Chess rules for kids
Everything a child needs to play a legal game, with the fiddly bits left until later.
1. The aim
Trap the other king so it cannot escape. That is checkmate, and it ends the game immediately. The king is never actually captured or taken off the board.
2. Taking turns
White moves first, then Black, one move each, always. There is no passing and no double move.
3. How the pieces move
Six rules, one per piece — see how the pieces move. Only the knight jumps; everything else is blocked by whatever is in its path.
4. Capturing
Move onto an enemy piece's square and it comes off the board. You can never capture your own pieces, and you can never capture the king.
5. Check
When a king is attacked, it is in check and the player must deal with it that move: move the king, block the attack, or capture the attacker. Leaving your king in check is not allowed — it is not a losing move, it is an illegal one.
6. Checkmate and stalemate
Check with no way out is checkmate and the game is over. No check but no legal move at all is stalemate, and that is a draw — a rule that surprises every beginner at least once.
Rules you can safely leave until later
None of these are needed for a child's first games, and introducing them early is the fastest way to make chess feel like homework:
- Castling — the move where the king and rook go at once.
- En passant — a rare pawn capture.
- Promotion — a pawn reaching the far side becomes a queen. Worth showing early, actually; children love it.
- Draws by repetition and the fifty-move rule.
Related
Learn the rules one at a time
- Rules are taught by playing them, not by being told them
- Blocked paths, captures and promotion each get their own lesson
- Works offline, so it is there in the car and the waiting room