Chess has great historical significance in the West, but Go is a better choice for universal education in abstract strategy. Most important reason: the handicapping system is rational. Chess handicapping has a way of leading to hurt feelings in young children: "see? I beat you without my knights! you suck!"<p>Also, the rules are simpler, the play is more complex, and (most subjectively) it teaches better lessons outside the context of the game. I would rather people's native mode of competition be "oops looks like this mostly belongs to me now" rather than "I am going to relentlessly pursue you until you're completely murdered"
Compulsory chess education may work in Armenia, where chess has achieved almost 'national pastime' status, but it would fail terribly in the UK or US. Westerners are incredibly strong-willed, and you'd probably incite more interest in chess by banning it than by forcing everyone to learn it.<p>People in the west relish controversy, whether it's violent video games being pulled from shelves, or dungeons and dragons being linked to satanism. These incidents only serve to increase the popularity of the banned game. As they say, there's no such thing as bad publicity (except in your own obituary).
A similar question would be, "Should every child be entered into a mathematics contest?" Mathematics contests, like chess games, have a win-and-lose aspect to show who has really learned the skills, a progression of skill development through practice, and a mixture of knowing technical tools through deliberate practice and creative insight developed by broad experience with competitions. A good discussion of the pros-and-cons of widespread schoolchild participation in mathematics contests (which has been going on in some countries<p><a href="http://www.komal.hu/lap/archivum.e.shtml" rel="nofollow">http://www.komal.hu/lap/archivum.e.shtml</a><p>for a century) can be found on the website of the Australian Mathematics Trust.<p><a href="http://www.amt.canberra.edu.au/mc20011.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.amt.canberra.edu.au/mc20011.html</a>
One thing chess taught me -- for better or for worse, I'm not sure -- is that for certain kinds of intelligence there is a very cleanly delineated hierarchy among people. There were chess players that were better than me at the game and they would usually win. There were chess players who were worse than me and I would regularly beat them.
We had just learned how to play chess in school. I was about 10 years old I think. Another guy challenged me to a game... he was friendly, but not exactly someone I would have called a friend at the time. We set up in a corner of the library, and he nailed me with the 4 move checkmate. He was extremely satisfied with himself, mainly I think because he had managed to hustle me. He wasn't any better at chess than I was, he had just heard of the 4 move checkmate before I did. I was, if not crushed, somewhat perturbed that this could happen. In my 10 year old life, it was a completely new experience. I realized that playing a game had a lot more to do with just knowing the rules.<p>In school, you tend to play games with people who are your friends for the most part. Chess is a bit different though... you seem to end up playing against people you don't know well or at all, yet especially when you are starting out in chess, trying to work out what sort of player (and by extension, what sort of person) your opponent is becomes quite important. I think there are a useful set of skills to do with that, which you would otherwise miss out on as a kid.
My knee-jerk reaction to 'made' was of course not. And then I thought about it. We 'make' children learn how to do fundamental mathematics and it doesn't seem do them harm (yes there are serious arguments about when and how we should do that, but setting that aside...) I have always been in favor of chess being offered in school. I've always thought that if it is good enough for West Point, then it is good enough for the local school system. Even out here in the 'sticks' of Idaho, we have a thriving academic chess program with no apparent damage. This is merely an escalation of elective to requirement--- still no harm. Obligatory admission; I regularly play tournament chess as a rated player (silly addiction :) ).
Instead of what?<p>On a more serious note, this would be a complete non-issue, except that education is state controlled. So now it's politics.
Where it private people could choose what's best for their child without choosing what's best for everyone elses.
As an occasional Go player, I mainly clicked through to see if the very first comment on the page would be someone mentioning that Go is a better choice than chess. The internets do not disappoint, regardless of whether that's a true statement or not.
I think kids should be taught a few classic games, chess, checkers, mancala, backgammon, etc. For the simple fact that most of those games are universal, regardless of language the chess rules are the same, so if there is a board you can strike up interaction regardless of language.<p>It also introduces rules and strategic thought. Some kids might get into chess, most probably won't, but like most of the stuff in school, part of it is to expose kids to concepts that they might have an interest to persue.
I was usually top of all my classes up until my teenage years (and got lazy and became the chancer I am now!) so I was pushed into playing chess, joining the chess club, etc, and I totally sucked! I could randomly beat people who barely knew the rules of the game but otherwise I was at the bottom of every ladder going, despite practicing.<p>So I'm not convinced chess is a natural fit for everyone or a way to increase intelligence. It did nothing for me except make me realize I couldn't be good at everything that was vaguely academic. Or maybe it says something about a certain <i>type</i> of intelligence that I totally lack(ed)? Scrabble, OTOH, I can win any time..
I think anything that encourages focussed/prolonged abstract thinking about complex systems should be encouraged. In chess, the mental discipline to think through a series of moves without actually seeing them, and also to formulate heuristic strategies ('if i put this piece here, it will stop any threats coming from...'). There probably is not enough of that at school - I think reading and analysing novels is the closest you get. And some kids do that <i>very</i> passively (like they'll completely miss the implied point of chapters).
While children should be exposed to both go and chess, I would argue against compulsory extended training.<p>There comes a point where much of extended training in chess is counter-productive to being a productive human being.<p>I would trade my Fide Master title in a heartbeat for more learning of discrete math(there is no reason predicate logic cannot be taught in junior high school) and programming concepts at an early age.
Chess isn't a bad thing. Neither is devoting yourself to mastering a subject. But like the article says, there are other equally good or better pursuits we can teach from an early age. So choose chess, go, piano, painting, math, programming, writing, golf, tennis, or any number of things. Just do something and do it well.