TIC TAC CHEC – CHESS FOR CHICKENS,

an art project for the homeless.

 Help – We need outrageous pictures of people playing Tic Tac Chec. Any pose, any place from playing on boards painted on a friend’s back to playing at the bottom of the ocean; while roped on the side of a mountain or played during sky diving. Cute is cool too, maybe pictures of your kids or pets playing. Dress up in a crazy outfit or play it while traveling by car, by elephant or wing walking an aircraft. Using your imagination will bring pleasure to thousands of kids. The game can be played in a few minutes so get outrageous and surprise us.

Just print out the board and pieces below or use genuine chess pieces. Make your own as funky or artistic as you like. If you use a paper version you can always stick safety pins through the pieces to hold them in place when in windy or other difficult places to play.

Why? Well, my wife and I have been making games for many years and have donated thousands of games annually to needy children via various charities. Now we have the biggest challenge ever; to raise enough money to give over 120 thousand Tic Tac Chec games to homeless children through the Feed The Children back to school program, see

(http://www.feedthechildren.org/site/PageServer?pagename=usw_education_company)  

Your pictures will be posted on our web site. The more pictures we get the more media attention and the more media attention means that more stores will carry the game. The more games that are sold, the more are given to needy children.

So below is an image of the pieces and board and instructions to play. Go ahead and then email us at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it the picture, the time and place and any other stories related to your experience.

Here is a perfect example:
(original source: http://www.buzzillions.com/dz_1636038_dream_green_tic_tac_chec_reviews#bz-model-reviewTitle )

"I didn't know how to play chess (nor did I want to learn) when my 8 year old son received this game as a gift. Since he was always bugging me to spend time with him, he volunteered to 'teach' me thinking that we would go on to play regular chess. WRONG! I learned the game so quickly and he found it so much fun to play as a 10 minute alternative to a chess game that now I bug HIM to play me and his video chess game is gathering dust. LOVE IT!" – Martha, Boise, March 8, 2007

There are many such stories, so take the challenge and help us help homeless children. Maybe you will discover how easy the basics of chess are for the first time, too. Extensive research shows that learning and playing chess dramatically improves cognitive development, has a positive effect on motivation and school achievement, enhances memory and benefits organizational skills generally. The research also shows improvement in reading and mathematics. The old proverb holds true;
“Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and
you have fed him for a lifetime” Read more here on chess research:
http://www.quadcitychess.com/benefits_of_chess.html

Looking forward to hearing from you and many thanks

Don & Sharon Green
To learn more about Tic Tac Chec see: http://www.dreamgreen.org/joomla/games/tic-tac-chec/

TIC TAC CHEC - RULES:
Be the first to align your four pieces of the same color horizontally, vertically or diagonally.

Play starts on an empty board, players take turns placing a piece on ANY empty square. (anywhere on the board) After placing your first three pieces you may move and capture as in regular chess, except a pawn reverses direction upon reaching the opposite side of the board. Captured pieces are returned to their owner and can immediately be played again on any open square. You can place a pawn on the opposite side of the board and immediately on the next turn move back towards yourself. If it is captured then placed back on the board it must first move towards the opponent's side of the board before changing directions.

THE CHESS PIECE MOVES:

The Knight, Bishop and Rook all capture by landing on an opponent’s piece in the same way that they move.

PAWN - Moves one space forward per turn except when it captures an opponent’s piece by moving one space diagonally forward.

KNIGHT (or HORSE) - Moves either one space forward or backward and two spaces either left or right or two spaces forward or backward and one space either left or right. A knight is the only piece that can move over another piece on the board.

ROOK (CASTLE) - Moves vertically or horizontally as long as it does not pass another piece.

BISHOP - Moves diagonally any number of spaces as long as it does not pass another piece.

TIPS:
1/  Emphasize the goal of getting all four pieces in a row and avoid capturing unless there is a definite advantage gained so that players develop better strategy skills.

2/  Before making a move consider what your opponent is planning.

3/  Always play to win.

4/  Play a flexible strategy by frequently changing where you are making your row. Fixating on a single row will most likely lead to a stalemate at best and more likely a loss.

5/  Avoid trying to make a row of pieces on your first horizontal row of squares. This will most likely lead to defeat as it is difficult to move the pawn back to this row if it is already on the board.

6/  Use a felt tip marker to mark one side of the pawn and always play with this mark facing the direction of movement. This will help you remember its direction.

7/  As in regular Chess, dominating the center of the board helps as some pieces have more potential places to move to.  

FOUR IMPORTANT REASONS FOR LEARNING CHESS WITH TIC TAC CHEC:
1/ There are only one-fourth as many pieces, so it is less confusing for a beginner.

2/ Captured pieces are returned and can be played again on ANY open square thus preventing new players from getting discouraged.

3/ Games only last a few minutes. There is no time spent setting up the board. Beginners don't use time "trading" pieces until there are only a few left at which time they are able to contemplate a strategy to defend their own King and capture the opponent's.

4/ Immediate recognition of mistakes. On a regular chess board beginners seldom remember where they made strategic errors and thus take longer to learn to avoid repeating them. A basic error while playing Tic Tac Chec almost always leads to instantly losing the game.

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