Chess classes for kids in Kuala Lumpur

For most of the second half of the 20th century, the world chess champion came from the Russian (Soviet) school — Botvinnik, Tal, Petrosian, Spassky, Karpov, Kasparov. That dominance came from a method, not luck: a systematic way of teaching where students learn why moves work — how to coordinate the pieces, how to calculate, and how to play the endgame — instead of memorising opening lines.

Today the same tradition is behind a new chess power. Uzbekistan’s young team won the Open section of the 2022 Chess Olympiad, and Nodirbek Abdusattorov became World Rapid Chess Champion in 2021 at just 17. They show that the method still wins against the best players in the world.

Our chess coaches are from Uzbekistan and have 10 years of experience teaching chess. They teach that Russian–Uzbek approach, adapted for children from age 5: a clear progression from the basics to real competitive play.

Classes follow the classical progression, adapted to each student’s level:

• How the pieces move and work together, and the basic checkmates
• Tactics: forks, pins, skewers, discovered attacks and combinations
• Endgames — king and pawn, rook endgames and other essential positions
• Opening principles: development, the centre and king safety, rather than memorised lines
• Planning in the middlegame and evaluating a position
• Analysing your own games to learn from mistakes

Two hours of lessons a week give the structure; steady practice in between is what makes it stick. Students who improve fastest usually play a few full games every week, solve a handful of tactics puzzles most days, and bring their games to class to go through them with the teacher.

Parents do not need to play chess to help. Asking your child to show you the best move in a puzzle, or to explain why they lost a game, builds the same habit of thinking before moving that the lessons teach.

Chess and programming train the same habits: thinking several steps ahead, breaking a big problem into smaller ones, checking your work for mistakes and staying focused for a long time. Chess classes run at the same campus as our coding and IT courses, so it is easy to combine them.