gardner). In the case of social value, we have prioritized the will-based qualities which are expressed
primarily as decisiveness, readiness for autonomy and self-control. We think that the above
mentioned qualities play a crucial role in interpersonal relations, as well as in the process of their
management. Through the experiment real-life situations have been observed allowing the
schoolchildren to make use of hints, prompts or peers’ or group-mates’ assistance. We were
particularly interested in the conditions and the types of assistance that the schoolchildren opted for
(some details, tools, strategy ways and methods of performance, etc.) for joint interaction. As it
became clear, schoolchildren’s reflexive and rational judgements are based on the activation of the
processes of performance (see Ferguson, 1986)*.
To sum up, we must state that, establishing connections between the chess activities and the
further development of chess education, motivated by those activities, with the simultaneous
investigation and implementation of the results of the investigation of the three groups of closely
interconnected spheres (intellectual, educational and social values of chess), we may verify in
practice the bases for developing the empirical models aimed at instigating the educational activities
meant to convert chess in education into a platform for consolidating the interdisciplinary links.
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References
Ferguson, R. (1986). “Developing Critical and Creative Thinking through Chess,” report on
ESEA Title IV-C project presented at the annual conference of the Pennsylvania
Association for Gifted Education, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
F. Kazemi, M., Yektayar, A.M. & Bolban Abad( 2011). Investigation the impact of chess play on
developing meta-cognitive ability and math problem-solving power of students at
different levels of education. Report on the 4th International conference of Cognitive
science.
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