ChessKid Review

In my opinion, a computer has its place in chess training. You can look at positions quickly, you can play a wide range of opponents with different styles, you can quickly try puzzles, and you can watch tutorial videos.

First, if you're looking to save money, you can definitely get all of this for free. Instructional videos from youtube, puzzles from chesstempo.com, and you can get your play at lichess.org or chess.com.

What chesskid.com offers is a curated set of these resources. The videos are produced and made for kids with cartoon popups and sounds. They're also organized and arranged in increasing difficulty, so students can learn increasingly complex ideas that might rely on one another. The opponents are other chesskid members. The puzzle experience is about the same, except that accessing them is made a little simpler thru the interface.

It's one month is $7.99 if purchased individually. That's pretty ridiculous, but you're buying flexibility to sample the site for a month without long term commitment. The price goes down steeply if you buy more time. But! If you buy thru Coach Chris Bortzner, it's only $15 and lasts an entire year! I believe he buys memberships in bulk to be able to sell them so cheap. Coach Chris's account will permanently occupy the coach field in your account.

Alright, so is it worth it? Here's what I do not like:

• It's not as interactive as it could be. There's a long video right at the beginning of each lesson, and then you click thru question and answer moves that are made automatically, and sometimes you are asked to make a move yourself. It would be so much better if the video paused at critical moments and you had to make a move. The portions of Khan Academy we've used execute this well.
• The difference between a "click to see the right move" and "click to make a move" after each lesson is very small, there's just an extra small arrow button to progress. August is constantly getting stuck trying to make a move he's supposed to click thru, and visa versa.
• The quiz moves are "on rails". If you make an alternative move that is also correct, it notifies you, but leaves you to guess until you get back on chesskid's pre-planned track. It would be better if you were playing against a live engine, and the engine's evaluation was used so that you could succeed on alternatively correct lines. 

And my biggest complaint of all, so much so that I will give it its own bullet point is:

• You must be able to read quite well. The click thru questions and instructions are small text with long (for a child) words, and it includes notation. "In this position, the f3 knight is pinned by black's bishop. But Be2 breaks the pin." Even for my kids that can read this, it makes using the site more tedious than is necessary. They could instead speak aloud to the students, while highlighting squares that they're referring to.

One of the main reasons I would pay for chesskid.com is if I could set my four year old at the lesson and he learns by himself for 10 minutes. That's not nearly possible at the moment due to me having to read to him what the site wants next.

The things I do like are:

• The videos are awesome. They explain things well and the silly cartoons work surprisingly well to keep the kids attention.
• The puzzles are simple to access and adjust in difficulty automatically. This is something that I can set my youngest at and he work on by himself.

For $15 I believe the site is valuable and would recommend you purchase one. But be expected to assist your child with the website, which might not be a bad thing :)

Remember that websites and services change, so if you're viewing this post years after it was made, look for a newer review or see if some of my complaints have been addressed.