Once your child has shown you he has all of the tournament skills, you’re half way to being ready for a tournament. Why half way? Emotions. Losing is hard on players of any sport, but in chess, losing carries a special kind of personal impact. Most kids play team sports where the team loses, and there can be some anonymity. True, there can be some spectacularly public individual errors, like dropping a fly ball or striking out, but if the team wins, those errors are forgotten. Like singles tennis, when a chess players loses a tournament game, his teammates, coach, parents, and the opposing player’s teammates all know he lost. And no one else is responsible! He wasn’t the pitcher throwing the game of his life only to lose because of another player’s error. In chess you play your best and if you don’t win, it’s on you.
Sounds harsh doesn’t it? I mean, come on, it’s just a game after all, right? Yes, absolutely. The reality is that it’s highly probable that your child will lose at least some games in her first tournament, but there’ll be many more games to play. Your daughter could win the next game or the next several. She will learn something about the game and herself from a loss or even a string of losses.
Your job is to be able to provide the support your child needs after a loss. Remind her of the italicized comments above. Some kids can shake off a loss and are ready for the next game with no problems at all. Some players have trouble with losing and sometimes carry with them to the next game thoughts about what they did wrong in the previous game. Some kids are so upset they will cry. Some get angry at themselves and draw on that burning to play better. I’ve seen players lose a tough-fought game, buck up and beat the living daylights out of their next opponent. Some players were so good at this that they got a reputation and no one wanted to play them after a loss because it meant certain doom.
Your job is to know what will work best with your child. Comfort them or push them? That’s not up to me–each child is different–but what I did was remind them of the italicized portion above, ask if they knew how the game became a lost game (note I don’t ask, “do you know why you lost?” it’s always “How did the game become lost?”). This allows them to disassociate themselves from the loss, even if it’s ever so slightly, and look at the game objectively. Almost every time the reply was something like, yes, I hung a piece and missed it, or I moved such-and-such and got out of position.
You know your child best. You may have already seen how he handles losing, whether on a team sport, or perhaps just playing video games with his friends, or family.
Back to our original question: “How do I know whether my child is ready?” If she can demonstrate the skills and you’re confident in her ability to withstand losing, she’s ready.
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