Un día de ajedrez en Born to Learn

En el centro educativo de Born to Learn (BTL) en Moshi, Tanzania, nos sumamos a la celebración del día internacional del ajedrez el 20 de julio. Para ello contamos con un ajedrez gigante donado por Meliá Arusha que agradecemos de corazón.

Un nuevo juguete gracias a Meliá Arusha

El club de ajedrez de BTL es una ínfima parte de un gran proyecto educativo donde más de 300 niñas y niños de diversas edades y circunstancias reciben semanalmente educación, nutrición en un espacio acogedor.

Con la excusa del día del ajedrez, intentamos promocionar el juego ante los diversos grupos del colegio: guardería, el curso de inglés y los participantes de las actividades extraescolares.

Guardería

En la actualidad BTL cuenta con 4 clases de guardería con más de 100 niños y niñas de entre 3 y 6 años. Se trata de un programa de gran éxito que les ofrece educación y nutrición gratuitas en una edad fundamental para el desarrollo físico y cognitivo de nuestros pequeños.Además de los beneficios educativos y nutritivos, esto reduce la carga de trabajo para sus familias, especialmente las madres.

La enseñanza del ajedrez se puede adaptar a todas las edades. En este caso, es una excelente herramienta para el desarrollo de la memoria, capacidad psicomotriz, socialización y lenguaje, todo ello en un ambiente jovial.

Conociendo a los personajes

Realizamos una actividad de 40 minutos donde aprendieron los nombres de las piezas y pudieron caminar por el tablero experimentando líneas rectas, diagonales, colores y patrones.

Caminando por un nuevo mundo

Curso de inglés

Cada mañana un grupo de jóvenes de entre 15 y 18 años fuera del sistema escolar vienen a BTL a mejorar su nivel de inglés en preparación para reincorporarse al sistema educativo.

Un poco de teoría…

Con este grupo nos centramos en el ajedrez como juego, para entretenernos y relajar la mente después del intenso estudio, el ajedrez ocupa la mente y libera de otras preocupaciones.

…y mucha acción!

Los jóvenes comienzan a jugar y competir desde el primer día, aquí aprenden a jugar con la torre. Por primera vez, maestros y alumnos se enfrentan en igualdad de condiciones ante un nuevo reto.

Extraescolares

De 4 a 7 de la tarde BTL recibe a más de 150 alumnas y alumnos de primaria que vienen al centro después de sus clases de primaria para aprender música, jugar a baloncesto, revisar mates… y muchas actividades más, para complementar su educación y también para recibir una muy bienvenida cena temprana.

El ajedrez se encuentra entre estas actividades y contamos con más de 50 participantes en el Club de Ajedrez. El lunes realizamos actividades de exhibición y estaban muy ilusionados con el juguete nuevo, despertó también el interés de todos los demás.

El primer grupo más joven realizó una actividad más sencilla de colocar las piezas en el tablero, el ajedrez es un juego muy versátil que ofrece muchas actividades, con los niños es muy fácil porque siempre muestran su voluntad por jugar.

Preparados, listos, ¡ya!

El plato fuerte del día fue la partida por equipos de los mayores, que estuvo que enfrentó a los equipos de Jasinta y Manase, los vigentes campeones de BTL. La emoción y tensión era equiparable a la de cualquier gran evento deportivo y el público se implicó intensamente.

Máxima expectación

Finalmente, y como es habitual en Tanzania, la actividad finalizó con el jolgorio y la alegría que tanto apreciamos en este país. Aquí la vida siempre se celebra.

Cualquier excusa es buena para sonreír

A World of Chess in One Day

The Born to Learn Educational Center in Moshi, Tanzania, joined the celebration of the World Chess Day the 20th of July. For that purpose we used for the first time the giant chess-set that Meliá Arusha recently donated and that we wholeheartedly thank them for.

A new toy thanks to Meliá Arusha

The chess club in Born to Learn is just a tiny part of a much larger educational project where over 300 kids of all ages and circumstances visit our center in Newland every week for education, nutrition and mentoring.

With the excuse of the International Chess Day we showcased the game to a broader audience, first to a group of 23 Kindergarten kids (4-5 y/o), then to 20 kids from the English Course (14-17 y/o) and finally a general public of about 100 kids (12-16 y/o) that observed the exhibition matches.

Kindergarten

Currently Born to Learn (BTL) has 4 kindergarten classes totaling almost 100 kids. It is a very successful program that offers a much needed nutritional and educational basis on a fundamental age, it also provides a much needed time relief for their families.

Chess is a resource as any other for the kids on these ages, where they are learning very basic memory, motion and language skills and where the most important part is the development of their emotional and social values in good fun.

Getting to know the characters

We did a 40 minute activity where the kids learned the names of the pieces and they run around the board to experiment with the colors, lines and textures.

Stepping on a new world

English Course

Every morning there is a group of 20 kids of ages between 15 and 18 years old that for diverse reason haven’t been able to register in a school. BTL offers them the opportunity to improve their English level in preparation to reincorporating to school or to any other formation.

A bit of theory first…

With this group we focused on chess as a fun activity to relax the mind and to interact with the other kids in English, supervised by their teachers.

…and then a lot of action

When we teach chess, we start to play and compete from day 1, here teachers and students practice with the rook, the first piece we usually teach. You can see how they are engaged, entertained and they socialize in a different manner with their teacher and they release stress. For the first time, the playing field is leveled for teachers and students

After School Programs

From 4 to 7 pm BTL receives over 150 kids that after finishing school have the opportunity to play football, learn music, do handcrafts, review Maths or English… and many other activities that serve as a complement to their education and personal development. They also receive a much welcomed early dinner every day.

Among these activities we have the Chess Club that has over 50 regular participants. This was their day to shine and for starters they were ecstatic about the giant chess-set donation that BTL received.

The chess set by itself has been a great marketing strategy, it attracted the attention of all of the kids, including teachers. The first group of younger kids did a simple game of setting up the board, this shows how dynamic and simple can chess get to be, you don’t need to be a genius, just show your willingness to play.

Ready, get set, go!

The main course of the day was the big match-up of the big kids. Jasinta and Manase, the best players in the school, lead each a team of eight players that would take turns to move. The tension and excitement were great and you could see how the public would get involved, even if many were not familiar with the specifics of the game.

Maximum expectation

Finally, as it is common in Tanzania and a good reason why we keep coming, they all celebrated joyfully, jumping, laughing, dancing, sharing, because be it chess, music, winning, losing… life is always celebrated here.

Just another day in paradise

The Game of Kings – Lesson 1

This is a great opportunity to teach the game of chess, if you don’t know where to start, this is a simple stepping stone.

The King vs King is usually the first game we play with new kids. This game is a very good example of how beneficial teaching the game is for the children and also of how rewarding it is to teach it.

First lesson for the kids from Kelele Africa

The game is as basic as it gets, each player has his king only and has to capture the enemy’s king. Kings move in every direction one step at a time and they capture the pieces where they land.

So, who will win? For any adult this is a no-brainer, the game will always be a draw, since none of the Kings may approach the other one and therefore they would be wandering forever over the board. This what in game theory they call a solved game.

However, this ‘no-brainer’ process is anything but that, and it is obvious when you let kids play, because they can play this for hours.

This is when the magic happens and you can see how children start to develop on their own reasoning individually, at their own pace and spontaneously. Where there was nothing, now there is an structure, a concept, and idea.

There are three main steps you can clearly notice when the kids start to play this game:

• First, kids learn about consequences, initially their actions are random, they just move the king and wait to see what happens, but gradually they realize that among the 3 to 8 options they have in every move, some will be winning and some will be losing. After a while kids stop doing losing (illegal) moves.

• Secondly, when the kid has learnt no to do losing moves, i.e. not getting within range of the opponent’s king, he starts to wonder if his opponent has reached this stage. This is very important, since the kid realizes that reasoning is individual, he develops self consciousness and awareness. If he is winning constantly, he is aware that he knows something his opponent doesn’t and vice-versa.

• Finally, usually when all the kids have gone through the first two steps, the kids start to recognize the pattern. The kids will notice that there is no end to the game, and suddenly they are introduced to concepts such us endlessness and how the same set of circumstances will generate always the same results.

This process can take up a full lesson, even longer depending on the age of the kids, and it is always a pleasure to witness, it is like watching fireworks or popcorn popping gradually while kids learn on their own while they are having fun playing, and this is just day 1.

After we learnt about the King and his limitations, we will learn about his travelling efficiency, following the breadcrumbs in the 2nd lesson.