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“Playing chess with local people from Portarlington made me feel visible and seen”- Participant
This project allowed a group of adults to improve their literacy and language by learning how to play chess. The course also worked to promote wellbeing and community connections, and combat loneliness.
Learners attended the course every Wednesday evening in Portarlington Library between September and November 2024. Participants improved their literacy and language skills by learning the basics of chess. They learned from both from a tutor and from each other.
Playing chess is proven to help people enhance their problem-solving, creativity, and planning skills. Learners mastered the rules by reading instructions and taking notes. This allowed them to practice their reading and writing skills.
Learners took part in a competition at the end of the course and received a certificate upon completion. After finishing this course, lots of chess learners have joined new programmes, including English language classes.
They also continue to play chess in their local library with the community chess club founded by this project.
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Learners deep in the game.
This project was a collaboration between Laois County Library Service and the Local Authority Integration Team.
For more information about the project, please contact Tamara Latham, Regional Literacy Coordinator in Laois Offaly ETB, at tlatham@loetb.ie
The Adult Literacy for Life Collaboration and Innovation Fund
The Collaboration and Innovation Fund supports projects for adults with unmet literacy, numeracy and digital literacy needs and projects that support organisations to be literacy friendly. The closing date for 2024 applications has now passed but keep an eye out for information on our 2025 fund which will be launched in December.
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