All the Right Moves

It's that time of year again!

ALL STUDENT chess players in the County are invited to the 2nd Annual Tai Lam Chess Tournament. You do not have to be a member of a school chess team to participate, and home and private school students are welcome too.

The 2010 Tai Lam Chess Tournament will be held on Saturday, June 12 from 2-5pm in the fountain plaza of Downtown Silver Spring (map: http://tinyurl.com/277cyml). All Montgomery County school students, grades K-12, and all levels of chess skills are welcome. We'll have plenty of trophies for winning participants and for the top public schools.

The Tai Lam Chess Tournament is brought to you by All The Right Moves (http://www.atrm.org/), the countywide chess movement founded by State Senator Jamie Raskin and school counselor Fernando Moreno to help prevent youth violence by encouraging chess in every school and instilling strategic thinking.

"All the Right Moves" is partially funded by an anonymous family fund at the Community Foundation for Montgomery County.

Please register online now at http://www.atrm.org/tailamtournamentregistration.htm for the tournament. All we need are your participating son's or daughter's name, school, and grade level, and contact information for one of his or her parents or guardians. Help support school chess in Montgomery County -- and have a great time !

Register online now at http://www.atrm.org/tailamtournamentregistration.htm! And please feel free to share this information with your friends and listserves!

Thanks! We hope we'll see you there!

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PS: If you have any questions please contact Fernando Moreno at morenofe@aol. com or Thomas Nephew at thomasn528@prodigy. net. If someone you know wants to register for the tournament but lacks Internet access, tell them to contact Fernando at 240-988-3211.
PPS: Photo by Sue Katz Miller for the Takoma Voice

Because of the generosity of the Montgomery Foundation and an anonymous donor, we can now supply chess sets and instructional materials for up to 25 Montgomery County school clubs.

Below is a photo of a supply box and its contents.

Each box contains chess game supplies...

• Plastic box and lid
• Chess board mats and bagged sets of white and black game pieces (10 sets) (green bags not shown)
  
• Demonstration chess wall board
• Demonstration chess pieces (next photo)

The board shows the positions after 12 moves
of the famous "Opera Game" between Paul Morphy
and two aristocrats, played in Paris in 1858.

... as well as instructional materials:

• Dynamic Chess Lessons (teacher's manual)
• Teaching Life Skills Through Chess: A Guide for Educators and Counselors (by Fernando Moreno)
• "All the Right Moves" Guide to Start a Chess Club notebook (by Fernando Moreno; not shown)
  
• Welcome to the Game of Chess (2)
  
• Welcome to Chess Ideas (2)
  
• Welcome to Checkmate (2)
  
• Chess Poems (for younger students)
• a donation of 3 books to your school library: one of each of the "Welcome" chess manuals
  

These instructional materials come highly recommended by "All the RIght Moves" own Fernando Moreno -- he's used them with great success at Broad Acres Elementary School.    They're written in clear, simple terms that will help anyone of any experience level -- in chess or in the classroom -- be a success in leading a chess club class.

If you're interested in leading a chess club at your child's school, please contact either Thomas Nephew (301-562-9393, thomasn528@prodigy.net) or Fernando Moreno  (240-988-3211, morenofe@aol.com). 

We'll be very happy to check out a supply box like the one above to you for as long as you're active with your school's chess club.  (In the event that you can't continue as a chess club sponsor, coach, or parent, we ask only that you return it to us at the end of the school year or pass it along to another parent and notify us.)

We look forward to hearing from you!

Registering for All The Right Moves -- and for the Tai Lam Invitational Tournament on May 30, 2009** -- takes a few simple steps:

1. If you're a kid, STOP!  Get your parents and have them help you with this.
2. Click on the "Register Today" link here or to the right.
3. Fill it in and click "Sign up."
   
4. This should result in an e-mail sent to the address you specify in step 2, usually in a matter of seconds or minutes.  Be sure to look in your e-mail client's spam filter, too, since this will usually be the first e-mail you've ever received from this web site.
5. You now have the chance to "edit profile" about the child or (if you're a coach or interested parent) yourself, especially:

1. school,
2. grade,
3. chess coach and club (if any),
4. chess experience, and
5. (before May 30) ...registering to attend the Tai Lam Invitational Tournament on May 30* (we hope you do!) -- this is a little check box at the very bottom of the page. 
   
   If you're registering for the tournament here and want us to expect you on May 30, it's important you check this box!
   
   NB: People who don't have Internet access, or who don't wish to register their children for the tournament via this site, can contact Fernando Moreno (a Broadacres ES school counselor) at morenofe@aol.com; he'll need the participant's name, school, and grade level.
   

Privacy

Your child's school and grade help us figure out who to match him or her up with in chess tournaments and clubs.  This and other identifying information (e.g., name and age) is kept private -- only administrators (adults in charge of this "All the Right Moves" web site) can see it.

"I am..."

For parents interested in volunteering for "All the Right Moves," the right answer to "I am..." is simply "A parent of a chess player."  For those kids entering information about themselves (with their parents' permission), the right answer is "A chess player."  We would appreciate kids' parents allowing their kids to register as "chess players" so we can pair kids with fellow players in their school, and so we can pair them with opponents at their age and skill levels, and so we can award school level trophies.  All information is confidential and will not be shared with anyone but ATRM organizers.

About Me, Signature, Profile Image -- recommend leaving blank
This web site -- donated by a generous supporter -- has a signup process that currently automatically encourages this, but due to valid concerns about kids' privacy and online security, we recommend that you not fill in anything in this area for your child.  If you do fill in these items for your child or yourself, be aware that they would automatically be public to other members of the site.

Changing a profile

You can always come back later and change a profile -- including answers to any of the above items -- by clicking the "Edit Profile" link.

I hope these instructions work for everyone -- but feel free to leave comments (see the link just above this post, on the right)  about anything that needs more explanation, and I'll answer your question and probably go back and clarify this post.

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* Details about the Tai Lam tournament (time, place) are here.

** Again, you can register your child for the tournament without registering for this site by contacting Fernando Moreno at morenofe@aol.com; he'll need your child's name, school, and grade level.

Thanks for visiting "All the Right Moves" web site! 

This is where you can find out about chess opportunities -- classes, tournaments, clubs, and more -- for kids in the Montgomery County area.  

For a little background about "All the Right Moves," have a look at the "About" page.  The movement started as a collaboration between Fernando Moreno (a Broad Acres Elementary School counselor and long-time youth chess coach) and Senator Jamie Raskin (D-Silver Spring and Takoma Park).  It is in part a way to remember Tai Lam, a Blair High School freshman who was a friend to both Fernando and Jamie's family, and who died tragically in November 2008, the victim of a random shooting by a gang member. 

We also hope "All the Right Moves" will be a way for kids in Montgomery County to get together, have fun, and sharpen their thinking.

Welcome aboard!