Case Studies on How Math and Chess Affects Children's IQ Frank Ho Teacher and founder of Ho Math and Chess

www.mathandchess.com In my over 10 years of teaching math and chess, I have had the precious opportun ities to teach grades from kindergarten to grade 12 and as a consequence I also have had many occasions to observe some interesting cases on how some of my own students learned. After I analyzed their patterns of learning, I have used their learning experiences to modify Ho Math and Chess worksheets. Case 1 C 4 years old boy My feeling is that we seem to use different parts of brain to do math and chess respectively. This observation is based on the following case. If this is proved to be true then it definitely is beneficial for children to learn both math and chess since different parts of their brain power will get strengthened. This 4-year boy really surprised me when he came to me since he already knew how to add or subtract 1 digit quite comfortably without any noticeable delay in co ming up with answers and could also do 2-digit addition or subtraction although my experience with him was not sufficient to draw any conclusions. He also knew the number skip pattern and could do multiplication as well. His mom wanted me t o teach him chess so I started with chess lesson but it caught me by surprise wa s his progress was slow when compared to the progress of his math ability. Why i s there such a disparity Every time, when I played chess with him, he needed to be reminded on how each chess piece should move even after he had shown that he already knew the moves of each piece. He did not seem to understand that to play chess well, he needs to look the entire chess board, not just one move of one c hess piece. He did not seem to care or understand what if effect. This smart boy intrigues me to think why he could do calculations so well and ye t is slow in absorbing chess knowledge, so I started an experiment by giving him word problem for he could read already at 4 years old. I would explain to him i f he did not understand the meaning or could not read some words. I found out th at if he was capable of doing something then he would do it quickly but if somet hing he could not do and I tried to explain to him and he still could not do the n he would simply shut off his brain and would not do it, so in this case I was not able to observe how he could make progress under my guidance. Perhaps, the function of playing chess is being handled by one part of brain and the functions of mathematical function is mainly being handled by the other par t of brain so in this boy's case, he could do math computation very well, but no t chess. Case 2 C Grade 2 Girl and a grade 3 boy 1.From these two students, I learned that children could shut off their brain an d refuse to learn. I taught this very friendly girl when he was at grade 3 and n ow she is grade 8 and I am still tutoring her. I tutored the boy when he was als o at grade 3 level and then I later met him again at grade 8 and I asked both of them the same question why they did not seem to be able to master the times tab le when they were young and their answers astonished me since both of them said to me they just did not want to memorize it. I have more interesting story to tell on how they overcame the problems themselves and how this little girl influ enced me in creating my workbook. In the girl case, I seem to have hit the roadblock since it does not matter how

I taught her by using flash cards, explaining the multiplication concept, using pencils as manipulative she just could not do times table and finally I realized that she understood the concept but she could not come up with the results with no delay or she would just come up with wrong answers. At no time I would force her to memorize the times table other than to remind her that she might as well spend some time to recite and memorize them. It never happened to her. I remind ed myself that this is a great chance for me to produce custom-made multiplicati on table for her to see if she could actually use my multiplication table to nat urally memorize all multiplication facts. I asked her what kinds of multiplicati on questions she liked and what kids of multiplication questions she did not lik e. My multiplication workbook went from initially with 100 pages to finally over 300 pages because of working with her. Clearly I learned that she did not like simple drill type worksheets because they are boring. I was forced to come up di fferent variety of formats to suit her taste. Finally, she could do multiplicati on but with some delay in coming up with answers. When getting to higher grades, her computation ability seemed to have a leap of progress, I asked her what had happened she told me that she just decided to memorize them and that is it. The same happened to the boy, I asked him why he could not seem to get the times ta ble, he told me that he just did not want to memorize it when he was young and l ater he decided to memorize them. So have we ever paid attention to the fact that some children could not learn t imes table well was simply because they did not want to remember' them Educators did not seem to do this kind of follow-up study in education to find out what w as the problem when some children could not learn when they were young. Case 3 C Ho Math and Chess worksheets vs. traditional worksheets From my own teaching experience, I have found that for ring and causes stress to children. On the other hand, hildren need to do math by hand and the skill children with second nature and be able to see the direction of some children drill is bo drill gives the fluency c need to do word problems getting answers.

What's wrong with drill rests with the tool of drilling that is the worksheet. I t is not interesting, boring, monotonic and makes children feel like working on a assembly line to get all those answers. I personally gave Ho Math and Chess wo rksheets to children and also traditional worksheets to children, and clearly ch ildren liked Ho Math and Chess worksheets more than the traditional sheets. I al so asked children why they liked Ho Math and Chess worksheets, they gave me the reason that they liked to work through a few turns and jumps to come up with ans wer and they felt it is more interesting that way. When I heard this kind of com ments It boosted my confidence that I have come up with an innovative product wh ich revolutionaries the traditional worksheets. My invention of Geometry Chess L anguage is a disruptive technology and an innovative idea which basically change d forever how children should be drilled and how to make math worksheets more in teresting. I was almost holding back my tears when my students were telling me w hy they liked Ho Math and Chess worksheets. Case 4 C Some children do not mind but some do not like to be drilled. 1.This is true story that some moms told me that they could not send their child ren to other learning centers anymore since their children are in tears when ask ed to go again C they hated the drill. On the other hand, I see, although rarely, some children do the drill worksheets until grade 12, why is there such a big d ifference I started to feel that our brain seem to function differently depend ing on individual and for some reason. Those children hated drill is because som e part of their brain is telling them to reject. We can do an experiment by givi ng Ho Math and Chess worksheets and also the traditional worksheets and to see h ow their brains have reacted by scanning images of their brains. This will remai n as a mystery until someone has done some research in this area.

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