Four third grade classes at Vine Hill Elementary School became chess pieces for the traditional living chess match that took place last Thursday morning.
Dirk Andrews, a third grade teacher at Vine Hill, said that the living chess game is a culmination of chess lessons, which the kids take every year.
“We have the kids dress up obviously as pieces and we have royals and musicians, and jesters — and cheerleaders to occupy the other kids — and then we have a small group of kids actually playing the game on a smaller board.”
From there, other kids acted as movers who directed the living pieces where to move next on the board.
The living chess game tradition began with former Vine Hill Elementary School Teacher Jane Hancock, who brought the idea back from Ströbeck Village in Germany during a visit in 2004.
“They had this calendar of all the kids dressed up in their chess costumes, I bought the calendar and I brought it back to my school.”
At the time of the trip, Hancock was teaching fifth grade. Upon her return, she showed some of the parents the calendar and they agreed to help make the costumes and giant quilted board.
“Chess is so wonderful for the educational and analytical skills of kids, goods sportsmanship, and really thinking things through,” Hancock explained.
The first living chess match took place with Vine Hill Elementary fifth-graders at the Civic Auditorium in Santa Cruz in 2005. In 2006, Hancock began teaching third grade so the living chess match changed classes and chess is now taught in third grade instead of fifth.
“It actually was a tie when we ended, we had to be off the playground by the first grade recess, so we had a limited time,” Andrews said.
