Chess Challenge - Housekeeping Rules
To ensure the chess challenge run as smoothly as possible we have consolidated this helpful guideline. While it may get a little bit of an information overload, we think it is important that participants understand them.
To quickly access certain sections, please refer to the table of contents below or use the pop-up button on the left.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Participants
Chess Tournament Director
>> Details
Tournament Director
The Chess Tournament Director is in charge of the chess side and the Digital Tournament Director for the coding and design side.
Any questions, disputes, or concerns should be addressed to the relevant Tournament Director.
The Tournament Director has the final say in resolving any issues relating to the tournament. The Tournament Director makes "pairings" (decides who plays whom), acts as the referee, keeps overall team scores, and names the winners at the end of the Global Chess Challenge.
If you think your opponent is breaking the rules of chess, or if you have any other problem, let the Tournament Director know immediately via email.
Divisions
Elementary Division: Grades 3-5 (ages 8-10)
Middle School Division: Grades 6-8th (ages 11-14)
High School Division: Grades 9-12th (ages 15-18)
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Divisions
Each Division is a separate Kai's Chess Challenge. Teams enter the Division that corresponds with their current grade level. For players not enrolled in a school with grade levels, the grade level will be the one that most closely matches the player's age and traditional grade level.
You will potentially play teams both from your country, as well as from other countries.
Teams
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Teams
This is a team chess challenge. Each team should consist of at least two but not more than four players.
All teams must consist of players that are eligible for the same division. Younger players may play up a division. For example, an eight-year-old may play at the 6th - 8th grade or 9th - 12th-grade divisions.
Coaches
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Coaches
It is recommended that the coach have both coding and chess experience. It is acceptable to have a co-coaching model in which one coach focuses on the coding aspects of team play and the other coach focuses on chess play.
Registration:
Each school may enter up to 5 teams per Division. Homeschooled students who actively participate in the chess club of the public, charter, independent, or parochial school for the area where they live are eligible to participate on the school’s team. Home school students who do not actively participate in their local area school chess club, and players who attend schools without chess clubs, can register as an independent team as long as the team has a designated adult supervisor. Individual classrooms may also enter a team.
How to Register
Timeline
We encourage you to register on the website (kaisclan.ai). The team should register by filling out the Team Registration Form. The entry fee for the Tournament is $15 and is included in your Chess Equipment kit you need. The entry fees are used to pay for website hosting, mailing of materials, creation of materials, trophies, and other costs for the tournaments.
Since this is a Global Chess Challenge, opposing teams will be given the autonomy to set up the date and times that work best for their respective teams. The Tournament Director will send an email (including information and links needed for Phase 1) during the 1st week of January 2022. Please plan for at least two hours on game days.
Phase 1: Round Robin - QUAD games: play must occur between February 2nd, 2022 - March 31st, 2022
Phase 2: Single elimination bracket will be played in April 2022 with the finals in May 2022.
Tournament Structure:

A classical game of 20 + 10 will be played via an online, live platform, ChessKid.com.
G/20+10inc time control means:
Each team starts with 20 minutes and adds 10 seconds with each of their moves. This means that one game can last up to 40-50 minutes.
ChessKid is a safe and secure website designed for young players to learn/play chess and includes protections against cyberbullying.
In each Division, all teams will be placed in a group of four, aka quads. We will be using a ‘Round Robin’ structure for each quad. Within your quad, you will play against all other three teams.
See diagram below: Quad A: Team #1, Team #2, Team #3, Team #4.
Round 1 | Round 2 | Round 3 | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
White | Black | White | Black | White | Black | |
Game 1 | Team 1 | Team 4 | Team 3 | Team 1 | Team 1 | Team 2 |
Team 2 | Team 3 | Team 4 | Team 2 | Team 3 | Team 4 | |
Game 2 | Team 4 | Team 1 | Team 1 | Team 3 | Team 2 | Team 1 |
Team 3 | Team 2 | Team 2 | Team 4 | Team 4 | Team 3 |
At the conclusion of Phase 1, the team with the highest point total will move on to Phase 2. Depending on the number of teams registered, phase 2 will also contain ‘wildcards’ to fill the phase 2 tournament bracket. As this is the first year of the Global Chess Challenge, the number of teams will be limited to 35 in each division.
Phase 2 will be a single-elimination tournament. The winner of each Quad (A-G) will move on to the quarterfinals. If all quads were filled with teams (A-G), then one wildcard will be issued to fill the bracket. If there are fewer teams and all the quads were not filled, more wildcards will be issued to fill the phase 2 tournament bracket. See diagram below:
Guidelines for Game Day:
Spectators must be passive and silent while any game is in process.
Spectators should stand or sit well away from the players and make no gestures of recognition; even a nod of the head could be misconstrued as approving a position or a move.
Due to the virtual nature of this tournament, spectators must be supervised by the on-site chess coach.
Unlike a traditional tournament, talk is encouraged between the team (up to four players) to decide upon their chess move. Each team should designate a captain of their team. It is the role of the captain to coordinate the communication of the team. Individual Roles on each Team during live matches:
- Coding Lead: Oversight of the code and makes changes as needed/desired.
- Chess Lead (usually the strongest chess player on the team). Decides & plays the chess moves.
- Logistics Lead: inputs the chess moves into the software (on chesskid.com) and transfers opponent’s moves onto the physical board
- Captain: ensures all functions are working smoothly & handles any communication to opponent’s team captain, fills out team scorecard
Coach: Observes, ensures fair play, refrains from ANY coaching
You must know the basic rules of chess. You can find copies of the rules with the instructions that come with chess sets, in books on chess, on the internet, or in encyclopedias. The rules that cause the most trouble for new players are castling, en passant capture, pawn promotion, and drawn games.
FREE Rules of Chess Guide (with linked videos) (great way to learn the game as each rule includes fun mini-games to reinforce learning the basics)
For basic gameplay:
- https://www.chesskid.com/login (free signup)
- https://www.chess.com/lessons (no account needed for beginner lessons)
Chess notation (recording moves):
- https://www.chesskid.com/videos/how-to-keep-score-algebraic-notation
- https://www.chess.com/article/view/chess-notation
Learning about Coding: https://scratch.mit.edu (explore tutorials that involve movement of characters)
Due to the nature of play, scoring for Kai’s Chess Challenge will be much different than the usual scoring used in a chess tournament. Consider the following scoring system as you practice for your chess matches.
At the end of each chess game, you will complete the scoring section (Kai’s Chess Challenge Score Sheet) on the ‘Kai’s Chess Challenge Move Record’. For middle and high school divisions, you will also need to record your cumulative score for all games played. Your team will get points for all of your opponent’s pieces that you capture. The following guides will be used for scoring:
- Castling – 10 points
- Moving all pieces from the back row at least once – 10 points
- Capturing 4 different pieces (pawn, bishop, knight, rook, queen) – 10 points
- Winning Team (checkmate, opponent gives up/Resigns, or wins on time) – 20 additional points
The committee will then allocate points up to 20 points for design and 30 points for coding and animations. See the ‘Final submission’ for requirements.
The following guides will be used for the score:
Use of 3D models to represent each physical chess piece: up to 20 points | ||
5 | 10 | 20 |
3D models from a 3D library to use during the game. | Modification of 3D models from a 3D library to use during the game. | Create your own Individual designs for each chess piece/character using Tinkercad or Minecraft |
Use of code and animations for your 3D models: up to 30 points | ||
10 | 20 | 30 |
Animations & effects added to their chess characters/pieces during gameplay. | The use of code and animations to enhance gameplay. | Use logic code to highlight your own strategies during gameplay. |
Teams and team members can only code their own chess pieces and add animations, effects, robot avatars to their own pieces.
All conditional logic coding statements have to be within their own chess moves and can’t interfere with their opponents, design, characters, code, or animations. Any team that breaches these rules will automatically be disqualified.
Each coach/teacher registers their own teacher account at app.kaisclan.ai for practicing purposes. They can set up both black and white sides to practice. On the day of the tournament, the black team will be the teacher account and the white team will join as all student accounts.
Kai’s Clan Set-up and Coding Rules
- Kai’s Chess Mat
- Tripod with adaptor
- One set of chess pieces with QR codes, make sure you can change if you are playing black or white.
- A spare set of chess pieces to represent your opponent’s pieces
- A smartphone with the Kai’s Eye Robot Tracker on
- Another screen to see the virtual viewer, either smartboard or another iPad.

Chess set:
Once you receive your Kai’s Chess Pack and create a mat, you can decide upon the best chess pieces that will fit within the (4-inch x 4-inch) squares. There are no requirements as to what chess sets you choose to use, but pieces should be easily identifiable for play.
Chess pieces with QR codes (for example black set) plus a set of chess pieces (for example white pieces) to use for opponents moves
Monitor/Screen:
We recommend having a large monitor or smartboard/iPad to view gameplay on.
Computers:
Team members should all have their own computers and possibly load Zoom onto a computer in case they have technical issues and need to switch over. One computer has to zoom in and show their own mat, the reason is that your opponents can see which moves you have made.
- Download Kai’s Eye Robot Tracker on a Smartphone (Android or iPhone, not older than 3 years.)
- Scan the serial number on the box
- Register a teacher account at app.kaisclan.ai
- On your Kai’s Eye app on your phone, go to settings and enable multiple classrooms
- When you have 2 teams, one team will run as the teacher account and the second team gets assigned a student name and log in as a student. They are then both ready to play chess and see each other’s characters.

- On your computer open the Sandbox tab
and upload your virtual chess characters.
- Design your virtual chess characters in Tinkercad/Minecraft and upload these characters in Sandbox.
- Each character must be identified as which chess character it represents, i.e a Queen should look like a Queen.
- Once the teacher has approved all of the models for their team but also the student account, everybody can allocate their characters to the appropriate QR codes, by using the Load model blocks under the blockly codes. Expert>Sandbox>Load Model
- Players can now code their animations or add their logic coding strategies to their chess play.
NOTE: YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO INTERFERE OR CODE YOUR OPPONENTS CHESS MOVES OR CHARACTERS, AUTOMATIC FORFEIT, AND ELIMINATION FOR THE TOURNAMENT IF YOU BREACH THESE CONDITIONS.
- We suggest you place normal chess pieces on the mat to represent what your opponent will be using to move and replicate.
- Ensure you have your Kai’s Clan mats facing the same way this will make it much easier to see what your opponent’s moves are.
- Use a phone or computer with a camera to show your opponent your mat, this player also signs in on Zoom. This can be a teacher’s phone or computer.
NOTE: WHEN YOU MAKE A MOVE, CALL IT OUT LOUD SO THAT THE OPPONENT CAN MOVE THE PIECE ON THEIR MAT AND BOTH TEAMS KNOW WHERE PIECES ARE SITTING ON THE MAT.
- Fill in your final scorecard and submit it via email to: [email protected]
- Use this Flipgrid to record your chess piece design, as well as showcase your animations, effects, and any coding strategies, i.e conditional logic. You will be limited to a one-minute Flipgrid.
Flipgrid Guest Password:1stChessChallenge
Flipgrid link:
How to access the Flipgrid:
Enter the link above or scan the QR code above.
You should then see this screen:
Click “Enter your guest password” as seen highlighted in the image above.
You should then see this screen:
Then, enter the password provided above into the Guest field seen highlighted in the image above.
How to play QR Chess?
Practise games in the same location
- Set up Kai’s Mat with both setup chess pieces (QR codes attached to all pieces)
- Log in, scan classroom code, set up Kai’s Eye Robot tracker on tripod positioning to look at the mat.
- Load all avatars, animations, and coding blocks
- Open up your virtual viewer (download the Kai’s Virtual Viewer from app store) on your IPad or TV screen. Scan classroom code and you are ready to play and practice.
- While both players/teams are in the same room you can see each other moves and characters on the screen.
- The game is played as normal.
- Remember to note down your moves (your team member can help you with this).
Practise games in different locations
- Set up Kai’s Chess Mat with either black or white chess pieces. These pieces need to have the QR codes attached.
- Your opponent pieces are just regular pieces on the board/mat
- Both teams log in, scan the same classroom code, set up Kai’s Eye Robot tracker on tripod positioning to look at their mat/board. The phone will be in sharing classroom mode.
- Each team load their own avatars, animations and coding blocks
- Each team open up their virtual viewer (download the Kai’s Virtual Viewer from app store) on their IPad or TV screen. Scan classroom code and you are ready to play and practice.
- Each team move their QR code chess pieces as per their strategy. They can see their chess pieces on the screen.
- When their opponent makes a move your team move the regular chess piece to the same position as what your opponent just moved to. So you copy/mirror their move.
- The rest of the game is played as normal.
- Remember to note down your moves (your team member can help you with this.)
Practice sessions will be available once a month for 3 months before the tournament commences with the organizers to answer any questions.
The following dates will be available for practice sessions:
Monday – 22 November, 1 pm CST
Wednesday – 15 December, 7 pm CST
Saturday – 15 January, 7 pm CST
Day of the tournament
This will be the same as above when you practiced in different locations.
How to build & setup Kai's Chess Set
Check the following to link that shows how to contruct your QR chess pieces and virtual characters.