pIsh has been kind enough to give me his copy of Igor Khmelnizky's Chess Exam and Training Guide.  You remember me banging on a couple of years ago about knowing your chess profile, having an idea of what your strengths and weaknesses are?  Well, this book does what I was telling you to do: it gives you a rating for a set of diverse features.nbsp; So, if your study of your own games gives you no clues, or you'd like a second opinion, I think you can't do better than this book.

Our esteemed colleague Dan Frean asked me recently about teaching chess in Maths lessons. In the spirit of BBC's Any Answers, I don't think ignorance should be any barrier to trumpeting my ideas...  I'll just dump the e-mail here, and add the links and the examples in later when I've got a bit more time.

I'm anxious not to use chess in a way that emphasises existing differences
in chess ability...

I'll soon fix that...

First, we discussed some statements from Jonathan Rowson ( Chess for Zebras ), who very nearly said:

Chess is more a game of skill than a game of knowledge.

He did indeed say:

Improvement begins at the edge of your comfort zone" (p.14)

[ Vygotsky ! shouted Ish.]