Strategical Thinking

Educational games: In order to make the games fun to play as games, there has to be some strategical choices, where the pupils need to set priorities. Therefore, the games always has a lot of opportunities to choose from, a lot of diversions to overcome to show focus. The pupils must show flexibility and be ready to a sudden shift if necessary, and a high degree of pragmatism is needed in order to go for the solution that yields the most points, given the circumstances. It is so easy to get a tunnel vision and set your mind on only one thing. Overall, the idea of prophylaxis is very important as a way of thinking both in attack and defense simultaneously. The core difference between prophylactic and passive thinking is that prophylaxis also has the attacking ideas in mind.

Chess: Central parts of strategical thinking in chess is also prophylactic/passive thinking, flexibility and pragmatism, and overall the same kind of thinking is important as in my educational games. To add a few specific for chess (taking from my coming book on Sharp Endgames), I can mention the method of elimination: you do what you have to do if there is no choice, no matter the consequences. Also play the most forced line if possible (should be applied with care, but it does reduce the possibilities for the opponent) and positional judgement (how well knowledge and intuition are used in the decision-making process). A feel for details is very important when comparing similar lines with minor differences.

The themes I refer to here are part of the 16 Parameters from Sharp Endgames. In this book, I have concrete examples to show the parameters in action.

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