Student plays
pawns to Pro Bowl

By Lauren Fritsky
Times Staff Writer

Some might think chess and football have little in common.
But one recently led to the other for Solomon Solis-Cohen School student Jonathan Skole.
Jonathan won an all-expenses-paid trip for two to the Feb. 10 Pro Bowl in Hawaii after winning the local First Move Pawn Chess Tournament.
Sprint and the National Football League sponsor the program, created by America’s Foundation for Chess (AF4C) to promote the game as a learning tool in the classroom.
Jonathan, a third-grader at the school at 7001 Horrocks St., competed with a dozen other students during the Jan. 25 tournament, which took place at an elementary school in Delaware County. Another Solis-Cohen student, third-grader Anthony Johnson, also participated.
"I thought I was going to lose," admitted Jonathan, 10, who first learned chess from his grandfather. He started playing at Solis-Cohen last year.
The tournament involved several rounds of a pawn game. Unlike regular chess, in which a player wins only if he "checkmates" his opponent’s king, this game requires a player to get one of their pawn pieces to the opposite end of the board.
While he reigned supreme in the end, Jonathan almost met his match during the competition.
In the final round, judges called a draw between Jonathan and another opponent when neither got a pawn to the other end of the board. During his next game against the same opponent, Jonathan came out on top.
Though still a young player, Jonathan knows succeeding at the game is up to him.
"I have no good luck charm. I just practice a lot," he said. "Whenever I look at the board, I think about what I’m doing, and then I do it."
And one person who helps him hone his skill is second-grade teacher Francesca Gonzalez, who won "Teacher of the Year" at the tournament for teaching the First Move chess program to her students in creative ways. Though he’s not in her class, Jonathan often visits Gonzalez’s classroom on Fridays to play.
Teachers in 14 states use the First Move program in their classrooms for an hour each week during the school day. It consists of 30 lessons over the course of the school year. Schools and the AF4C share the cost of the program.
Gonzalez believes chess helps strengthen students’ skills in a variety of subjects.
"It’s helping them in math, helping them in science, helping them on the (Pennsylvania System of School Assessment tests)," she said.
The school’s principal, Joseph Bahm, fully supports the program.
Jonathan and Gonzalez said they felt like a king and queen in Hawaii. Though they each won only two tickets apiece, several of Jonathan’s family members accompanied him on the trip, paying their own ways.
"It was fun," said Jonathan, who took surfing lessons on the trip. "My favorite thing I got to do was see the Pro Bowl."
Jonathan even got to watch and hang out with some players at their practice before the game.
Gonzalez, a world traveler who came to Solis-Cohen two years ago, enjoyed meeting other chess players from different parts of the country. But the player she remains most awed by is Jonathan, whose playing she describes as "quick, but precise."
"Jon is amazing in that he gets it. He’s at the next level. I was so happy and proud of him," she said.
Jonathan believes winning the tournament will help him become an even stronger player.
"I’m really excited," said Jonathan, who doesn’t like being the first to make a move in the game. "Now I know different moves to use." ••
For information on how your school can become involved in First Move, visit the American Foundation for Chess Web site at www.af4c.org
Reporter Lauren Fritsky can be reached at 215-354-3038 or lfritsky@phillynews.com