Puzzles for my Students

Hi everyone, here I am giving you five puzzles to solve. You have to print the page, solve the puzzles and turn them to me on Wednesday, November 25th. Good Luck !!!

1. White to move. Find the best Fork.

2. White to move. Find the best Fork.

3. White to move. Find the best move (Hint: there is a fork involved)

4. Black to move. Find the Pin.

5. White to move. Find the best move (Hint: White is already pinning the Knight)

2nd Place for McMillan

Congratulations to the Chess Team for getting 2nd Place in the South Central Regional Center Title 1 Chess Tournament celebrated last Saturday November 15th and at the same time for classifying to the Title 1 Chess District Championship which will be on May 2nd, 2009.
Here are some pictures of the event:

Warming up before the first round

Warming up before the first round

Nathan and Jorge in the playing room

Nelson and Jorge in the playing room

Oscar, Robert and Daniel in the playing room

Sergio and Mike in the playing room (last round)

After the last round, from left to right: Nathan, Oscar, Sergio, Daniel, Nelson, Jorge, Robert and Mike.

After the last round.

Beginning of the Ceremony

Mr. Diez getting the 2nd place trophy

Everyone feeling the trophy

More Puzzles

White to play, mate in two moves:

White to play, mate in one move:

WELCOME McMillan Chess Team

Welcome to an excited school year 2008-2009. There are a lot of tournaments this year so you better get ready. Your first assignment online is to answer the following questions along with the solution of a puzzle. And remember, they are due on Wednesday, October 15th.

1. List all the pieces of a chess game along with their value.
2. List three strategies to follow when your opponent is attacking one of your pieces.
3. Solve the following puzzle. White to move and mate in one

Title 1 Chess Tournament Results !!!

The McMillan Chess Team made it for the Title 1 Chess Tournament Finals after ending in 4th place at the Title 1 Chess Tournament for Regions 5 and 6, celebrated last Saturday, April 26.
Special congratulation to Mike Lee who ended up in 2nd place in the K-8 section. You can see him getting his trophy in some of the pictures.
Q: Was this the best result of the team?
A: Not really. Only one of the schools in the top 5 offers Chess as an elective class, so the McMillan Chess Team was supposed to do better than that, however we made it to the finals, and that was our objective, so for now on until May 17th we will work harder to get better results in the finals.

Q: How many players compete, and how did they do?

A: There were four players who played all 5 rounds, and one more player who played the last two rounds only. Mike Lee 4.5, Jonathan Ochoa 3.5, Nathan Larrea 2.0, Nicholas Sanches 2.0, and Aaron Guanch 2.0 (he only played 2 rounds)
Q: Any predictions on May 17th.
A: We will be in the top 5 again.

Top 5 students in the K-8 section. Second from left to right is Mike Lee.

Top 5 teams in the K-8 category. Second from left to right is Mr. Diez (McMillan Chess Coach)

From left to right Nicholas Sanchez, Mike Lee, Mr. Diez and Jonathan Ochoa

Nathan and Mike were the best at the South Regional !!!

The McMillan Chess Team participated in the South Regional Chess Tournament having great results as a Team, however the best two players received an incentive (Glass Chess Set), courtesy of the Administration of McMillan Middle School.

Nathan Larrea and Mike Lee were the students who ended up with the best result so they received this nice present which they will use and enjoy forever.

Here are the players receiving their "Glass Chess Set".

From left to right Mike Lee and Nathan Larrea

Puzzles of the Week 3/10/08 to 3/14/08 !!!

Hi everyone, this is one of the most important weeks of the School Year because of the FCAT. So the puzzles for this week are simple in case you have to study for your EXAMS. Think about them, find the solutions, write the solutions in a piece of paper and bring them to Class before Friday, March 14th.

For both puzzles, white play first and checkmate black in two moves.

Good Luck !!!