Chess Strategy for Beginners

This course offers a comprehensive exploration of opening, middlegame, and endgame concepts, designed specifically for players—both young and adult—who have mastered the basic rules of chess and are ready to advance to an intermediate level. Starting with essential techniques like checkmating a lone king, it progresses to more sophisticated strategies such as leveraging material and positional advantages. Featuring 55 structured lessons and over 1,200 carefully selected examples and exercises, this course effectively transforms beginners into confident intermediate players.

Part of the Chess King Learn series (https://learn.chessking.com/), this course utilizes a revolutionary interactive teaching method. The series spans tactics, strategy, openings, middlegame, and endgame training, with content tailored to players at all levels—from newcomers to advanced and professional players.

By engaging with this course, you'll deepen your chess understanding, discover powerful tactical motifs and combinations, and solidify your knowledge through practical application. The program functions as a personal coach, assigning tasks and offering guidance when you're stuck. It provides hints, detailed explanations, and even highlights the most striking refutations of incorrect moves.

The course also includes an interactive theoretical section that breaks down key strategies for each phase of the game using real-world examples. This material is presented in a dynamic format—allowing you not only to read the lessons but also to play through moves on the board and analyze critical positions hands-on.

Key Features of the Program:

♔ Thousands of high-quality, thoroughly verified examples
♔ Required input of all key moves as guided by the instructor
♔ Tasks of varying complexity to suit different skill levels
♔ Diverse objectives in exercise positions
♔ Instant hints upon making an error
♔ Refutation analysis for common mistakes
♔ Ability to play out any exercise position against the built-in computer
♔ Fully interactive theoretical lessons
♔ Well-organized, intuitive table of contents
♔ Real-time tracking of your ELO rating progression
♔ Customizable test mode with flexible settings
♔ Bookmark functionality to save favorite exercises
♔ Optimized for tablets with larger screens
♔ Offline access—no internet connection required
♔ Sync progress across multiple devices (Android, iOS, Web) via a free Chess King account

The course includes a free version, allowing you to experience the full functionality before unlocking additional content. The free lessons are complete and ideal for testing the app in real conditions. Topics included in the free section:

1. Utilizing a Decisive Material Advantage
   1.1. Mating with major pieces
   1.2. Mating with a rook
   1.3. Mating with a queen
   1.4. Mating with two bishops
   1.5. Mating with bishop and knight (king on the edge)
   1.6. Mating with bishop and knight (king in the center)
   1.7. Mating with two knights
   1.8. Various forms of large material advantage
   1.9. How to solve chess problems

2. The Three Stages of a Chess Game
   2.1. Principles of opening play
   2.2. Rapid mobilization of pieces
   2.3. Controlling the center
   2.4. Building a harmonious pawn structure
   2.5. Transitioning from the opening
   2.6. Introduction to the endgame
   2.7. Fundamental endgame principles

3. Basic Pawn Endings
   3.1. The rule of the square
   3.2. Advanced applications of the rule of the square
   3.3. King support in pawn promotion
   3.4. The concept of opposition
   3.5. Key squares in pawn endings

4. Fundamentals of Chess Tactics
   4.1. Core tactical methods
   4.2. Components of a combination
   4.3. Double attack
   4.4. Knight and pawn forks
   4.5. Exploiting pinned pieces
   4.6. Defending against pins
   4.7. Discovered attack
   4.8. Discovered check
   4.9. The "Mill" tactic
   4.10. Double check
   4.11. Decoy
   4.12. Blocking
   4.13. Smothered mate
   4.14. Distraction
   4.15. Back-rank weaknesses
   4.16. Clearing a square
   4.17. Clearing a line

5. Utilizing Material or Positional Advantages

What's New in Version 3.3.2

Updated on Jul 24, 2024
• Introduced a Spaced Repetition training mode—combines previously missed exercises with new ones for optimal learning retention
• Added the ability to run tests using bookmarked exercises
• New daily puzzle goal feature—set your target number of exercises to maintain sharpness
• Implemented daily streak tracking—monitor consecutive days of completing your daily goal
• Various bug fixes and performance improvements