The Chess Scholar Noviembre - Diciembre 2007 | Page 6

CHESS A B C’s
Chess Basics for the Beginner Player
HOW TO READ AND
WRITE THE CHESS
MOVES IN ALGEBRAIC
NOTATION
(PART 1)

Chess move notation should
describe the pieces involved,
the end (and for clarity start)
location and any resulting ef- White’s king is located on the
fect (capture, check, mate etc). square d2 while Black’s king
is located on the square g8.
Not so hard, right? Actually,
Algebraic chess notation is
once you get started, writing
more compact than the older
obsolete descriptive chess no- notation is easier then you
tation and is the most widely think.
used method for recording
Next you must learn the corremoves. It has been in use in
sponding letters for each
some regions since the early
piece, I.E. the King is K; the
1800s, is less prone to error
than the older English descrip- Queen is Q; the Rook is R; the
tive system, and is much easier Bishop is B and the Knight is
N since we already use the K
to learn.
for the king. Notice that each
First you must be able to read piece is designated by a capital
a chess board which is simply letter.
the lining up of the letters on
Also notice that there is no
the bottom of the board with
the numbers on the side of the letter designated for the pawn.
Instead we just use the correboard.
sponding chess board square
For example; Let’s take a look that each pawn moves to
at the diagram at the top of the which you’ll see how to do in
a minute. But first, let’s take a
next column.
look at a chess score sheet.

As you can see there are
spaces to add the Event in
which you are playing, the
Date, the Round, your Board
number, which Section you’re
playing in and a place to mark
which Opening is played along
with two spaces for you and
your opponent’s name.
What we are going to be concerned with is the numbered
spaces labeled White and
Black that take up most of the
sheet. This is where you will
write down each move made,
and yes, you must write down
the moves for both sides
(White & Black), no matter
which color you are playing.
Are you ready? Let’s start!