Some time ago I posted about my oldest son's newfound interest in Chess. You can read that here. I thought today I'd give a bit of an update on this.

It's funny—in the months since that time, my youngest son has developed a passion for Shogi, Japanese chess. Both Shogi and Chess derive from the same game that was played in ancient India, but they developed in different ways and are quite different in certain ways. For example, in Shogi, you can return captured pieces to the board. It's interesting watching my kids argue about which is better.

I don't know Shogi very well, so my youngest can already beat me. I keep forgetting the rules, but even though he's only nine, he grasped them very quickly and has a very instinctive feel for the game. He's also managed to beat his teachers at school who are good at Shogi (or claim to be) so maybe this is a talent for him. The teachers contacted us to tell about that, it's not just his boasting, so I know it's accurate. I'm trying to encourage him to keep it up anyway and I'm trying to increase my knowledge of the game quickly so I can play with him.

Anyway, back to my oldest son and Chess. I never studied chess to any great degree, so I am not very good at the game. In fact I was probably around my son's age when I last put much effort into the game. Luckily I am still good enough to stay ahead of my son and beat him. His moves, however, are growing smarter and he has surprised me several times, capturing pieces when I carelessly moved without looking well. As a result I'm finding myself paying closer attention to each game, as I try to double-check every move to make sure I don't move into anything stupid. He hasn't shown any kind of planning yet and hasn't tried to lure me into anything, but I can imagine him progressing to that level next. Although he doesn't seem to be grasping the game quite as instinctively as his younger brother is grasping Shogi, he is already playing pretty well. It is probably only my experience that's keeping me barely ahead of him!

I think in addition to studying Shogi to play my youngest son, I'm also going to have to study Chess a bit to keep up with my oldest son! On one hand, it's too bad they didn't learn to like the same game so they could play each other, but on the other hand, they are at the age when frustration can get the best of them, so playing each other would probably lead to fighting.

Anyway, I'm happy to see them both getting into these classic games. I don't know if these classic games are really all that better for the brain than video games. Maybe? Probably? It seems like they teach a certain level of planning and strategic thinking, but I'm not sure—I've never read any studies on the matter. At any rate, these classic games may be useful for networking in the future, so for that it's a great skill. And if there is some kind of thinking advantage that is gained by becoming good at these games, well that's definitely great too!

By the way, this is a Mario chess set he picked out. I would prefer a classic set, but he wanted it and I'm trying to encourage him, so I bought it. He's enjoying it a lot.

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David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Twitter or Mastodon.