Shako wrote:I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts on the following quote which come from a really interesting (and modern!) chess book.
Jonathon Rowson in Chess for Zebras suggests that most learners try to improve by increasing their 'knowledge' while they should be trying to improve their playing 'skill'..(the 'what' instead of the the 'how')
"It really doesn't matter what you study (referring to ideas of studying tactics, strategy, openings, endings etc etc), the important thing is to use this as a training ground for thinking rather than trying to assimilate a mind-numbing amount of information. In these days of a zillion chess products, this message seems to be quite lost, and indeed most people seem to want books to tell them what to do. The reality is that you've got to move the pieces around the board and play with the position. Who does that? Amateurs don't, Grandmasters do..."
That is a lot like my approach to go when I was learning. Even though I had a good memory, I wanted to understand something well enough to be able to work it out on my own and not have to rely upon memory. And now I encourage people to think and to play around with positions by playing stones on the board.
But now I question that approach, and I do not think that it is best for everybody. Go has always struck me as a very literate, conceptual game. There are thousands of concepts to commit to memory. I am not talking about mind-numbing information, but about building blocks for thought. I expect that there is a body of basic go knowledge that adult beginners, in particular, would be well advised to learn.
Let me give an example. John Fairbairn recently posted a position with a Door Group. Now, how to handle the Door Group is part of that basic knowledge that I mean. As it turns out, I never learned about the Door Group. Oh, at this point it is not difficult for me to read out. The key variation is only 11 moves deep in a small area. But could I have read it out in a game as a 5 kyu? I doubt it. The reason is that that variation involves a very basic concept that I never learned.
Besides, in go and chess the distinction between skill and knowledge is not sharp. For instance:
(;GM[1]AP[GOWrite:2.3.46]CA[ISO8859-1]ST[2]SZ[19]FF[4]AW[ha][hb][hc][ic][ka][la][lb][lc][ld][kd][fa]FG[259:]PM[2]GN[ ]PB[ ]AB[ia][ib][jc][jd][kb][kc][id][hd][gc][fd][fb][eb]PW[ ]
;W[jb]
)
Skill or knowledge?
In light of that, I personally find it interesting that beginners at Go are told "Go play a lot first!" and "Go do exercises" BEFORE they get bogged down in ideas.
OC, I encourage beginners to play. But if they want to improve quickly, I advise them to play against stronger opponents. And to review their games. (During my first year of play my weakest opponent was a 5 kyu. I have no regrets about that.
And we went over almost every game.)
As for doing exercises, I have my doubts for adult beginners. They have plenty of challenges in their games, especially if they have good opponents. I know that doing tsumego is standard advice these days. But if you want people to think, they have to have something to think about. When people talk about doing dozens of easy problems in a single day, I wonder if they are challenging themselves enough. When I was in training, I did 4 problems a day, taking one hour to do them. (OC, that was at the dan level, but still. . . .)
As for getting "bogged down in ideas", well, stumbling blocks or stepping stones?
), which tends to reduce the amount of time that people spend scratching their heads over a board.
).