Dr. Alexey Root

This posting is Part Three of my review of J. Bosch & S. Giddins (Eds.), The chess instructor 2009. Alkmaar, The Netherlands: New in Chess. Part One was posted on Monday, November 2nd and Part Two on November 9th. In Part Three, I pick out some interesting guidelines and quotations from the chapter Alexander Vaisman: Honoured Trainer of the Ukraine. Vaisman begins by discussing God-given talent for chess. In his opinion, some children have that gift and others do not. 

Over the past four days I have been promoting chess in education at the Texas Association for the Gifted and Talented (TAGT) annual conference in Dallas, Texas (November 12-14) and at the Turkey Tournament (1st through 12th grade, November 15) in Fairview, Texas. At TAGT, I was part of The University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) vendor booth.

This posting is Part Two of my review of J. Bosch & S. Giddins (Eds.), The chess instructor 2009. Alkmaar, The Netherlands: New in Chess. Part One  was posted on Monday, November 2nd. On November 2nd, I reviewed Van Wijgerden’s chapter, one of sixteen in The Chess Instructor 2009. Ten of the chapters are about training players who have lots of tournament experience and, in some cases, already have FIDE titles.

Quoting from the Sloan Creek Middle School (Fairview, Texas) News:

"Sloan Creek Chess Club will be presenting a USCF chess tournament on November 15th. This tournament is open to the scholastic public. . . .The Turkey Tournament will also host the famous Dr. Alexey Root, 1989 U. S. Women's Chess Champion and author of children's educational books, present at 11:30 to sign autographs! Dr. Root will have a few of her educational books available for sale. This will be open free to the public.

Two of my students won $500 Undergraduate Scholar Research Awards. Both students will be researching important topics in college chess. Read the press release

Amy Michelle Lehman is a current student in my online course ED 4358, and Bayaraa Zorigt took ED 4358 in fall of 2007. Amy and Bayaraa both plan to take ED 4359 in spring of 2009.

An important new book for chess teachers, coaches, and parents has just been published by New in Chess. Titled The Chess Instructor 2009, it is edited by Jeroen Bosch and Steve Giddins. Unlike my own Children and Chess: A Guide for Educators and Science, Math, Checkmate: 32 Chess Activities for Inquiry and Problem Solving, The Chess Instructor 2009 assumes that the adult reading the book already knows how to play chess. In contrast, my books give basic chess instruction (such as chess rules and algebraic notation) to help the non-chess player who wishes to utilize chess in an educational setting.

On Halloween The University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) defeated the University of Belgrade (UB) 12.5 to 3.5 in the third annual Transatlantic Cup match. The match started late, because University of Belgrade had already switched to standard time.

My third book will be published in March of 2009. Go to http://www.abc-clio.com/ABC-CLIOCorporate/product.aspx?pc=F2654P

Then look at the cover for Read, Write, Checkmate: Enrich Literacy with Chess Activities. If you recognize the cover model with the green shirt, which avid MonRoi blog readers should be able to do, please put his name in the Comments section for this blog posting.

At the beginning of August, I piggy-backed my own book signing onto that of the best-seller Breaking Dawn (Stephenie Meyer), because that book has a chess queen and pawn on its cover. Chess Life has now published my article about that book launch evening (have to register to read full article).

My photo is in Susan Polgar's blog, and photos that I took are in the UTD CHESS blog (September 30th posting). In spring 2008, UTD CHESS blogger GM Alejandro Tadeo Ramirez Alvarez took both of my online courses. Enrollment is still open for the second 8-week session which begins October 20th. The courses are next offered in spring 2009. The courses are completely online, and may be taken from anywhere with Internet access.

Right now, September 27-28, 2008, I am playing in the Texas Women's Open (TWO). I used a MonRoi for the first time yesterday (in rounds 2 and 3). MonRoi was a really easy and fun way to keep a record of my games. You can watch my games by going to monroi.com, then to Chess Games, then to Live Chess Games. If the round has finished, go to Replay Chess Games.

I just returned from Encyclo-Media. My publisher, Libraries Unlimited, paid for my trip there. I spent most of my time on both days (Thursday and Friday) at my publisher's booth. The booth started with 20 copies of Children and Chess, 20 copies of Science, Math, Checkmate, and 20 chess sets/boards ordered from American Chess Equipment. Buyers got a free chess set and chess board if they purchased one or two books.