Chess in Russian school education: chasing the elusive "universal education"

Russia introduced the first educational program focused on teaching chess as a compulsory primary school subject 30 years ago. However, despite the implementation of pilot projects and political support, when new federal state standards appeared in 2009 and in 2022, chess did not become a compulsory subject in elementary school. The article summarizes the achievements of the ideas of «chess universal education» in Russia, which include the scientific foundations of the developmental effects of chess (the ability to «act in the mind») and ongoing research (longitudinal studies in schools of the Satkinsky district of the Chelyabinsk region), the development of three educational and methodological complexes corresponding to the requirements of the Federal State Educational Standard, conducting additional professional training programs for primary school teachers schools, creation of methodological support and communication systems for specialists and enthusiasts of chess education. As a hypothesis about the key obstacles to the transformation of chess into a compulsory primary school subject, an assumption is made about the negative role of the competitive side of the chess game, contributing to a high emotional load on the child during the learning process: the average dropout rate in the first-second year of studying chess at the sports school of Petrozavodsk is 68 %, more than two thirds. Today, chess occupies the place of one of the optional modules of physical education in the primary education system. To improve the status of chess in the Russian school education system, it is proposed to additionally develop a block of chess skills aimed at the ability to cope with the emotional burden of the sports side of chess; adapt the scientific concept of the ability to «act in mind» to the ideas of the development of «functional literacy» of new primary school standards; propose new ways of organizing chess education in schools, corresponding to the conceptual foundations of the project «School of the Ministry of Education of Russia».