volume 4 Checkers: issue 11 A Very Old - What’s pieces, called men, with each turn. Men are only moved your favorite diagonally, not forward or backward. game? Today, Checkers is a . This means that players video plan how they will play. Having a strategy allows players are popular, to think several moves ahead. The goal is to capture the but they’re opponent’s men by jumping over them. The game ends only about when a player captures all of the opponent’s men. 60 years old. Countries around the world have groups called People around Checkers Federations that organize competitions. The the world World Draughts Federation was formed in 1947 to have been organize and regulate these competitions. (Draughts is ©2013 by University at Buffalo Library in Flickr. Some rights reservedcommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/ http://creative playing games another name for checkers.) for thousands of years—long before computers were Today, many players invented. Many of these games were played on boards, wish that checkers, and like checkers. In fact, checkers is one of the oldest board other mental games such games still being played today. There is evidence that as , were part of the ancient Egyptian pharaohs played checkers years ago. Olympics. They consider Checkers may also have been played centuries before these games to be mental the pharaohs played it. Some historians think that the . Whether or first “board games” were played when people scratched not checkers will ever a pattern in the dirt. They then may have moved stones, become an Olympic bones, or shells around on this “board.” The games is uncertain. What might have been played for fun, but they might also have is certain is that people been used to practice the things people did every day, have played games for such as hunting and trading. thousands of years, and Checkers, which is played by two people, is played on they will probably play a board with eight rows of squares. Players move small them for thousands more.

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Have you ever played checkers? Checkers is a that requires strategy, or planning. You have to think carefully about what you are going to do before you make a move. Think about the board games, card games, and video games you like to play. Which of these games requires a strategy? Write about what kinds of strategies you use to win a game.

Comprehension Response Activities FYI for Kids ­— Level 4 For more information about TextProject and FYI for Kids, visit textproject.org v.1.0 © 2014 TextProject, Inc. Some rights reserved (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/). ©2013 by University at Buffalo Library in Flickr. Some rights reserved http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/ Review Checkers: A Very Old Game

Write keywords or phrases that will help you remember what you learned.

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