
School Workshops
Opening Gambit!
Are you a teacher who has always wanted to introduce chess into your school. Perhaps, you already have a chess club up-and-running but are wondering what the next move is for your students? If you are a TY co-ordinator looking to offer your students a fun activity-based full-day workshop with an inter-disciplinary reach across a broad spectrum of disciplines (history/ film/ literature/ art etc.), Chess Bud Ireland can tailor a workshop to suit the needs and interests and chess level of your students.
Let’s get started!
- Fill out a form and book a date for your school workshop. Tell us as much as you can about chess in your school, i.e. how many players you have, whether the students in your workshop group will be complete or experienced beginners or a mix of standards including intermediate or advanced players. If your students are all complete beginners or relative novices, we recommend a full-day workshop that does not include intermediate or advanced players.
- Chess Bud will come back with a proposal which will detail how the workshop might work on the day and how it would cater to players of diverse levels.
- Chess Bud Workbook: Two weeks before the workshop take place you will receive a workbook in pdf format with tactical chess problems, middle-game plan-formation challenges and essential endgames to analyse and solve. The workbook will contains separate sections for students of all levels in your club (i.e. complete beginner/ experienced beginners/ intermediate/ advanced). Club members can tackle these puzzles individually or in groups at lunch-time in the lead up to the workshop. The idea is to encourage students to analyse together, so they can learn from each other and share ideas. Many hands make light work 🙂
- Group Analysis, Feedback and Insights: During the workshop, students will be encouraged to present their solutions and ideas. Analysis will take place on a large demonstration board or classroom white board during the course of the workshop. Students will be encouraged to present their solutions and also to explain the thinking underpinning their choices. Particular emphasis of these group analysis sessions will be on the specific thought processes that strong chess players use to assess a position, the criteria they use to draw up a series of potential moves, then how they ultimately decide on one specific plan. All participants in the workshop, regardless of their current standard will benefit from this insight. This exercise is designed to improve strategic and lateral thinking.
- Play, Analyse, Experiment: Practical playing elements will be a key aspect of the workshop, with students getting to try out new openings and dangerous attacking ideas and/or take part in a simultaneous display etc. For these playing sessions, students will be grouped according to strength (i.e. experienced beginner/ intermediate or advanced) to that they can have the most fun and get to play to win!
- Deliberate Practice: Expert Feedback. In the final phase of the workshop, we will analyse some of the games played in the practical playing sessions and offer advice on how individual participants and the entire group can continue to develop their game.
- Review the Workbook Solutions and the Workshop Content for two months on Lichess. Immediately following the workshop, Chess Bud Ireland will set up a lichess study containing the solutions to the workbook. This study will also include 10 deeply annotated master games selected to help students to expand their opening knowledge. Any student or teacher participating in the workshop can play through solutions or games if they have a lichess account. Only your students/techers school will have access to this study and it will be available for two months. Teachers should compile a list of the names of the lichess accounts of any students participating in the workshop. Chess Bud Ireland will then invite them to become members of the Lichess study.
Workshop Fees:
Full-day (4 hours): €450 + expenses – max 40 kids
Half-day (2.5 hours): €290 + expenses max 40 kids
Chess Bud Ireland will provide all the chess boards & sets/chess scoresheets for the day
Expenses:
Petrol: €0.50 per kilometer (for schools situated 20km beyond Kilkenny)
Lunch/ Dinner: €15/ €30
Lodging/ BB: where overnight is required

IM Mark Quinn: Playing & Coaching & Career
After representing Ireland in many Junior World championships, I gained the title of International Master of Chess at the Istanbul Chess Olympiad in 2000. While completing a PhD in the School of English, Drama and Film in UCD, I taught chess in many Dublin schools as well as giving one-to-one classes. A number of my individual students including Ryan Rhys Griffiths (FM, 2352 Elo) went on to play for Ireland at Junior and Senior Level. I began playing for Kilkenny Chess Club in the Leinster Leagues in 2001 and subsequently moved to the Marble City with my family in 2019. I founded Chess Bud Ireland in September 2019 and gained the title of FIDE Trainer in 2020. During the pandemic, I offered free online classes while on the PUP scheme and, post-pandemic, I resumed teaching chess in schools, as well as organizing in-person Kids Camps in Kilkenny, Dublin, Cavan, Monaghan, Cork and Kerry. Most recently, I was head-coach to the Irish Junior Chess Squad during the European Schools Chess Championships held in the University of Limerick in June 2024. I have my own third-party public liability insurance and am regularly garda vetted by the schools I teach in. I am currently ranked 5th in Ireland on the International FIDE rating list with an active rating of 2379 Elo. In September 2024, I became captain of the Kilkenny Armstrong Cup Team (Division 1/ Leinster League ) and am currently on a score of 5.5/6 on Board 1
Chess Coaching Credentials:
I have my own third-party public liability insurance and am regularly garda vetted by the schools I teach in.
Teaching Philosophy:
I often teach students of mixed level of standards and am a big believer in integrated learning. Classes are informative and structured but also light and fun. My role is to the fire the imaginations of students regardless of their age and make them aware of the magic of chess but also their own unique potential, whether they decide just to play chess for a few weeks or to make the game a bigger part of their lives going forward.
Let’s get the ball rolling!
Please fill out the form below and I will let you know my availability and give you a quote.
Alternatively, text me on 085-1526889 and I will give you a call!
Let’s play chess!
IM Mark Quinn

SCHOOL WORKSHOP BOOKING FORM