Josh Fish plays a game of chess. Fish has been playing the game since he was a freshman in high school, and he's started an afterschool club for third through fifth graders.
Josh Fish would like to see kids win at the game of life across the board rather than be pawns, so he took a gambit with a classic game.
The first chess club will start after school next Monday at Evergreen Elementary, with Fish and helpers teaching students the rules of the game, with the hope of developing social skills and critical-thinking skills in the young players.
Fish, 25, learned to play chess in Fayetteville, North Carolina, when he was a freshman in high school. The game turned his life around by changing his thinking and approach to interacting with other people.
"When I started playing chess, I was pretty shortsighted on most things, most ways that I went about living life. I didn't think too many moves ahead," he said. "It was just about having fun and enjoying the moment."
Rather than encourage Fish to go out and play with other kids, he said his parents encouraged him to stay in and read and play board or video games since the neighborhood they lived in was rough. Fish admits that he's not a very social person and chess has been a lifeline for interacting with others.
In high school, Fish and a friend quickly outpaced others at their school, so they began to travel up to 90 minutes away to other communities in North Carolina, joining their chess clubs and playing new opponents.
"While playing all these different people, not only do you see how critically they think, but you have to fill the silence," Fish said. "You talk and get to know each other. You might not know each other too well after the first game, but after 20 or 30 games, you consider each other friends."
He's found the same strategy works with students to get them engaged in conversation. "It's hard to talk about mundane things like, 'How was your day? What did you do after school?' Whereas, as you're playing chess, and you're eight moves in, it's like, 'Why did you do that?' And all the sudden you're talking about personal things and your life."
Fish works as a server at the Stikine Restaurant, a job he took to help him be more social and interact with others. He's also a volunteer firefighter and a paraprofessional at the elementary school, where his little brother Kaden, 8, is a third grader. Since working at the school, Fish thought it would be a good place to develop a club and help students.
"I was very excited and pleased that he'd be able to do this and that he'd be able to engage with the kids further than his job," said Ann Hilburn, principal of Evergreen Elementary. "We had way more students respond in a positive way than we anticipated."
At first, Fish thought there would be about 10 to 15 third to fifth grade students interested in learning the game. He said all but four students said they'd want to learn the game. As of last Friday, 15 had submitted their forms to sign up.
"I think having a chess club for the kids is going to be amazing for them," Hilburn said. "It teaches so many life skills and for them to start learning at this age, hopefully it will lead to them becoming competitive."
The club will start with teaching how each piece on the board moves before jumping into gameplay and strategies, Fish said. He doesn't foresee games being played until about the seventh or eighth week of the club. He will assess their abilities, eventually matching up students of similar skill levels.
Though the club is starting at the elementary level, Fish is already planning on creating a high school club sometime during the school year. Eventually, he would like to see players go to statewide tournaments.
Fish is taking donations of chess sets. He has four now with about another four or so promised. If he has enough come the end of the school year, he would like to send sets home with students to encourage them to keep playing during summer. He also hopes his students will join the club he and a friend started at the Stikine Inn, which is held on Sundays at 3:30 p.m. Chess set donations can be made by contacting the school at 907-874-2321.
It's all a part of his wish to give back to the town he's come to love.
"I don't want to miss out on my opportunity to give back to the town of Wrangell," he said. "The amount of volunteer programs I see and how much people want to make a difference, I want to be a part of that."
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