How the Pieces Move
📋 What it is
Each piece travels its own way — rooks in straight lines, bishops on diagonals, the knight in an L that leaps.
🗣️ Coach says
You can’t calculate a move you don’t understand. Learn how each piece moves cold, and the board stops being a jumble — it becomes a map of what’s possible.
🧠 Memory hook
Rook = plus (+), Bishop = cross (×), Queen = both. Trace the shape with your finger.
😂 Giggle
Why is the knight the trickiest piece?
Because it's the only one that can jump to conclusions — and over other pieces!
😲 Whoa!
The knight is the only piece that jumps over others — and from the middle of the board it can reach eight squares at once.
✅ Quick check: A bishop starts on a light square. After ANY number of moves, what colour square is it on?
Say your answer out loud first — then reveal.
Always a light square — bishops never change colour.
A diagonal step keeps a bishop on its own colour forever, so one bishop only ever covers half the board.
🧪 Try it! (2 minutes)
Put one piece on an empty board and, before you move it, say every square it could go to. Then move and check.